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13-Apr-22 World View -- Brooklyn subway shooter may have been targeting Asians

Analysis by NIH of black hate crimes against Asian American women

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Brooklyn subway shooter may have been targeting Asians
Analysis by NIH of black hate crimes against Asian American women

Brooklyn subway shooter may have been targeting Asians

Frank R. James, 62, person of interest in Brooklyn subway shooting (NYPD News)

Frank R. James, 62, person of interest in Brooklyn subway shooting (NYPD News)

Early on Tuesday morning, during rush-hour at a Brooklyn subway station, a man in a construction vest carrying a backpack reached into his backpack and donned a gas mask, then reached into his backpack and set off an explosive smoke canister, and then pulled out a gun and shot at least 16 people. All the injured people are recovering. The suspected shooter, Frank R. James, is the subject of a manhunt.

The incident took place in the Sunset Park neighborhood, predominantly home to Asian and Hispanic communities.

The suspect, Frank R. James, is a 62 year old black man.

The police have said that the motive is unknown, but the fact that the perpetrator is black and the target is an Asian neighborhood, means that this act of violence fits an increasingly familiar pattern -- black men targeting Asians, especially Asian women. Asian women have been attacked by blacks, whites and Hispanics, but the majority have been by blacks, according to a report by the National Institutes of Health.

Analysis by NIH of black hate crimes against Asian American women

In March of last year, there was a mass shooting of Asian women in Atlanta. The shooter was white, but it gave rise to questions about what was going on.

I wrote an article on the subject, based on a posting in January by the National Institutes of Health, which used data from the Department of Justice to "examine the nature and characteristics of hate crimes against Asian Americans." The report compared hate crimes against Asian Americans, African Americans, and Hispanics.

The following is an edited version of what I wrote in that article.

The most important finding of the report is that perpetrators of hate crimes against Asians are most likely to be blacks, for economic reasons. This is something that's been known anecdotally for a long time, but the NIH report confirms it. It's also clear that the writers of the NIH report don't want you to easily find this result, probably for fear that if they expose the truth, they'll get fired or canceled.

You have to go far into the report to find the results (search for "Table 3" or "Findings of this study, however, also provide support to the minority-specific model"), but the findings are clear:

Hate crimes against Asians are overwhelmingly done by blacks.
"Hate crimes against Asian Americans are more likely than hate crimes against either African Americans or Hispanics to be committed by non-White offenders."

Blacks may be motivated by their resentment of the success of Asians.
"This finding may be attributed to animosity toward the �model minority� from other minority groups. As aforementioned, the �model minority� stereotype assuming Asian Americans� success in economics, education, and other opportunities generates potential competition or threats by members of other racial groups, which in turn may lead to resentment to be further acted upon through hate crimes."

Blacks may be motivated by fears that they'll lose their special privileges and financial welfare and other benefits because Asians will get the same benefits during downturns.
"Offenders of other minorities of color targeting Asian Americans might fit the category of �reactionists." ... Instead of acting impulsively, the �reactionists� are motivated by protecting their resources from competitors.... This finding might also lend indirect support to the perspective of racial competition motivating hate crimes, which argues that when members of a racial group perceive that their access and privileges to material resources are threatened by other racial groups during economic downturns, racial conflict and hate crimes may occur."

So now we return to Frank R. James, the 62 year old black "person of interest" in Tuesday's Brooklyn subway shooting. James is still at large, so we still can't be sure that he was actually the shooter, we still can't be sure whether he had help, and we still can't be sure what his motive was. We can imagine that James has built up 62 years of hatred and resentment against the American system, and against Asian Americans in particular, as suggested by the NIH report, but we may not know for sure for many days or weeks.

All we can say at this time is that we see a familiar pattern, which becomes worse every month, identified by the National Institutes of Health, of Asian American women being victims of hate crimes by blacks, and that problem still has to be recognized and solved, whether or not Frank R. James is Tuesday's shooter.

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (13-Apr-2022) Permanent Link
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10-Apr-22 World View -- Ukraine war causes chaos in Asia -- Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Philippines

Ukraine war causes global food and fuel prices to spike

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Ukraine war causes global food and fuel prices to spike
Anti-government protests raging across Sri Lanka
Pakistan constitutional crisis puts the government in chaos
Philippines facing new election as Duterte sucks up to China

Ukraine war causes global food and fuel prices to spike

Pakistan's prime minister Imran Khan ousted by no-confidence vote on Saturday

Pakistan's prime minister Imran Khan ousted by no-confidence vote on Saturday

In 2011, sharp increases in global food prices led protests that started in Tunisia and spread like wildfire across the entire Mideast in something called the "Arab Awakening." There were coups in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, and wars in Yemen and Syria are continuing to this day.

With global food and fuel prices spiking, unrest is growing in several Asian nations, and there is the prospect of a new wildfire spreading across Asia.

Ukraine has been the largest wheat exporter in the world, with countries in Asia, the Mideast and Africa largely dependent on Ukraine's exports through the Black Sea. But now Russia has shut down ports in the Black Sea, with the result that there are massive stockpiles of wheat in Ukraine that can't be exported. Russia's port blockade is creating global shortages of wheat, corn and cooking oils, resulting in food shortages and high food prices.

Fertilizer and fuel prices have also been spiking globally. This is also caused by Russia's attack on Ukraine, but is also caused by President Biden's fanatical attack on the the American fossil fuel industry.

Anti-government protests raging across Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is in the midst of its worst economic crisis in decades, with shortages of food and fuel, and steep price rises. There are daily power cuts, and people have to queue for hours to get cooking gas and diesel.

This has led to days of sometimes violent anti-government protest, with demands that president Gotabaya Rajapaksa step down.

Watching the street protests on al-Jazeera, I saw many protesters carrying signs with slogans. Two of the most amusing slogans that I noticed were the following:

"U Divided us for a seat. Today V R uniting to throw U out of the seat."
"No need sex. The government f-cks me daily."

Sri Lanka has become the poster child for China's "debt trap diplomacy," typically signing deals with the following terms:

China loans the country a large amount of money at a high interest rate to build an infrastructure project that will benefit China. The money loaned is too large to ever hope to pay it back, and a default leads to China's full control of the infrastructure project, and other country assets.

China creates an enclave of Chinese citizens in the country to do the work for the infrastructure project, shutting out the local workforce. Their salaries are paid out of the loan money.

China purchases all services and supplies for the project from Chinese entities, so the local businesses do not benefit from the project.

China pays off the government leaders with bribes to keep them quiet, and to guarantee that the terms of the contract will remain secret.

The result is that country has to repay the loan twice, once to purchase goods and services from China and to pay the Chinese workers' salaries, and again to repay the loan to Beijing, with interest.

In 2008, Rajapaksa signed the agreement with China to build the Hambantota seaport. This was China's first major "debt trap" deal, putting Sri Lanka into so much debt that it had to hand control of the seaport over to China. Furthermore, China not only has control of the Hambantota seaport, but it also has control of a large enclave of Chinese workers and their families who are employees of the seaport. The seaport project has been a disaster for Sri Lanka.

Today, Sri Lanka is still in so much debt that it will never be paid back. This debt crisis is on top of the spike in food and fuel prices, and is triggering large anti-government riots that could spiral.

Pakistan constitutional crisis puts the government in chaos

Pakistan's prime minister Imran Khan was ousted from power, after losing a no-confidence vote in parliament on Saturday. A new prime minister will be chosen next week.

Khan had created a constitutional crisis a week ago when he tried to prevent the no-confidence vote from occurring by dissolving parliament and calling for new elections. However, Pakistan's Supreme Court declared this to be illegal, and said that the no-confidence vote had to go ahead. So it did go ahead, and Khan lost.

However, it's far from clear that Khan will go quietly. He claims that he will not recognize an opposition government.

He also claims, without evidence, that there was a US-led conspiracy to remove him. It's pretty standard behavior for any politician around the world to blame their problems on the United States, and Khan is no exception.

Many people fear that Khan will refuse to step down, but will assume dictatorial power to prevent the opposition party and prime minister from taking power. This could lead to violence or even a new civil war. It's been 75 since since the 1947 Partition War between Hindus and Muslims that followed the partitioning of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan, so, like much of the world, Pakistan is overdue for a new generational Crisis war. The spike in food and fuel price is hitting Karachi and the interior very hard, and that might be the trigger.

Philippines facing new election as Duterte sucks up to China

Chinese coast guard vessels and warships have been harassing Philippines fishing and research vessels in Philippine waters adjacent to the South China Sea. This harassment activity has been going on for years, as China has illegally annexed and militarized the South China Sea, including waters historically part of the Philippines, Vietnam, and other countries. When I did my research for my book "World View: War between China and Japan," I found that China has absolutely no historical claim to the South China Sea, and this is consistent the finding of the UN court in the Hague that China's claim to the South China Sea is illegal. China's claims are simply a hoax.

Ever since Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte came to power in 2016, he has sucked up to China.

In fact, in 2018, Duterte recounted a conversation with Xi Jinping that made the threat of war explicit. Xi said that if the Philippines drills for oil and gas in its own territorial waters, then China will go to war. Duterte concluded:

"Are they willing to fight? Because if they are willing to fight, we are. But why would I do that? It will result in a massacre and it will just destroy everything."

So Duterte appeased China and gave in to all of China's demands.

In a phone call on Friday between Duterte and Xi Jinping, Duterte continued his policy of appeasing China, while Xi promised to invest more money in the Philippines. However, Duterte's term as president will end in June, and a new president may or may not continue the policy of appeasing China.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 Complete Table of Contents
https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (10-Apr-2022) Permanent Link
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3-Apr-22 World View -- History and future of the Russia-Ukraine war

Russia's incompetence in the Ukraine invasion

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Status of Russia-Ukraine war
Army culture and skill sets
The Mfecane war (1820s)
Vietnam war
Russia's history of crisis and non-crisis wars
Russia's incompetence in the Ukraine invasion
Russia's Winter War invasion of Finland (1939)
Operation Barbarossa (1941), Hitler's invasion of Russia
Russia's invasion of Ukraine
The Regeneracy in Europe, Russia and America
A word of thanks

Status of Russia-Ukraine war

Map of Russia-Ukraine war, status on April 2, 2022 (Al-Jazeera)

Map of Russia-Ukraine war, status on April 2, 2022 (Al-Jazeera)

The purpose of this article is to provide a historical analysis of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in order to forecast what is most likely to come next.

Russia has been conducting numerous war crimes, making indiscriminate attacks on civilians and residential neighborhoods, flattening villages and cities with illegal cluster bombs, illegal cassette bombs and illegal thermobaric bombs. Russia hasn't yet begun using illegal chemical weapons, as they used in Syria and Chechnya, but that's presumably coming.

There are now some ten million displaced people in Ukraine who have lost their homes. Three million refugees have flooded into neighboring countries, including Poland, Hungary and Romania.

Russia is supposedly withdrawing some forces from around Kiev into the Donbase in the east, near the border with Russia. Many analysts believe that they're being redeployed in preparation for a new assault on Kiev.

Army culture and skill sets

The most common opinion among military analysts is that the Russian army botched the war, and has been shown to be incompetent. This is the subject that I want to explore in detail in this article.

I'd like to address the skill sets possessed by an army, and the societal culture from which the army comes.

Suppose you have an expert gardener. She came from parents who valued gardening, and raised her to develop powerful gardening skills.

Now suppose you have an expert carpenter. He came from parents who valued carpentry, and raised him to develop powerful carpentry skills.

Now ask the gardener to do carpentry, and ask the carpenter to do gardening. Both will do a poor job, and may be totally baffled. You can train them to do their new jobs, but the training will take many months, but even after training they won't do their new jobs well, since they lack the cultural background to do so.

I'm going to make the argument that Russia's army has the skills and culture to be effective within Russia, as in defending against Napoleon and Hitler, but does not have the skills and culture to be effective in an expeditionary war, as is currently occurring in Ukraine. Before making that argument, I'll give some examples.

The Mfecane war (1820s)

The first example is the Mfecane war ("the crushing") of the 1820s in southern Africa, a remarkable example of how a leader can change the skills and culture of an army, and turn it into a formidable expeditionary fighting force.

The southern portion of Africa in the first decades of the 1800s was a region in great turmoil, with many different populations competing for resources.

Among the indigenous populations, the Zulus were an obscure tribe in the Transvaal, the northern portion of what is now South Africa. The Zulus went from obscurity to world renown as a result of Shaka, born in 1787, who became the tribal chief in 1816, and who took the Zulu from being a tribe to being an empire.

Standard practice in tribal wars of the time was that the fighters of each warring tribe would throw long spears from a distance at the fighters of the other tribe. Shaka changed both the skills and the culture by having his fighters carry short spears, requiring them to attack the other fighters at close range. Shaka revolutionized tribal warfare with these new kinds of spears and warfare techniques, resulting in the deaths of millions of indigenous Africans, by the time the war climaxed in 1828. Shaka's Zulu Empire left behind vast uninhabited regions by obliterating the populations that used to live there.

The great Zulu Empire lasted for decades, until it was destroyed by the British in 1879 in the bloody Anglo-Zulu war. At the climax of that crisis war, the Zulus were dispersed, and the Zulu nation ended.

Vietnam war

A reader expressed surprise that the Russians have had more casualties in one month than the Americans had in the entire Vietnam war. Actually, this isn't surprising at all.

A basic tenet of the American culture is that each individual human life is valuable, and is worthy of saving and protecting. So it's not surprising that the American armed forces placed a very high priority on reducing casualties, with the result that American casualties were low during the Vietnam war.

The Americans had developed plenty of skills for fighting expeditionary wars. They had fought the Nazis and Imperial Japanese during World War II, and then the Korean war, and so by the time of the Vietnam War, they had developed powerful doctrines for winning wars with few casualties. That is the American culture.

The North Vietnamese and Chinese cultures are very different. They place very little value on an individual human life. The result was different battle tactics that led to many casualties. During the Vietnam and Korean wars, they used human wave tactics, which means that they used an infantry of hundreds or thousands of soldiers, attacking a well-defended enemy position, intended to overwhelm the enemy by sheer weight of numbers and regardless of inevitable high casualties.

This cultural difference actually gave the North Vietnamese a big tactical advantage during the Vietnam War. The North Vietnamese could suffer huge numbers of casualties and win because Americans did not want to suffer even a few casualties.

In my recent book, "World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War," I quoted Bui Diem, Saigon's Ambassador to Washington from 1967 to 1972, who gave his assessment of why America lost the war. He emphasized the cultural differences between the American and Vietnamese soldiers:

"In the eyes of the South Vietnamese, the Americans created for themselves extra difficulties by making the war too expensive by the way they fought it. The men from the "affluent society" brought into Vietnam a new kind of war never seen or even thought of before. The Vietnamese opened their eyes wide in bewilderment when they saw U.S. forces supplied with hot meals by helicopter while still in combat. They saw the thousands of unnecessary gadgets piled high in huge PXs, the hundreds of planes crossing the Pacific for the transport of American troops on rotation. They witnessed the more than generous use of bombs and ammunition by the U.S. forces, and hours of bombing and strafing . . . triggered in many instances by mere sniper fire."

I'm not going to pass judgment on whether it's a good idea to send helicopters to provide hot meals to soldiers on the front line. I'm simply pointing to this as a capability that requires a great deal of organizational skill and coordination, skills in logistics and command and control, and indicative of America's capabilities in executing an expeditionary war.

England has had centuries of experience with expeditionary wars, and we inherited those skills. We built on those skills since WW II with the Korean, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghan wars. All of these wars have been politically controversial, but one thing they unequivocally accomplished was giving the American army the skills to fight an expeditionary war.

This assessment illustrates powerfully how armies are as different from one another as gardeners and carpenters. There were vast differences in both skills and culture between the American and Vietnamese soldiers. Keep this in mind when we discuss the Russian army. In particular, the American ability to fight an expeditionary war with few casualties was and is unmatched in the world. However, as we saw in Vietnam, this doesn't necessarily mean that the American army always wins, since the American culture and skills are at a disadvantage when facing human wave attacks.

Russia's history of crisis and non-crisis wars

The Russian people hate the Chinese people but love the European people, even though Russia has been invaded by both, the worst invasion being the hated "Mongol Yoke" that followed the 1209 Mongol invasion of China, followed by an attack and conquest of almost all the Russian principalities, making them bitter vassals of the Mongol Empire for two centuries.

The major European invasions of Russia were all non-crisis (Awakening/Unraveling era) wars for Russia, fought in conjunction with a crisis war for Europe. These were the Great Northern War with Sweden during the European War of the Spanish Succession (1701-14), Napoleon's invasion (1812) following the French Revolution, and Hitler's invasion during World War II. Russia's army performed very well in defending "Mother Russia" during these wars, which were non-crisis wars even though they presented an existential crisis for Russia.

Russia's crisis wars for the last few centuries were internal rebellions -- the Razin's peasant rebellion in the 1600s, Pugachev's Rebellion in the 1770s, the Crimean War in the 1850s, and the Bolshevik Revolution in the 1910s. In other words, Russia has never had a successful expeditionary crisis war.

This leads me to posit the following claim: That Russia's army has been and is incompetent when executing an expeditionary war, but is extremely competent in fighting an invading army within Russia. In other words, the Russians don't have the culture and skills to fight an expeditionary war.

I have to add that "Navigator," a military historian posting in the Generational Dynamics forum, disagrees with this claim. He says that the "trigger" for the Russian army to become extremely competent is when Mother Russia is being threatened. The current war in Ukraine may provide the answer to which of these claims is correct.

Russia's incompetence in the Ukraine invasion

There are obvious differences in skill and culture requirements between an army fighting a defensive internal war versus an army fighting an expeditionary war in another country. The local civilian population supports the army in one case, and opposes the army in the other case.

Much of the incompetence of Russia's army in Ukraine can be attributed directly to the opposition by the local population. The following are things that I've heard analysts say to explain Russia's failure in Ukraine:

The army was not supplied with enough food and ammunition to sustain an invasion lasting more than a few days, and did not have the skills to resupply the troops on the front line. The Russian troops were forced to raid local stores and homes just to get food, which obviously was not supported by the local Ukrainians. In an internal war, such as the Soviet army's defense of Stalingrad during WW II, the army would have prepositioned food and ammunition, and the local population would have supported the Soviet army.

The Russian tanks ran out of petrol, and were stuck for weeks because they could not be resupplied.

The stuck tanks were sitting ducks for Ukrainian anti-tank missiles, launched by the army with the help of the local population.

Morale is very low among the Russian soldiers, because they consider the Ukrainians to be their brothers.

The Russian army is extremely hierarchal and only generals can make decisions. This is in contrast to the American army, where lower-level officers have considerable decision-making ability. In the Russia-Ukraine war, this meant that the generals had to personally lead the troops. At this time, seven generals have been killed.

Russia has failed to capture any large city, because of fierce opposition of the Ukraine army and the local population. Even Mariupol, which has been under constant Russian bombardment for weeks, still has an uncertain status because the local population is fighting the Russians.

Contrast that with America's performance in Vietnam, where helicopters delivered hot meals to the soldiers in the front line. I'm not saying whether that's good or bad, but it does illustrate a mastery of supply line management that the Russians do not have.

Russia's Winter War invasion of Finland (1939)

In 1939, Russia's dictator Josef Stalin ordered an invasion of Finland to gain territory to serve as a buffer between Germany and Russia. This war is remarkably similar in many ways to Putin's current invasion of Ukraine. Here's how history.com describes it:

"On November 30, 1939, following a series of ultimatums and failed negotiations, the Soviet Red Army launched an invasion of Finland with half a million troops.
Though vastly outnumbered and outgunned in what became known as the �Winter War,� the Finns had the advantage of fighting on home turf. Led by Marshal Carl Gustaf Mannerheim, they hunkered down behind a network of trenches, concrete bunkers and field fortifications on the Karelian Isthmus and beat back repeated Soviet tank assaults. Elsewhere on the frontier, Finnish ski troops used the rugged landscape to conduct hit-and-run attacks on isolated Soviet units. Their guerilla tactics were only aided by the freezing Finnish winter, which bogged the Soviets down and made their soldiers easy to spot against snowy terrain. One Finnish sniper, a farmer named Simo H�yh�, was eventually credited with over 500 kills. While the Finns put up a spirited resistance during the winter of 1939-1940, their troops were ultimately no match for the sheer immensity of the Red Army. In February 1940, following one of the largest artillery bombardments since World War I, the Soviets renewed their onslaught and overran the Finnish defenses on the Karelian Isthmus. With its forces low on ammunition and nearing the brink of exhaustion, Finland agreed to peace terms the following month.
The treaty ending the Winter War forced Finland to cede 11 percent of its territory to the Soviet Union, yet the country maintained its independence and later squared off against Russia a second time during World War II. For the Soviets, meanwhile, victory came at a heavy cost. During just three months of fighting, their forces suffered over 300,000 casualties compared to around 65,000 for the Finns. The Winter War may have also carried important consequences for World War II. Among other things, the Red Army�s lackluster performance is often cited as a key factor in Adolf Hitler�s mistaken belief that his June 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union would be a success."

Russia's final "victory" over Finland was the result of what was essentially a human wave attack. Stalin has been quoted as saying, "Quantity has a quality all its own," referring to such an attack.

So far, the Russian invasion of Ukraine appears to be very similar to the Soviet invasion of Finland. "Navigator," the military historian whom I quoted earlier, said that he believes that the Russians will make the "post Winter War" adjustments and begin a national militarization and mass mobilization. This will allow them to repeat the human wave attacks of 1939-40.

Operation Barbarossa (1941), Hitler's invasion of Russia

On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, an invasion of the Soviet Union. More than 3 million German and Axis troops invaded the Soviet Union along an 1,800-mile-long front. But in this case, the roles of invader and defender were reversed from the Winter War, with the obvious consequences.

Hitler's Blitzkrieg victories in Belgium and France made him overconfident, even though his attempted invasion of Britain was faltering. In Russia, the Nazi army made numerous blunders, and was overwhelmed by the long supply lines, the harsh Russian winter, and the fierce opposition of the Russian civilians, who were defending "Mother Russia." The Nazis attacked but failed to control any large cities -- Leningrad (St. Petersburg), Moscow or Stalingrad (Volgograd). Hitler's defeat in Russia turned the tide decisively toward the Allies.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine

Few people believe that Russia will agree to any "peace deal" short of full conquest of Ukraine, and possibly Moldova, Poland, Romania, and the Baltics as well. Vladimir Putin expected a quick victory in Ukraine, and as his army suffered one setback after another, Putin is suffering from Cognitive Dissonance which will only infuriate him and cause him to double and triple down on the offensive. As suggested, Putin's next step may be national militarization and mass mobilization of the Russian population in defense of "Mother Russia," in preparation for a human wave assault on Ukraine. This would be similar to Stalin's actions in Finland in the Winter War.

Of course, there are some significant differences between Russia's invasions of Finland and Ukraine, mainly the possible interventions of Nato and China. Poland and the East European countries cannot afford for Ukraine to lose, and China cannot afford for Russia to lose. This is a formula for a long war, a proxy war, and a war that will spread to the rest of Europe.

The Regeneracy in Europe, Russia and America

I've written about the generational theory concept of the "Regeneracy" for years: During a generational Crisis Era, bitterly opposed political factions put their political differences aside and unite against the common enemy, in a regeneracy of civic unity for the first time since the end of the previous crisis war.

In my last article, I described how the Regeneracy applied to the European nations. All of these countries had significant political differences, but now they are increasingly united against Russia.

What about Russia itself? There have been some scattered anecdotes about Russians turning against Putin, but most reports indicate that the vast majority of Russians support Putin's war in Ukraine, especially as he has cut off all foreign media and allow only state-run media that says that Mother Russia is defending against Nazis in Ukraine.

In America, the position of the Biden administration is confusion, and laden with mixed messages, including contradictory statements by the president and vice-president.

There are numerous reports quoting unnamed administration and military officials that Biden has been pressuring Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept any peace deal offered by the Russians, even one that gives up significant territory to the Russians. Biden's motivation would be that any other outcome would be a block to his fanatical support of the "green new deal."

However, it's increasingly clear every day that Biden's war on the domestic fossil fuel industry is causing huge spikes in energy prices and inflation, which is causing Europe to suffer, and is providing the funding for Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Zelenskyy is considered a hero by many Americans, while Vladimir Putin is considered evil incarnate, and this is causing many Democrats and Republicans to demand that Biden change policies. Biden has been forced to speed up military aid and weapons deliveries to Ukraine. The pressure is growing to support and encourage more domestic development of gas and oil, rather than beg Iran and Venezuela to produce more. This is the Regeneracy process in America, and it is continuing.

A word of thanks

After my last article, I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people who have written to me to wish me well, and to tell me how valuable my articles have been by providing a non-ideological explanation of what's actually going on in the world. By applying modern generational theory to historical and current events, I've apparently filled a very important need for a few thousand people, much more than I previously realized. It makes me want to go on, as best as I can.

If any organization or college would like to set it up, I would be willing to give a Zoom course on Generational Dynamics. Here's the blurb: Twenty years ago I began developing Generational Dynamics, a methodology for analyzing historical and current events, based on Forrester's MIT System Dynamics applied to generational flows, and incorporating Chaos Theory and technology forecasting. My web sites, generationaldynamics.com and gdxforum.com, contain over 6,000 articles with thousands of analyses and predictions about hundreds of countries, and they've all come true or are trending true. None has been proven wrong. In addition, I've written four books on the history of Iran, China and Vietnam, and the history and theology of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Daoism. The major prediction over the last 20 years has been that we are headed for a global financial crisis and a world war against China. That time is now approaching. So now, the Russia-Ukraine war is just beginning, and it is expected to cause a chain reaction that will lead to a major European war, and within a couple of years to a world war and a global depression.

I would also like to repeat my invitation to some organization or college that would like to take on the responsibility on further development of Generational Dynamics.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War: How Vietnam became an economic powerhouse after the Vietnam War" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 4), March 2021 Paperback: 325 pages, over 200 source references, $13.99 Complete Table of Contents
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732738645/

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy -- Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle East" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 1), September 2018 Paperback: 153 pages, over 100 source references, $7.00 Complete Table of Contents
https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Supremacy-Obsession-Generational/dp/1732738610/

John Xenakis is author of: "Generational Dynamics Anniversary Edition - Forecasting America's Destiny", (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 3), January 2020, Paperback: 359 pages, $14.99, Complete Table of Contents
https://www.amazon.com/Generational-Dynamics-Anniversary-Forecasting-Americas/dp/1732738629/

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (3-Apr-2022) Permanent Link
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10-Mar-22 World View -- Asian politics confounded by Russia's debacle invasion of Ukraine

South Korea's election of Yoon Suk-yeol moves the country to the right

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Russia's invasion of Ukraine far from resolution
Russia's invasion a shock to the Chinese Communists
South Korea's election of Yoon Suk-yeol moves the country to the right
The Regeneracy
The future of Generational Dynamics

Russia's invasion of Ukraine far from resolution

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov.

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which was supposed to succeed within a few days, is currently looking like a debacle.

Russia's president Vladimar Putin ordered hundreds of thousands of troops into the battle, along with tanks, artillery, warplanes, and dozens of warships in the Black Sea and Sea of Azov to Ukraine's south.

Russia is conducting massive genocide and war crimes, bombing and flattening innocent women and children in one village after another causing enormous suffering, specifically targeting schools and hospitals, driving millions of refugees into neighboring countries -- for no discernible reason at all except the sociopathic genocidal mind of Putin.

Russia has become an international pariah state, condemned by 141 countries in the United Nations General Assembly, with 23 abstentions (including China), and only five countries opposing the condemnation: North Korea, Belarus, Eritrea, Syria, and Russia itself. Thanks to international sanctions, Russia's economy is becoming increasingly distressed.

While Putin is being condemned as an international war criminal, Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is being viewed as a "Churchillian hero," starting with his refusal to flee the country in the way that Afghanistan's president Ashraf Ghani had fled.

The Ukrainian people have turned out to be extremely resilient, much more so than anyone expected, after Russia had simply rolled over Crimea in 2014. They've prevented Russian troops from taking control of Kharkiv, Mariupol, and other large cities that Russia has attacked, and so far Kiev has remained out of reach.

The Ukrainians have killed hundreds of Russians, destroyed dozens of tanks, and shot down tens of Russian warplanes.

This does not mean that Russia will be defeated. Far from it. Vladimir Putin has a history of reacting to losses by using increasingly horrific war crimes. In Syria, Russia sent missiles into school dormitories to kill children, or dropped barrel bombs laden with metal, chlorine, ammonia, phosphorous and chemical weapons on civilian neighborhoods, or using Sared gas to kill large groups of people. The barrel bombs, missiles and chemical weapons specifically targeted schools, markets and hospitals, in order to kill as many women and children as possible, Since chlorine gas is heavier than air, it seeps down into the basements and forces the choking women and children out into the open, where they can be targeted by missiles and gunfire.

As Putin becomes increasingly desperate, he is expected to employ increasingly horrific violence, including the tactics used in Syria and in Chechnya. If he becomes desperate enough, it's even possible he'll resort to tactical nuclear weapons.

However, even if he manages to kill Zelenskyy and subdue the country, the battle will be far from over. An occupation army of a couple of hundred thousand people is not nearly enough to fight an insurgency in a country of 44 million people. Furthermore, there will be millions of Ukrainian refugees in neighboring countries who will be prepared to do what they can to defeat the Russian occupancy. This would be extremely expensive for Russia to sustain, and it's not believed he could do so for long.

Russia's invasion a shock to the Chinese Communists

China and Russia have been historic enemies, with the Chinese and Russian people hating each other, but the two countries have been united by their common enemies, the United States and the West. Nonetheless, China has found it impossible to give a full-throated endorsement to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. China is a close ally of Ukraine, and has invested heavily in Ukraine.

I've previously described long-term delusional geopolitical strategy of the Chinese Communists to gain hegemony over the entire world. This analysis was based on a CCP newsletter forwarded to me by a web site reader. (See "16-Dec-20 World View -- China's delusional geopolitical strategy")

Guided by China's leadership, countries throughout Africa, Asia and the Mideast will put aside their disagreements. Old hatreds will be mended by necessity, to attract capital for investments. These include countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, India, and Pakistan. China will create a "global colossal," of dozens of countries in a massive multi-country partnership, bound together by China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

The plan specifies concessions to be made by one nation after another to "mend old hatreds," but it doesn't contain a single example of China making any concession whatsoever.

According to the CCP newsletter: "The big question is how America will respond to the challenge of connecting so much of the world through trade and peace. Their containment policy has failed so far. The choice is either to join this more peaceful venture or to fight it. If the latter choice is adopted it will result in a global war between America and its remaining allies and the combined forces of China and Russia."

This whole delusional fantasy strategy has been torn apart by Russia's Ukraine invasion. The Chinese Communists had assumed that the world would welcome Chinese hegemony, but it's clear that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would also make China as much a pariah as Russia is. The whole strategy of using BRI to make the world love China has been shown to be ridiculous, even to the delusional Chinese Communists.

Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communists will abandon their plans of world domination. To the contrary, the Chinese Communists will become desperate, and will adopt the most horrific tactics, including a nuclear weapons attack on the United States. China has been threatening to invade Taiwan for years, and is too well invested in that goal to abandon it. Furthermore, China has been preparting a nuclear attack on America for decades, and will launch it as a time of its choosing.

South Korea's election of Yoon Suk-yeol moves the country to the right

Yoon Suk-yeol, leader of the People's Power Party (NY Post)

Yoon Suk-yeol, leader of the People's Power Party (NY Post)

Former prosecutor and conservative Yoon Suk-yeol of the People Power Party won South Korea's presidential election on Wednesday, defeating the liberal candidate Lee Jae-myung of the Democratic Party, which had formerly been led by the incumbent president Moon Jae-in. Yoon will take office on May 10.

Yoon is expected to take a harsher line towards China and North Korea than did his predecessor Moon, and is expected to be more closely aligned with US policy than Moon. For example, Yoon has voiced a need to deploy another American Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (Thaad) anti-missile system to deter North Korea. The 2016 installation of the first Thaad battery in South Korea triggered massive economic retaliation from China that lasted nearly two years.

By the way, Yoon has developed a reputation for being a "non-woke" politician. His wife, Kim Keon-hee, has been attacked by feminist activists for criticizing sexual harassment "opportunists."

The Regeneracy

Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have undoubtedly been shocked at the unity of the international community to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Putin certainly expected to take advantage of a split among the countries of Nato, but now the Nato countries seem completely unified. Even Germany will be sending lethal weapons to Ukraine, in a major reversal of policy.

This is the generational theory "Regeneracy" that I've been talking about for years. I've been writing about it domestically, as the regeneracy of civic unity, where Americans put political differences aside and unite against the common enemy. Today we're seeing the same thing internationally, as countries around the world unite against Russia.

The regeneracy has also united Western-linked countries in Asia. South Korea's election aligns it more closely with America. Japan has strongly condemned Russia's invasion, and has announced that it will end "peace talks" about the Kuril Islands dispute.

The interesting political battle in the next few months will be over energy. So-called "green" policies in America and Europe have been an absolutely disaster, as they've made Europe much more dependent on Russia, and they've raised oil prices so that America and Europe are funding Russia's war in Ukraine. There is enormous pressure from both Republicans and Democrats on the Biden administration to abandon the disastrous "green" policies, and the abandonment of those policies will be a major sign of the regeneracy in domestic politics.

In my opinion, the US will try to stay out of this European war, just as the US at first stayed out of the European wars in 1914 and 1939. The US was able to stay out of those wars for 2-3 years. In my opinion, the European war will trigger a full-scale world war within a few months or at most a couple of years, with the exact timing dependent on China's actions, especially in Taiwan.

The future of Generational Dynamics

I am 77 years old, soon to be 78, and I have absolutely no desire to even try to live through World War III. I'm miserable, depressed, in intermitten pain, alone, surviving on Social Security, and disgusted with the Cassandra Curse, which says that I'm treated abusively, even when (or especially when) I'm right.

Twenty years ago I began developing Generational Dynamics, a methodology for analyzing historical and current events, based on Forrester's System Dynamics from MIT applied to generational flows, and incorporating Chaos Theory and technology forecasting. My web sites, http://generationaldynamics.com and http://gdxforum.com, contain over 6,000 articles with thousands of analyses and predictions about hundreds of countries, and they've all come true or are trending true. None has been proven wrong. In addition, I've written four books on the history of Iran, China and Vietnam, and the history and theology of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Daoism. The major prediction over the last 20 years has been that we are headed for a global financial crisis and a world war against China. That time is now approaching. The Russia-Ukraine war is just beginning, and it is expected to cause a chain reaction that will lead to a major European war, and within the next year or so to a world war and a global depression. Nuclear weapons will be used.

I published four books, thinking that they would create some sort of legacy that would survive me. And they're really good books, in my opinion. I'm really proud of them. You would think by this time, they would have generated some interest somewhere, but they haven't. I've only sold a few dozen copies of each.

I apologize for writing so few articles these last few months. I simply no longer have the energy to write as much as I used to, especially in view of the Cassandra Curse. However, I do try to contribute something to the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Nonetheless, Generational Dynamics may be reaching the end of the line.

After I'm gone, very few people will even remember Generational Dynamics, and many of them will remember it only with scorn and derision as the invention of an old Boomer fossil. There will be nobody whose sa lary depends on keeping Generation Dynamics alive, so Generational Dynamics will die with me.

That's why I'm extending an invitation to any individuals, think tanks, universities, or other organizations that would like to take on the responsibility on further development of Generational Dynamics. There's wealth of information on my books and on my web sites. Furthermore, I am available right now to provide guidance and even to give a professional or college course over zoom. So this is the right time.

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19-Jan-22 World View -- Major escalation in Yemen war as Houthis attack UAE with missiles and drones

Iran's support for the Houthis

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Major escalation in Yemen war as Houthis attack UAE with missiles and drones
Iran's support for the Houthis
The purpose of the Houthi attack on the UAE

Major escalation in Yemen war as Houthis attack UAE with missiles and drones

Site of Saudi-led air strike in Sanaa on 18-Jan (Reuters)

Site of Saudi-led air strike in Sanaa on 18-Jan (Reuters)

The Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen on Monday evening attacked targets in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), including airports in Dubai and an oil refinery in Musaffah, as well as "a number of important and sensitive Emirati sites and facilities," with five missiles and a number of drones. Three people were killed.

Early on Tuesday, warplanes from Saudi Arabia, UAE's coalition partner, attacked Houthi camps and strongholds in Sanaa, Yemen's capital city, including the home of a high-ranking Houthi military official, including his wife and son. About 20 people were killed, according to the Houthis.

The Yemen war began in 2015, when Houthi rebels from northwest Yemen took control of the capital city Sanaa, and seized the international airport. In response, warplanes from a mostly Arab coalition led by Saudi Arabia bombed Houthi rebel targets.

The war escalated substantially in November 2017, when the Houthis launched a ballistic missile, undoubtedly supplied by Iran, that reached the King Khalid International Airport near Riyadh, about 800 km from the Yemen border. The Saudis reacted with their own escalation, a blockade of all of Yemen's land, sea and air ports.

The Houthis increased their missile attacks on Saudi cities, and then in June 2018, Saudi Arabia and UAE launched a 'catastrophic' assault on the highly strategic Port Hodeidah in Yemen. The objective was to cut off supplies of Iranian weapons to the Houthis, as well as a source of income.

The battle over Port Hodeidah continued for years, until November 2021, when the Houthis scored a complete takeover of the port, marking an important turning point in the war. Tuesday's Houthi attack on the UAE targets with drones and missiles marks another turning point.

Iran's support for the Houthis

Since the Yemen war began in 2015, it's been seen as largely a proxy war between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia. In the wars between Sunnis and Shias following the death of the prophet Mohammed, one Shia sect was known as the Zaydis or "fivers," because of their allegiance to the fifth Imam descendant. Most Shias, including the Persians, had allegiance to the twelth Imam descendant, and so they are sometimes called "twelvers." The Zaydis have become today's Houthis. Despite this theological dispute, the fivers and the twelvers identify with each other as not-Sunni Shias, and so the Iranians are supporting the Houthis in Yemen in a proxy war against the Arab Sunnis. (See my book "World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy," for the history of Islam and the Sunni-Shia split.)

Iran is denying that they've had anything to do with Tuesday's attack by the Houthis on the UAE. However, this claim has little credibility since the Houthis have no ability to develop and manufacture the drones and missiles that were used in the attack.

It seems likely that the Houthis' recent takeover of Port Hodeidah has enabled the Houthi attack, because Iran can use the port to smuggle drones and missiles and other weapons to the Houthis. Two weeks ago, a UN group announced that it would be investigating whether the port has been militarized

According to Hans Grundberg, the UN envoy to Yemen:

"The accusations of the militarization of the ports of Hodeidah are worrying and the threats of attacking them are equally disturbing given that these ports are a lifeline for many Yemenis. [The UN Mission to support the Hodeidah Agreement was] closely monitoring the situation in the ports and has requested as part of its mandate to undertake an inspection."

Well, we can hardly wait until the UN report comes out. These UN committees always produce useful results, don't they.

The purpose of the Houthi attack on the UAE

What is the purpose of the Houthi attack on UAE targets? Here are some possibilities:

The Houthis are drunk on their success with the takeover of the Hodeidah Port, and they may think that with Iran's backing they can defeat the Saudis and Emiratis, just as the Japanese thought they could defeat the Americans in 1941.

Iran has been holding "peace talks" separately with Saudi Arabia and UAE, and the Houthis may wish to sabotage those talks.

Iran may wish to send a message that it wants America and the West to end the sanctions on Iran.

Each one of these objectives is likely to backfire.

Houthi Yemeni military expert Brigadier-General Abdul Ghani Al-Zubaidi was interviewed on Monday by Russia Today TV, and said the following:

"We sent a message [with the Abu Dhabi drone strike], and the UAE should take this message seriously. The UAE is not like Saudi Arabia, which is bigger in size, and which can perhaps, take the hit and absorb the shock. The UAE is a country made of cardboard and glass. ...
The second thing is that we hope to receive Iranian weapons, and to have Iranian experts with us. [Our enemies] have Zionist experts, as well as American and French experts, They have gathered all of the world's vagabonds in their command center and in the battlefield. ...
We have the power, the will, and the determination to strike in the UAE and in Saudi Arabia. If it turns out that the Americans attacked in Yemen, or if they declare that they did, we will target the American interests wherever they may be. Wherever they may be!"

Right now, there's a bit of a lull, as both the UAE and the Houthis decide what to do next. If this is as much of a turning point as it seems, then we should see some additional military reactions soon.

As I've written many times, Generational Dynamics predicts that there is an approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, pitting the "axis" of China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries against the "allies," the US, India, Russia and Iran. Part of it will be a major new war between Jews and Arabs, re-fighting the bloody the war of 1948-49 that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. The war between Jews and Arabs will be part of a major regional war, pitting Sunnis versus Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and various ethnic groups against each other.

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8-Jan-22 World View -- Kazakhstan protests threaten Russia-China stability in Central Asia

Russia leads five CSTO nations in sending troops into Kazakhstan

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Kazakhstan president orders shoot to kill peaceful protesters without warning
Russia leads five CSTO nations in sending troops into Kazakhstan
China versus Russia

Kazakhstan president orders shoot to kill peaceful protesters without warning

Kazakhstan map (BBC)

Kazakhstan map (BBC)

Protests began in western Kazakhstan over the weekend, and were triggered by the removal of government fuel subsidies and the resulting price rises. However, the protests spread quickly, across the country and over numerous other issues related to government corruption. The result is the worst riots since the country became independent after the collapse of the Soviet Union Empire in 1991.

Kazakhstan was ruled since independence by a dictator, ex-president Nursultan Nazarbayev, who selected his successor, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, in 2019. Nazarbayev has remained head of the country's Security Council after stepping down as president in 2019. Both Nazarbayev and Tokayev were and are unpopular and thought to be corrupt. There were widespread anti-government farmer riots in 2016 when the government announced a "land reform" program that would have permitted China's agriculture businesses to buy up huge tracts of Kazakh land. Because of the protests, the "reforms" were never implemented. (See "22-May-16 World View -- Kazakhstan farmers riot over fears of encroachment from China")

In the last week, protesters have attacked a military barracks, and also brought down a monument of the former president Nazarbayev. The 2016 protests were brutally oppressed by Nazarbayev, and now the new protests, which are far more widespread and dangerous, are being suppressed by Tokayev, who has issued a "shoot to kill without warning" order to the police. Dozens of people have already been killed.

Russia leads five CSTO nations in sending troops into Kazakhstan

President Tokayev has declared a state of emergency, and has shut down the internet and other communications.

At the invitation of president Tokayev, Russian troops are now entering Kazakhstan to help quell the protests. It's not clear what these troops will do in a country as enormous as Kazakhstan, but presumably they'll concentrate on Almaty, the largest city.

It's not just Russian troops. Tokayev made the request through the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Russia-led military alliance which was formed in the 1990s as a counterweight to Nato. This is the first time that the CSTO is deploying troops on foreign soil since the organization was formed. So there are now troops from five foreign countries on Kazakh soil: Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Tajijistan and Kyrgyzstan.

According to the CSTO charter, one CSTO member may send troops to another member country only in the case of "foreign interference." No details of this "foreign interference" have been provided, but I heard one report that both Russian and Kazakh officials are blaming "Muslim jihadist terrorists," without providing evidence.

According to several reports that I've heard, this deployment of foreign troops is not very popular with anyone.

Many Kazakhs are opposed to any foreign troops on their soil. The Armenians are really furious that Russia didn't help them out in the Nagorno-Karabakh war with Azerbaijan, and now Armenian troops are being deployed to Kazakhstan. The Tajiks are unhappy with the deployment of their soldiers, and the Kyrgyzstan government is so concerned about the situation that they've closed their border with Kazakhstan.

There is one region of Kazakhstan that's certain to be under the protection of Russian troops, and that's the city of Baikonur which is the home of Baikonur spaceport. All Russian space flights are launched from Baikonur spaceport. According to Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the Russian state space agency, "Today it was calm at Baikonur. The branches of Roscosmos� enterprises, law enforcement agencies, city services and organizations are working as normal. The crisis center set up at Baikonur�s administration is fully controlling the situation in the city. Armed security at the cosmodrome�s key facilities has been boosted."

While all this is going on in Kazakhstan, Russia is also continuing its buildup of troops along the border of Ukraine. Will Russia invade Ukraine again this month? We'll have to wait and see.

China versus Russia

Kazakhstan is a mostly Sunni Muslim country, with Kazakhs having the same Turkic ethnicity as the Turks, the Azerbaijanis, and the Chinese Uighurs. Kazakhs in China's Xinjiang province (East Turkestan) are subjected to the same torture, beatings, sterilization and enslavement as the Uighurs. Kazakhstan is a kind of poster-child for China's use of money to gain compliance for the worst atrocities since the Nazis in the 1930s. Kazakhstan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and other Sunni Muslim countries are simply ignoring China's torture and enslavement of their Turkic brothers, because China is bribing them to do so.

Nonetheless, it's hard to escape the view that Russian troops in Kazakhstan are less about unnamed Muslim jihadists and more about China. Kazakhstan is rich in oil, gas, copper, and other commodities, and China has invested billions of dollars since independence to buy them.

Furthermore, as I've described in the past, China has 20 border disputes with its neighbors. This includes claiming 34,000 sq km of Kazakhstan's territory, and also claiming much of Russia's Far East, including Vladivostok, the home of Russia's Pacific Fleet, (See "5-Jul-20 World View -- India's list of China's border disputes and disagreements")

As I've described many times, Russia and China are historic enemies, at war most recently in the 1960s. They currently have a kind of "marriage of convenience" in opposition to the United States and West, who oppose their respective threatened invasions of Ukraine and Taiwan.

But it won't be long before the historic differences turn to new disagreements and war. Russia's sending troops into Kazakhstan, with little or no information about their mission, may well be first step in that development.

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25-Dec-21 World View -- Merry Christmas! America plays Santa to keep Europe from freezing

Russia cuts natural gas flows to Europe as possible Ukraine extortion ploy

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Russia cuts natural gas flows to Europe as possible Ukraine extortion ploy
American energy firms play Santa Claus and send an LNG flotilla to Europe
Germany and France fight over coal and nuclear energy
The outlook in Europe

Russia cuts natural gas flows to Europe as possible Ukraine extortion ploy

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov. Putin may next be planning to invade the seaports Mariupol and Berdyansk, in order to create a land bridge from Russia to Crimea

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov. Putin may next be planning to invade the seaports Mariupol and Berdyansk, in order to create a land bridge from Russia to Crimea

Merry Christmas, everyone! There's peace in Europe right now, but we don't know how long it will last.

The drama is growing on Russia's border with Ukraine, where Russia now has over 120,000 troops, along with tanks and other military equipment, apparently in preparation for an imminent invasion of Ukraine. Vladimir Putin says that the US and Nato are to blame for the hundreds of thousands of troops on the border with Ukraine, which is typical of the garbage that comes out every time Putin opens his mouth. Putin claims that there are no invasion plans, but Putin would say that, no matter what his plans. Putin is following the exact same playbook that he followed in 2014, when he illegally invaded eastern Ukraine, and he illegally invaded and annexed Crimea, after claiming he wouldn't do so.

However, there's a very interesting and amusing sub-plot to the current drama, where American energy firms are playing Santa Claus to keep Europe from freezing to death, despite the efforts of Grinch Putin.

Starting last weekend, flows of natural gas from Russia into Europe have been falling, depriving the Europeans of the natural gas needed to heat their homes. By Tuesday, European gas prices had spiked 40% to an all-time historic high. Freezing temperatures across Europe, low Russian gas supply, and low wind power generation in Germany all combined to send European and UK gas prices to new records.

It's not known whether Russia capped gas flows because of a shortage of gas in Russia, or because Putin wants to use extortion to force the EU to accede to his demands on Ukraine.

Part of the geopolitical situation is that Putin wants Germany to approve a new pipeline, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. This is important because much of Russia's gas flow to Europe currently comes through a pipeline that passes through Ukraine, forcing Russia to pay commissions to Ukraine. Once the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is approved, then Russia can bypass Ukraine, and end the payments.

American energy firms play Santa Claus and send an LNG flotilla to Europe

The situation has pushed European gas prices way above Asian prices, and 14 times higher than prices in the US. As a result, a flotilla of at least 30 LNG (liquified natural gas) tankers from American energy firms have been or are being diverted from Asia to Europe.

As a result, gas prices in Europe fell over 20% on Friday. The fall in gas prices was helped by forecasts of warmer weather on Friday through Monday.

America's Santa Claus flotilla is expected to keep European gas prices down for several weeks, but it's a temporary fix. By summer, at the latest, gas prices are expected to spike once again.

Germany and France fight over coal and nuclear energy

Europe's energy problems are substantially exacerbated by the climate change chaos going on in Europe, which is pitting Germany and France against each other.

France is first in the world in its reliance on nuclear energy. But France was forced to shut down two nuclear power plants last week, because of potential safety faults. The shut down reactors accounted for 10% of the nation's nuclear capacity, straining the nation's power grids in the cold weather. This has led a desperate president Emmanuel Macron to approve the firing up of six oil-fired power plants on Tuesday morning.

Macron has previously stated his commitment to "green energy," meaning wind and solar, and so many people were shocked last month when he announced in a televised speech, "For the first time in decades [France] will relaunch the construction of nuclear reactors." Macron�s government argues that investments in nuclear power will allow France to keep energy costs in check, while meeting its climate goals.

Macron's announcement infuriated the anti-nuclear activists in Germany. Germany has no such political disputes, because Germany is producing energy by burning coal, flooding the atmosphere with pollutants and emissions. Indeed, the country continues to raze villages to make way for new coal mines.

Nuclear power plants produce "clean energy," with no carbon emissions, but activists claim that they're too dangerous. However, pro-nuclear activists point out that far more people die from air pollution in Germany than could ever die from a nuclear power plant meltdown.

After the meltdown in 2011 of the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan, Germany has banned further nuclear development. Germany, Denmark and Austria are fiercely opposed to any further building of nuclear-power plants, or of designating nuclear energy as "climate-friendly."

The outlook in Europe

America's Santa Claus flotilla of LNG tankers may keep the Europeans from freezing this winter. At least, the LNG shipments will help keep gas prices down so that Europeans can afford to heat their homes.

But the big question in Europe is Putin's apparent plans to invade Ukraine. He claims that he has no plans to do so, but he would say that no matter what he plans, and he keeps massing more and more troops and military equipment on the border.

So it would be quite surprising if Europe got through the next few months unscathed.

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25-Nov-21 World View -- Ahmaud Arberry verdict and the KKK Democrats

Kyle Rittenhouse, George Floyd and Darryl Brooks

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Overwhelmingly white jury finds three white defendants guilty of murdering black Arberry
The return of the Democrat KKK
Kyle Rittenhouse and George Floyd
CNN commentary
Loony left comments on the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict
Darryl Brooks
Lessons learned

Overwhelmingly white jury finds three white defendants guilty of murdering black Arberry

Black murder victim Ahmaud Arberry and three convicted white murderers (Getty, toofab.com)

Black murder victim Ahmaud Arberry and three convicted white murderers (Getty, toofab.com)

Despite the hysteria and threats of violence from the left-wing loons on CNN and MSNBC, a jury of 11 white people and one black person convicted three white defendants of murder of a black person, Ahmaud Arberry.

The leftist loons claimed that white jurors only vote in a racist, bigoted way, but instead they examined the evidence, and the evidence was overwhelming that Ahmaud Arberry had been murdered.

So the court system worked correctly.

The return of the Democrat KKK

It was pretty clear that the Democrat KKK attitudes and hatred of blacks were still in place during the Arberry trial.

A defense attorney stood up and asked for black pastors to be banned from the courtroom. A Southern judge last century would probably have granted that request, but today, the request is idiotic. Today, it takes a Democrat attorney steeped in KKK hatred to try it.

Also, in closing arguments, the defense tried to appeal to the white jurors by saying that Arberry was no victim, and that he was in the neighborhood with "dirty khakis with no socks to cover his long dirty toenails." This would certainly have worked with the Democrats in the KKK in the last century, and would probably also have worked with many Democrats steeped in KKK hatreds today, but instead it appears to have badly backfired, even among the white Democrats on the jury.

These acts by the defense attorneys were typical of the KKK in the last century, and they would have worked. They're less common today because they frequently backfire, even among many Democrats. But it's clear that racism and hatred of blacks still runs deep in the Democrat party. This dates back to the Civil War, and the fury that Democrats felt that the Republicans under Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves and won the war, causing the Democrats to create the KKK and the Jim Crow laws, and spend the next century lynching and killing blacks, and frequently using the epithet, "The South Shall Rise Again!"

In fact, Joe Biden grew up in that hate-filled atmosphere, with a mentor of Democrat Party scion Robert Byrd, who was a Grand Cyclops in the KKK and a recruiter for the KKK. If Joe Biden had been on the Arberry jury, he might well have found the defendants innocent. Robert Byrd would almost certainly have done so.

It's impossible to overstate what's going on - almost a resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) in the Democrat party. You have thousands of blacks being killed in the streets of Chicago, LA, San Francisco, Baltimore, and other cities run by Democrats. Killing blacks is just as much the policy of Democrats today as it was in the last century. That's not true of all Democrats, just as it wasn't true of all Democrats in the last century, but it is true of a large segment of the Democrat party today. And, unfortunately, that segment of the Democrat party is now the loony left that is running the Democrat party, and they appear to want to re-fight the Civil War, in the hope of winning it this time and re-enslaving the blacks.

Kyle Rittenhouse and George Floyd

The evidence was overwhelming that Kyle Rittenhouse had fired only in self defense, and so he was found innocent. So the court system worked correctly.

Derek Chauvin was found guilty last year of murdering George Floyd. So the court system worked correctly.

These are two more examples of how the court and jury system worked correctly, so it makes no sense for the people on the loony left to want to destroy the American court system by packing the Supreme Court and by making every case about racial justice.

CNN commentary

On CNN, the Arberry commentary focused on the dog whistles and racial baiting that we described earlier to get the white people in the jury not to convict.

CNN commentary on the Rittenhouse verdict was apoplectic.

I saw the Jim Acosta show on CNN shortly after the Rittenhouse verdict. Recall that Acosta made a jackass of himself every day during the Trump administration by screaming stupid questions and epithets at Trump during press conferences, but being a jackass only made him a hero to the loony left, and made him a star at CNN.

The contrast between Fox News and CNN was enormous. Analysts on Fox News almost universally said that finding Rittenhouse not guilty was the correct verdict, based on the overwhelming evidence. But they contrasted that to the event, which they said was a tragedy because two people had been killed, and they said that Rittenhouse was not a hero.

But Acosta was unable to distinguish between those two things -- finding innocence and not being a hero. What I've found is that many people in general are unable to do fourth grade math or even second grade math, to the extent of being baffled by fourth grade percentage problems. AOC is a prime example of this, as she showed her stupidity in that issue over the Amazon HQ issue in 2019. AOC is one of the stupidest people in Washington, and the only people who are stupider than she is are her millions of followers in the Democrat party.

It takes a certain grasp of logic to be able to do fourth grade math, and people who can't do fourth grade math should not be expected to distinguish between seeing Rittenhouse as not guilty and Rittenhouse as some kind of hero. Even worse, you have to be really stupid not to understand that a case where a white man shoots three white men is not a racial issue. Acosta is clearly that stupid. CNN attracts commentators who are too stupid to do fourth grade math. From what I've seen, Fox News attracts commentators who are intelligent enough to do fourth grade math.

CNN headquarters is in Atlanta, where the Arberry trial was held. Atlanta is a hotbed of Democrat racists and idiots, which makes it the perfect location for CNN. Nonetheless, the brilliant American jury system, which is the best in the world and in the history of the world, came to the correct verdict.

Loony left comments on the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict

Anyone who watched the Kyle Rittenhouse trial could see that the innocence verdict was justified, but left-wing Democrat politicians and journalists became hysterical, and called for the virtual detruction of the American jury system. Many of the claims made in the following quotes were lies, made by people who knew they were lies, but who didn't care:

Mayor Bill de Blasio: "This verdict is disgusting and it sends a horrible message to this country. Where is the justice in this? We can't let this go. We need stronger laws to stop violent extremism from within our own nation. Now is the time."

Joy Reid, MSNBC: We knew, but it�s sometimes helpful to remind ourselves how America was designed to work. It continues to work as designed. We have learned again what is considered legal for *some* people to do in America. It�s helpful to know where you stand in your country. Be safe out there.

Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes: "Over the last few weeks, many dreaded the outcome we just witnessed. The presumption of innocence until proven guilty is what we should expect from our judicial system, but that standard is not always applied equally. We have seen so many black and brown youth killed, only to be put on trial posthumously, while the innocence of Kyle Rittenhouse was virtually demanded by the judge."

NY Governor Kathy Hochul: "Kyle Rittenhouse used an assault weapon to kill two people. This is not justice. If there was any question about why we need strong gun safety laws, this is your answer. This should never have been allowed to happen in the first place. We have a lot of work to do."

Reverend Al Sharpton: "These continue to be dark days for black people killed at the hands of people that believe our lives do not matter. This verdict was not only outrageous and dangerous, it was also an obvious signal that encourages and notifies "vigilantes" that they can continue to use violence to assert their power, and more importantly that they are above the criminal justice system when they do. While it is disheartening that we take one step forward, then several steps back, let this be a reminder that our activism cannot take a backseat"

Eric Adams, NYC Mayor-elect: "This decision is an indictment of irresponsible laws that make our society far more violent and unsafe under the guise of personal freedom and so called self-defense. It also sends an extremely dangerous message to those in our country who seek agendas of anarchy - often born in prejudice and ignorance - to wreak havoc in their communities and potentially murder their neighbors. We should not be shocked. We should be focused on swift and righteous action."

Jumaane Williams, NYC Public Advocate: "This trial and the verdict it produced are clear and devastating representations of the way our country and our legal system view innocence and guilt, vigilantes and villains, race and the fight against racial injustice. A white seventeen year old killing protesters with a weapon of war is celebrated and acquitted. A black seventeen year old walking the community with a bag of Skittles is criminalized and murdered.

Rep. Jerry Nadler: "This heartbreaking verdict is a miscarriage of justice and sets a dangerous precedent which justifies federal review by DOJ. Justice cannot tolerate armed persons crossing state lines looking for trouble while people engage in First Amendment-protected protest."

Nikole Hannah-Jones, NY Times: "In this country, you can even kill white people and get away with it if those white people are fighting for Black lives. This is the legacy of 1619."

George Takei, former Star Trek actor: "Justice denied is a body blow to our national psyche. On trial was not only a killer, but a system that continues to kill. Today that system defeated true justice, once again. But mark these words: We will never stop fighting for what is right and just."

Darryl Brooks

In the midst of all this, Darryl E. Brooks, a black male in late 30s, killed six people and injured 60 others by running them over intentionally with a car as they marched in the Christmas Parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, on Sunday.

Screen shot from video, just before Brooks' red SUV plows into parade marchers

Screen shot from video, just before Brooks' red SUV plows into parade marchers

Brooks had previously been out on bail after pimping out a 16 year old girl who got pregnant, and for attempting to kill the mother of his baby by running her over with his car, and almost succeeding in killing her, and after numerous other felonies, dating back to 1999. He was out on bail because of a "woke" District Attorney who was following "woke" policies of not jailing convicted criminals. Brooks was let out of jail, and he repeated the crime of killing people by running over with this car, this time succeeding spectacularly.

Examination of Darryl Brooks's media posts shows him to be a man filled with hatred for whites and women.

Darryl Brooks tweet: 'The old white ppl ... knock dem TF out!'

Darryl Brooks tweet: 'The old white ppl ... knock dem TF out!'

This reminds me of the e-mail messages found on Hunter Biden's laptop, which showed similar hatred of blacks. Like father, like son.

Not surprisingly, CNN did not mention the Darryl Brooks case.

Lessons learned

The main lesson learned from all of these cases is that the brilliant American jury system works. As everyone points out, there are reforms to be made. In this case, there were many complaints about prosecuters in both the Arberry and Rittenhouse cases. But the American jury system, at its core, is the best for determining guilt or innocense.

Another lesson to be learned is that racial hysteria doesn't always work, and shouldn't work. Race hysteria was raised in all the cases I've mentioned, and in the end, race didn't matter in any of them.

A third lesson to be learned is the importance of video evidence. This is a relatively new development in jury trials, and it fits in well with the American jury system, since it provides a new and very powerful means for juries to assess what happened.

The fourth lesson is that racism and hatred of blacks still runs deep in the Democrat party. Unfortunately, this is evident in the policies of Joe Biden and the Democrat party leadership. This is evident in policies that lead to the deaths of thousands of blacks in Democrat-run cities, and it's also evident in the drive for "Critical Race Theory," whose purpose if to victimize and marginalize blacks, as was done in the last century by the KKK and the Jim Crow Laws.

So we would have to agree that there's a lot of work to be done to cure systemic racism, but that work has to be done almost exclusively within the Democrat party, especially its leadership.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

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12-Nov-21 World View -- Israel holds joint naval exercises with UAE, Bahrain, affirming Abraham Accords

After one year, the military drills affirm the continuation of Abraham Accords

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Bahrain, UAE, Israel, US hold joint exercises in Red Sea
After one year, the military drills affirm the continuation of Abraham Accords

Bahrain, UAE, Israel, US hold joint exercises in Red Sea

Signing ceremony for Abraham Accords at the White House on 15-Sep-2020, with officials from Bahrain, Israel, USA and UAE

Signing ceremony for Abraham Accords at the White House on 15-Sep-2020, with officials from Bahrain, Israel, USA and UAE

Israel's navy is taking part in joint maritime drills with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, and the United States in the Red Sea. This is the first time that Israel's navy has publicly taken part in naval drills with Gulf Arab states.

According to a statement by the US Naval Fifth Fleet, which is headquartered at a base in Bahrain:

"The five-day exercise includes at-sea training aboard amphibious transport dock ship USS Portland (LPD 27) focused on visit, board, search and seizure tactics. The training will enhance interoperability between participating forces' maritime interdiction teams.
"It is exciting to see U.S. forces training with regional partners to enhance our collective maritime security capabilities," said Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, commander of NAVCENT, U.S. 5th Fleet and Combined Maritime Forces. "Maritime collaboration helps safeguard freedom of navigation and the free flow of trade, which are essential to regional security and stability."

This statement doesn't say so, but the drills are aimed at Iran. In March and April, Iran and Israel allegedly attacked each others ships in the Persian Gulf with missiles and explosive. And the US Navy had to fire warning shots during encounters with Iranian vessels in the Gulf.

After one year, the military drills affirm the continuation of Abraham Accords

The Abraham Accords were announced on August 13, 2020, and signed by the participants in September. The Accords were negotiated by Donald Trump's administration between Israel and UAE, later joined by Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan. Trump described the Accords as historic because they were the first public normalization of relations between Israel and an Arab country since the agreement with Jordan in 1994 and the agreement with Egypt in 1979.

There was a lot of skepticism that the Accords would survive for long, but after a year they've even survived an 11-day war between Israel and Gaza. Israel has exchanged ambassadors with the other signatories, and has initiated trade relations with them. The joint naval exercises that Israel is holding with UAE and Bahrain indicate that the Accords are continuing as intended.

One (simplistic) way of looking at the Mideast is that Israel is part of two major fault lines.

One fault line is Sunni vs Shia. This conflict is pitting Iran versus the Arab Gulf nations, and Israel against its will has been drawn into this conflict by Iran. The Abraham Accords directly address this fault line.

The other fault line is Israel vs Palestinians. This conflict comes out of the bloody 1948 war that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. This fault line is completely unrelated to the Abraham Accords, and is still headed for conflict as much as before.

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9-Nov-21 World View -- Crisis grows on Poland-Belarus border over weaponized migrants

Lukashenko's revenge following Ryanair plane forced landing

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Crisis grows on Poland-Belarus border over weaponized migrants
Lukashenko's revenge following Ryanair plane forced landing
Tensions grow on the border as Polish and Belarus forces face off

Crisis grows on Poland-Belarus border over weaponized migrants

Hundreds of migrants are trapped in a Belarus forest along the border with Poland (AFP)

Hundreds of migrants are trapped in a Belarus forest along the border with Poland (AFP)

There is a growing possibility of military clashes across the border between Poland and Belarus, as Belarus attempts to push thousands of migrants into Poland. The policy is in revenge for sanctions imposed after Belarus illegally forced a passenger plan to land, in order to jail a reporter on the flight.

Hundreds of migrants from the Middle East, Africa and Asia are trapped in Belarus on the border with Poland, with thousands more migrants on the way to the border. Poland has installed a barbed-wire border fence to prevent the migrants from crossing, but the migrants are using wire cutters and shovels, supplied by the Belarus military, to cut the wire or dig up the fence.

The Belarus military is standing behind the migrants, shooting their guns into the air, threatening any migrants who attempt to turn back from the border. Poland's military is standing on the other side of the barbed-wire fence, blocking any attempts by the migrants to cut the barbed wire and cross into Poland.

Poland has deployed more than 12,000 soldiers to the border and a volunteer Territorial Defense force was put on alert, according to Poland's defense ministry.

The European Union is describing the Belarus policy as "weaponizing migrants." Belarus has extended this policy from Poland to Lithuania and Latvia.

Lukashenko's revenge following Ryanair plane forced landing

The reason that these thousands of migrants are in Belarus is because they were solicited on the orders of dictator Alexander Lukashenko. Belarus has been soliciting migrants from the Middle East, Africa and Asia to travel to Belarus, and has provided free air travel for them to do so. The migrants are promised an opportunity to cross the border into Poland or Germany.

The current crisis began on May 23, when a Ryanair passenger plane with 126 passengers crossing Belarus air space was ordered by Belarus air traffic controllers to land in the Belarus capital city Minsk, supposedly because of a "potential security threat on board." The demand was backed up by a Belarus fighter jet.

When the plane landed in Minsk, Belarus security forces boarded the plane and arrested a Belarus journalist, Raman Pratasevich, and his girlfriend Sofia Sapega. Pratasevich had been a vocal critic of Lukashenko, including accusations of rigged elections. After his arrest, Pratasevich was paraded in staged events.

In June, the EU, US and UK imposed coordinated sanctions on Belarus. The EU has banned flights from Balavia and other Belarus airlines from its airports and airspace. The EU is also planning to sanction airlines that are cooperating with Belarus in flying migrants from the Mideast and Africa to Belarus.

Already, Poland's defense ministry has thanked Iraq for having Belarus close its consulates in Baghdad and Irbil that were giving tourist visas to migrants.

These sanctions have infuriated Lukashenko. He has retaliated and taken revenge by launching his program of weaponizing migrants -- transporting them from the Middle Ease and Africa, and then trying to push them into Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania.

Tensions grow on the border as Polish and Belarus forces face off

Video from the border is showing a tense military standoff. Polish border guards have used teargas to push back people who tried to cut through the barbed wire. Gunshots were thought to come from Belarus border guards, shot in the air to frighten migrants and prevent them from moving away from the border.

Hundreds of migrants have set up a tent city on the Belarus side of the border in a forested area, where they are essentially trapped.

As more thousands of migrants are headed to the same area, it seems certain that there will be some kind of military confrontation on the border. There is the possibility that lives will be lost, or that a gunfight will break out between the border guards on the two sides. And with Russia supporting Belarus, it's possible that a clash could spread.

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8-Nov-21 World View -- Pro- and Anti-Iran violence grows in Iraq as PM survives assassination attempt

Consequences of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88)

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Iraq's PM Mustafa al-Kadhimi escapes assassination from drone attacks
Consequences of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88)
Growing anti-Iran riots
Muqtada al-Sadr and the Sadrists

Iraq's PM Mustafa al-Kadhimi escapes assassination from drone attacks

Riots in Baghdad on Friday

Riots in Baghdad on Friday

Iraq's prime minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi escaped an assassination attempt early Sunday morning, when three explosives-laden drones attacked his residence. The army shot down two of the drones, but a third reached its target and exploded, wounding six guards. Al-Kadhimi was unharmed. The residence is in Baghdad's heavily fortified "Green Zone."

The drone attack follows widespread riots and protests on Friday, where Iran-backed militias were protesting the results of the October 10 parliamentary elections. The Iran-backed Fatah Alliance won only 17 seats, down from 48 seats in the previous parliament.

Because of the Iran-backed protests, many people assume that the drone attacks were engineered by the pro-Iran militias, especially because Iran has used drone attacks to attack American bases along the border with Syria. However, the militias deny responsibility, and claim that the drone attacks were staged. So nobody has claimed responsibility for the failed drone attacks.

Consequences of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88)

Iraq had two generational crisis wars during the last century, the 1920 Iraqi Revolution and the 1980s Iran-Iraq war. In both of those wars, the Iraqi Sunnis and Shias united behind the war effort against the enemy -- the British colonists in 1920 and the Iranians in the 1980s. The Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) was one of the longest and bloodiest wars of the 20th century. Chemical weapons and large-scale missile attacks were used. There were millions of casualties and refugees in both countries. ("Iraqi Sunnis are turning against al-Qaeda in Iraq (1-Apr-2007)")

Today, Iraq is in a generational Awakening era, so there is no chance of a renewal of the Iran-Iraq war. But the horrors of the war are still well-remembered, and it's still the objective of Iran to obtain political control of Iraq. Not surprisingly, these attempts have triggered anti-Iran protests in Iraq.

Iran gained a great deal of popular support in Iraq in 2016-2018, when Iran trained and funded Shia militias called the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMFs), which played a major role in expelling ISIS from the country. So it was during the 2018 parliamentary elections that the Iran-backed Fatah Alliance gained 48 seats.

Growing anti-Iran riots

However, there were already widespread anti-Iran riots in September 2018 in Basra, which is in southern Iraq, adjacent to Iran. Protesters attacked or set fire to Iran-linked buildings and the Iranian consulate. They also attacked almost every office belonging to the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces. (See "9-Sep-18 World View -- Riots in Iraq's Basra evoke fault lines of 1980s Iran-Iraq war")

In October 2019, there were widespread anti-Iran political protests, this time in Baghdad, with protesters calling for political reforms, and end to corruption, and an end to sectarian system of government that guarantees government control to groups depending on religious sect. There was also a call to end foreign intervention, with a particular focus on Iran.

So by the time of last month's parliamentary elections, the pro-Iranian militias had lost almost all of the good will they had gained from fighting ISIS, and the pro-Iranian Fatah political alliance lost two-thirds of the seats it had previously held.

So the protests on Friday were quite different from the protests in October 2019. The latter protests had been led by students who were protesting corruption and Iranian influence. Friday's protests led by Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) militias, claiming that last month's parliamentary elections were rigged.

Muqtada al-Sadr and the Sadrists

The biggest winner in last month's parliamentary elections appears to be the Sadrists, the political party of Muqtada al-Sadr, who got 73 seats. Those with a long memory will recall that al-Sadr is a highly respected Shia cleric who opposed American intervention in Iraq during the 2000s. Today he strongly opposes all foreign intervention, including intervention by the US, Iran and Turkey.

With or without the drone attack, there's a feeling that Friday's violent protests represent a turning point in Iraq. According to one analyst, Muqtada al-Sadr had been using the time since the October 10 election to negotiate with other political groups in order to form a governing coalition, and Friday's violent protests have forced those negotiations to end.

There is a growing conflict between the Sunnis and the Sadrists on one side, and the pro-Iranian Fatah alliance on the other side. In the meantime, the Iranians are attempting to pressure the Iraqi government to demand with the withdrawal of American forces, just as the Americans had to withdraw from Afghanistan. This conflict will continue during the next few months, but it seems unlikely that America will be forced to withdraw from Iraq, as long as the Americans are seen as a countervailing force to Iran, especially in view of the disastrous results of the American withdrawal from Afghanistan.

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7-Nov-21 World View -- China's grand geopolitical strategy threatened by Myanmar / Burma civil war

UN warns Myanmar / Burma of 'crimes against humanity'

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

UN warns Myanmar / Burma of 'crimes against humanity' and threats of civil war
Violence and crime along the China-Myanmar border
Myanmar's threat to China's geopolitical strategy

UN warns Myanmar / Burma of 'crimes against humanity' and threats of civil war

Globe showing China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (Switzerland's Federal Intelligence Service)

Globe showing China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (Switzerland's Federal Intelligence Service)

For six weeks after the February 1 military coup in Myanmar, the army, known as the Tatmadaw, took a measured approach to the peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations. However, this was followed by "an uptick in violence and much more violent methods used to suppress the demonstrators," according to a UN report issued on Friday:

"We do feel now having observed the events and collected preliminary evidence that the facts show a widespread and systematic attack on the civilian population amounting to crimes against humanity.
This was happening in different places at the same time, indicating to us it would be logical to conclude this was from a central policy. And, also, we saw that particular groups were targeted, especially for arrests and detentions that appear to be without due process of law. And this includes, of course, journalists, medical workers and political opponents."

According to Nicholas Koumjian, the UN official who issued the report, there are more and more groups within Myanmar calling for a full civil war, which is not surprising, as the junta continues to escalate its violence.

It's worth pointing out that the junta really couldn't care less what some United Nations agency claims. Myanmar is in the opening stages of a full-scale generational crisis civil war, and no outside political pressure can have much of an effect, just as a tsunami could not be stopped by a UN agency.

In fact, none of this is particularly surprising. Myanmar entered a generational Crisis era in 2016, and the Buddhist army began by committing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Muslim Rohingyas. So now, the army is performing the same "clearance operations" against the Chin people in northern Myanmar, and is preparing similar operations against other non-favored ethnic populations.

Violence and crime along the China-Myanmar border

According to China's state media, there are over 10,000 Chinese nationals in Myanmar waiting to cross the border into Ruili, China. Regulations and restrictions by China's government are permitting only about 100 people to cross the border into China each day. The restrictions were put in place in June because of the instability in Myanmar, and also because the delta variant of the Covid virus is spreading in China, and steps are being taken to block it.

In addition, there's also been a sharp increase in cross-border crimes against China or Chinese citizns, such as telecommunications and internet fraud, gambling and money laundering. Chinese citizens living in northern Myanmar are being told register their identities, and to confess any crimes they've committed.

Ruili is a city of 260,000 residents, and they've suffered almost 200 days under lockdown, because of the two factors -- China's Covid policy and the turmoil in Myanmar. According to the city's mayor: "The epidemic has ruthlessly looted [Ruili] over and over again, draining the city�s last trace of life and devouring the hope of its residents. Please save this hero city! Please pay attention to this beautiful border town!"

There is also anti-Chinese violence in Myanmar far from the Chinese border. Many people in Myanmar blame China for supporting the junta in its violence against peaceful protesters, and Chinese factories and citizens in Yangon have been attacked in Yangon. The Chinese have deflected these accusations by blaming the attacks on incitement by the United States.

China is actually pursuing a dual strategy in Myanmar. At the top level, and in the national media, China is not referring to a "coup," but to euphemisms like a "cabinet reshuffle." On the other hand, local media in China are referring to the violence in Myanmar following the "coup."

Myanmar's threat to China's geopolitical strategy

The coup and the threat of civil war in Myanmar have been a lot more than a mere annoyance to the Chinese. They represent a threat to China's grand geopolitical strategy for world domination.

China has for years been supplying weapons to Myanmar's government, led by Aung San Suu Kyi until the February 1 coup. Since then, the Chinese have cautiously maintained good relations with the junta, because of Myanmar's part in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

As I've written in the past, China's grand plan is that it will become the leader of the world within 5-10 years, and that almost all countries will gladly accept China's leadership. This goes beyond invading and annexing Taiwan. It also means that the 20+ border disputes that China has with India, Russia, Vietnam, Kazakhstan and other countries will be settled amicably in China's favor, and that includes China's control of the South China Sea.

China's vision is like Isaiah 2:4, which says: "The Lord will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore." This is exactly China's delusional vision, except that the role of the Lord will be played by the Chinese Communist Party. (Incidentally, that's why China is promising to stop increasing coal production by 2030.)

According to the delusion, the only possible reason why this plan might fail is that the United States would be jealous of China's power and might come to the defense of Taiwan and Japan. That's why China is developing hypersonic and ballistic nuclear missiles, in order to attack the United States and bring about this millennium of peace.

So now getting back to Myanmar, the major BRI project in Myanmar is the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), which is strategically essential to China's grand plan, since it provides a corridor for the transport of people and goods between China's Yunnan province and the Indian Ocean, through Myanmar's ports on the Andaman Sea. This is similar to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which connects China's Xinjiang province to Pakistan's Gwardar port, which China now controls.

Both CMEC and CPEC are essential to China's delusional grand plan, and so the civil war in Myanmar represents a threat in two different ways -- because it could spill over into the population of China, and because it would threaten the strategically important CMEC.

So China is taking a cautious approach to the Myanmar junta. The junta leaders couldn't care less what a United Nations agency says, but they might listen to what the Chinese say. However, what's going on in Myanmar is a generational crisis civil war, and the drive to fight the war is deeply organic and buried deep in the DNA of all the parties. The Chinese probably understand that because of their own deeply organic ethnic atrocities, directed at the Uighurs and Tibetans, so all they can do is hope that the Myanmar war will fizzle out, which is highly improbable in a generational Crisis era.

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2-Nov-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma civil war gathers steam as ASEAN watches

Myanmar's ethnic rebel militias fight junta's 'clearance operations'

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar's ethnic rebel militias fight junta's 'clearance operations'
ASEAN takes on increased regional role after snubbing Myanmar

Myanmar's ethnic rebel militias fight junta's 'clearance operations'

ASEAN meeting on zoom, with Myanmar disinvited (The Irrawaddy)

ASEAN meeting on zoom, with Myanmar disinvited (The Irrawaddy)

When Myanmar's Buddhist army conducted genocidal "clearance operations" against the Muslim Rohingyas in southern Myanmar in 2016-2018, they met little resistance. In fact, the Rohingyas were like sheep being led to slaughter. The Buddhists burned down entire villages, tortured, beat and killed males, raped females, and shot down civilians who tried to flee. Except for an occasional terrorist act, the Rohingyas did nothing to fight back, but instead fled across the border into Bangladesh, where hundreds of thousands of them still live in refugee camps.

As we described two weeks ago, the Myanmar junta has been massing troops in northwest Myanmar in Chin State, and has been talking about "clearance operations." Analysts at the United Nations see this as a sign that the junta is planning to do the same thing to the Chin people as they did to the Rohingyas. (See "24-Oct-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma junta massing troops in northwest, preparing for mass slaughter")

The junta military, known as the Tatmadaw, have already begun "clearance operations" in earnest. Over the weekend, the military shelled a town in Chin State and burned down more than 160 buildings, including businesses and churches. The humanitarian aid agency Save the Children said its offices were in one of the buildings that was �deliberately set ablaze.�

So they're repeating what they did to the Rohingyas in the past. Another thing they're repeating is to claim that the villagers set the fires and burned down their own homes and villages. Nobody was stupid enough to believe their claim that the Rohingyas burned down their own villages, and nobody is stupid enough to believe those claims now.

However, we're seeing a big difference between the Rohingyas versus the Chin and other anti-junta rebels. While the Rohingyas simply fled or died like sheep, the anti-junta rebels are fighting back.

According to one report, the Tatmadaw in June attacked the town of Pale in northwest Myanmar with the usual tactics, where soldiers looted homes, raped women and set a village on fire. But instead of simply fleeing, the villagers formed a militia of some 2,000 fighters, mostly farmers, and counterattacked, killing 400 troops, according to their claims, which are probably exaggerated.

However, the point is that since the junta took power on February 1 in a coup, some 250 rebel groups have emerged, ranging from small urban underground cells to militias comprising thousands, according to reports. These rebels have not previously fought in wars, but their grandparents did, in the bloody Burma crisis civil war from 1948 to 1958. It's this historical memory that makes these rebels willing to fight, where the Rohingyas were not.

As I've explained in the past, Myanmar entered a new generational Crisis era in 2016, 58 years after the end of the last crisis war. (See "24-Jun-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma army fights new militia in Mandalay as civil war spreads")

Since 2016, the Tatmadaw have become increasingly violent and belligerent within their own country. They committed genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Rohingyas, and now they're turning to other ethnic groups within Myanmar. This will not end quickly. This is turning into a repeat of the ten-year Burmese crisis civil war that ran between 1948-1958, and involved multiple ethnic groups. History is now repeating itself.

ASEAN takes on increased regional role after snubbing Myanmar

ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Nations) has ten members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, and they've always followed a strict policy of not criticizing the government of any of the others, even when the member governments committed atrocities.

ASEAN held three days of summit meetings last week at which the biggest news was that Myanmar's military junta leader, Min Aung Hlaing, was not invited to participate. This was a shocking move by the organization, which has previously made a point of not criticizing the internal actions of its member states.

ASEAN members felt the need to take a stand in order to maintain relevance as a regional organization. There are several developments that seemed to make ASEAN increasingly marginalized.

In 2012, ASEAN failed to issue a joint statement -- for the first time ever -- over disagreements on how to deal with China's claims to the disputed South China Sea. At that time, ASEAN's rotating chairmanship was held by Cambodia, whose leader is Hun Sen, who is a close ally of China. With Cambodia's help, China attempted to get ASEAN to endorse, or at least not object to, China's claims, but the Philippines objected, and so ASEAN took no position at all. ASEAN received a great deal of international criticism for failing to take a stand on China's illegal claims. (See "21-Nov-12 World View -- China is forced to back down diplomatically at an ASEAN meeting")

More recently, ASEAN's role as a regional power bloc has been challenged by other alliances led by the United States. One is the so-called Quad, a bloc formed by Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, to counter the influence of China. The most recent is the ANKUS agreement (Australia, UK, and US), where the US and UK will help Australia build a nuclear-powered submarine fleet. (This has triggered a major international diplomatic disagreement, since Australia had previously agreed to purchase diesel-powered submarines from France, and the ANKUS agreement was formed without notifying France.)

Few people doubt that Myanmar is headed for a major civil war, with the danger that it will spill over into its neighbors, especially Thailand, India and China. As the civil war overwhelms the region, it remains to be seen whether ASEAN can be relevant.

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31-Oct-21 World View -- Saudi Arabia expels Lebanon ambassador over Iran's increasing influence

Judge Tarek Bitar the center of the Beirut's October 14 gun battle

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Saudi Arabia expels Lebanon ambassador over Iran's increasing influence
Judge Tarek Bitar the center of the Beirut's October 14 gun battle

Saudi Arabia expels Lebanon ambassador over Iran's increasing influence

Christian protesters block the streets in Beirut (Al-Jazeera)

Christian protesters block the streets in Beirut (Al-Jazeera)

Lebanon continues to face one disaster after another, following a historic port implosion last year and an eight-hour gun battle in Beirut earlier this month. Lebanon now faces a major diplomatic and trade crisis with Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries.

Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Lebanon on Friday for consultations, and requested the departure of Lebanon's Saudi envoy by Monday. Saudi Arabia futhermore halted all imports of all products from Lebanon. Bahrain followed Saudi Arabia in solidarity, and Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates did the same.

The action was triggered by the airing last week of an August 5 interview in which Lebanon's Information Minister George Kordahi made harsh criticisms of the Saudi Arabia led coalition in the war in Yemen against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels. In the interview, Kordahi that the Houthi rebels were "defending themselves ... against an external aggression," and that "homes, villages, funerals and weddings were being bombed" by the coalition.

Last week, Kordahi told local reporters on Wednesday that he refused to apologize and that the interview was his "personal opinion," since he was still a private citizen at the time. He said, "I did not wrong anyone. I did not attack anyone. Why should I apologize? I stated my position with love as a human who feels Arab suffering."

Well, the Saudis apparently did not feel the love, as the Saudis withdrew their ambassador shortly thereafter.

Saudi Arabia has considered Lebanon a close ally for decades, but relations have soured as Hezbollah has gained power in Lebanon. Hezbollah is recognized as a Shia terrorist group by the West and by the Arab League. Saudi Arabia and Lebanon got along well for years, as long they could agree that Israel was the bad guy. But things started deteriorating in 2011 when Syria's Shia/Alawite president Bashar al-Assad started attacking innocent Sunni protesters, and and Hezbollah's militias began fighting in Syria in support of al-Assad's army. Relations between Lebanon and Saudi further eroded in 2020, when the Abraham Accords were signed during the Trump administration.

A particularly dramatic incident occurred in 2017, when Saad Hariri, the prime minister of Lebanon, made a seemingly routine trip to Saudi Arabia, but then shocked everyone by resigning as prime minister while there, giving as a reason the fear that Iran and Hezbollah would assassinate him. Hariri's father, Rafiq Hariri, was killed in 2005 by a massive explosion in Beirut that was blamed on Syria and Hezbollah. (See "5-Nov-17 World View -- Saad Hariri shocks Lebanon by resigning as PM while in Saudi Arabia")

So George Kordahi's harsh criticism of Saudi Arabia's role in Yemen may have been stated "with love," but now that he is Lebanon's Information Minister, he is under increasing pressure to resign.

Judge Tarek Bitar the center of the Beirut's October 14 gun battle

The new actions by Saudi Arabia followed a six hour gun battle in downtown Beirut, Lebanon's capital city, on October 14. Hezbollah supporters were marching peacefully to protest the investigation of last year's port explosion, which was led by Judge Tarek Bitar. The gun battle was between Hezbollah supporters and supporters of Samir Geagea, who is leader of the Lebanese Forces party (which is a political party, not the Lebanon army). Each side accuses the other of firing the first shot, and seven people were killed, with dozens injured.

At the center of all this is Judge Tarek Bitar, who has been described as incorruptible, and who is conducting the investigation into who is responsible for the Beirut port explosion last year. On Tuesday, August 4, 2020, a catastrophic explosion in the Beirut seaport leveled thousands of homes, killed and injured thousands of people, and left 300,000 people homeless. It's considered by many to be the biggest non-nuclear explosion in history. (See "22-Aug-20 World View -- Hezbollah implicated in catastrophic Beirut Lebanon explosion")

Lebanon is a country where corruption runs deep and politicians are assassinated, all with impunity. Meanwhile, there is no regular electricity or water or garbage collection, the value of the currency has fallen 90%, and the politicians appear to be doing very well. The ordinary people of Lebanon are sick and tired of the impunity, and want someone to be named responsible for the port blast. It's widely believed that Hezbollah is responsible, though the crime may be great enough to enmesh other politicians as well. The reason that Hezbollah supporters were marching on October 14 is that they were demanding that Judge Bitar's investigation be ended, leaving no one to take the blame for the port blast.

Lebanon is hoping for aid from the international community before the economy collapses completely. Aid is being blocked, pending reforms and democratization of Lebanon's government, and Bitar's investigation has been seen by the international community as the best hope for reform. Lebanon's politicians were particularly hoping for support from the Arab nations, but that now seems impossible.

The October 14 gun battle has further paralyzed Lebanon's government. Hezbollah is refusing to allow any cabinet meetings to occur unless Judge Bitar's investigation is permanently ended. Lebanon's government was disastrously weak before, but now can't even hold a meeting.

Hezbollah's leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah is blaming Samir Geagea and the Lebanese Forces party with being responsible for the October 14 shootout, and is accusing Saudi Arabia of providing support and perhaps instigating the attack on Hezbollah protesters. This infuriated the Saudis, and after the airing of George Kordahi's interview, and his harsh criticisms of the Saudi Arabia led coalition in the war in Yemen, the Saudis withdrew their ambassador from Lebanon.

Sources:

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24-Oct-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma junta massing troops in northwest, preparing for mass slaughter

ASEAN blocks Myanmar's attendance

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar/Burma junta massing troops in northwest, preparing for mass slaughter
ASEAN blocks Myanmar's attendance
The future of Myanmar (Burma)

Myanmar/Burma junta massing troops in northwest, preparing for mass slaughter

Burmese troops

Burmese troops

Ever since the military coup that took place on February 1 of this year, the military junta of Myanmar (Burma) has been increasingly violent. More than 1,100 civilians have been killed by Myanmar security forces with thousands of others arrested, according to the United Nations, involving mostly peaceful anti-government protesters.

Now, the military junta in Myanmar is massing tens of thousands of troops and heavy weapons in northwest Myanmar, and talking about "clearance operations." This is exactly the same scenario that preceded the ferocious attacks, unspeakable violance and mass atrocities conducted against the Rohingyas in Rakhine state in 2016-2018.

According to Tom Andrews of the United Nations:

"These tactics are ominously reminiscent of those employed by the military before its genocidal attacks against the Rohingya in Rakhine State in 2016 and 2017.
We should all be prepared, as the people in this part of Myanmar are prepared, for even more mass atrocity crimes. I desperately hope that I am wrong."

As I've described starting with the massive demonstrations in 2007 by the "'88 Generation," Burma's last two generational crisis wars (1886-1891 and 1948-1958) were extremely bloody and violent civil wars involving multiple ethnic groups. (See "Burma: Growing demonstrations by the '88 Generation' raise fears of new slaughter")

When a crisis war ends, the country enters a new generational Crisis era (fourth turning) 58 years after the end of the war. In this case, Myanmar entered a new generational Crisis era in 2016.

Almost on cue, Myanmar's army started committing major atrocities in 2016, and today, the next round of atrocities is apparently about to begin.

ASEAN blocks Myanmar's attendance

ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Nations) has ten members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, and they've always followed a strict policy of not criticizing the government of any of the others. ASEAN has been criticized in the past for refusing to condemn atrocities conducted by any of its member governments, but they've maintained their non-interference policy until now.

At an emergency meeting two weeks ago, ASEAN members agreed to exclude Myanmar junta's chief Min Aung Hlaing from attending a regional summit later this month, on October 26-28. This was a major snub since nothing like it has ever happened before. The reason given is that they didn't want to legitimize the junta as the government of Myanmar. Instead, they said that they would invite a "non-political representative" to represent Myanmar.

Apparently this panicked the government of Myanmar, since two days later they released thousands of political prisoners. But it soon became obvious that this a ploy to regain the approval of ASEAN, since they re-arrested many of those prisoners since then. Myanmar has angrily rejected the claims of ASEAN, blaming them on "foreign intervention," referring to the United States. Myanmar may not have anyone at all representing Myanmar at the meeting.

The future of Myanmar (Burma)

Myanmar entered a generational Crisis era (fourth turning) in 2016, and is apparently already in a full-scale generational crisis war. The last crisis war, from 1948 to 1958, was a massive, bloody war involving multiple ethnic groups within Burma (Myanmar).

It now appears that Myanmar is entering a similar period. The army is currently massing in Myanmar's northwest, but analysts I've heard say that the army is expected to do the same in other regions of the country.

Sources:

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20-Oct-21 World View -- Investigation of Beirut Lebanon's seaport explosion leads to more violence

Hezbollah threatens large-scale violence

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Bloody gun battle in Beirut Lebanon stokes memories of civil war
Lebanon's government of impunity
The investigation of the port explosion paralyzes Lebanon's government
Hezbollah threatens large-scale violence
Lebanon's future

Bloody gun battle in Beirut Lebanon stokes memories of civil war

A man stands near the Beirut blast site on August 11, 2020. Graffiti reads 'My government did this' (Reuters)

A man stands near the Beirut blast site on August 11, 2020. Graffiti reads 'My government did this' (Reuters)

One again, new events have occurred to prove that Lebanon is an island of grief surrounded by woe. The people have to suffer through one disaster after another in Lebanon, where there is nobody on the side of the angels.

On Thursday of last week, there was a bloody five-hour gun battle in Lebanon's capital city Beirut, pitting Syriac Maronite Christians versus Shia Muslim Hezbollah. Seven people were killed, all Shia Muslims, and dozens were injured.

The gun battle was carried live on al-Jazeera. The gun battle occurred in an ordinary residential neighborhood, where the apartment buildings on one side of the street were mostly occupied by Hezbollah supporters, while the apartment buildings on the other side were mostly occupied by Christians. The Hezbollah protesters marched down the street separating the two neighborhoods. According to the news reports, snipers were on top of the apartment buildings on the Christian side, shooting protesters in the head as they walked by. Hezbollah, which is a military force backed by Iran, and its political arm, the Amal movement, are accusing the Christian party of conducting an "ambush."

According to the reports, the residents of the apartment buildings were elderly people who remembered the extremely horrific 1975-90 civil war, and did not want to see it repeated. This is what always happens after a crisis war. The people who lived through the war are traumatized and keep the war from recurring. In the case of an ethnic civil war, the result is the Democide pattern which means that the government (the winning side in the civil war) uses violence to keep the losing side under control.

As the gun battle was progressing, many people feared that it would escalate into a renewal of the civil war. But this is a generational Unraveling era for Lebanon, and there are too many people alive who remember the horrors of the last civil war, and will do everything in their power to prevent a new one. So it's not surprising the gun battle fizzled after five hours.

Lebanon's government of impunity

In August of last year there was a massive explosion in the port of Beirut, which could be felt as far away as Cyprus. It has been described as the greatest non-nuclear explosion in world history. The people of Beirut, many of whose lives were destroyed by the catastrophe, correctly blame government officials. Many go to blame the most powerful force in Lebanon's government, Iran-backed Hezbollah. (See "22-Aug-20 World View -- Hezbollah implicated in catastrophic Beirut Lebanon explosion")

In 2013, 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate were stored in an unprotected warehouse in the seaport of Beirut next door to a fireworks factory. The government did nothing about it for years, despite repeated warnings, and there are reports that Hezbollah used some of the ammonium nitrate to create bombs and weapons that it used in the war in Syria. Finally, on Tuesday, August 4, 2020, a catastrophic explosion in the Beirut seaport leveled thousands of homes, killed and injured thousands of people, and left 300,000 people homeless,

Prior to the explosion, goverment services like providing electricity, water and garbage collection were spotty. Since the explosion, the value of the currency has fallen 90%, homes go for days with no electricity, the water is filthy, and there's no garbage collection.

Anecdotally, they now live the �shawarma paradox�: the national sandwich which cost 5,000 Lebanese pounds or $2 a couple of years ago, today is priced at 20,000 pounds or less than a dollar.

Lebanon's government is a government of impunity. Any government official can skim money and put it into his Swiss bank account or buy a Swiss villa with impunity. There have been numerous political assassinations, and no one is ever held accountable. There are never even any investigations.

With the seaport explosion, a whole city was blown up, and so many of the Lebanese people were traumatized, and are still traumatized, that the ordinary people (not the �lite) and are demanding to know who was responsible for the explosion so that they can be held accountable.

The investigation of the port explosion paralyzes Lebanon's government

The "ordinary" people of Beirut have been demanding an investigation, and an end to the government of impunity. They want to know who is responsible, and they want someone to be held accountable. People want to know who owned the ammonium nitrate? Who refused to do anything about it, though they were repeatedly warned over and over? Who ordered the ammonium nitrate to be unloaded from the boat into the port in 2013 in the first place?

Last year, the people initially demanded an international investigation. Hezbollah's powerful leader, Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah, blocked those attempts, and said that an investigation would have to be local.

So surprisingly there actually was a Lebanese investigation, led by Judge Tarek Bitar has been praised by the international community for being unbiased and transparent in carrying out the investigation.

However, as the investigation has proceeded, it has been increasingly threatening to Hezbollah, as former Hezbollah ministers are being called to testify. At the same time, Lebanon's Christian President Michel Aoun has supported the investigation.

It's the success so far of the investigation that led to Thursday's shootout. The Hezbollah supporters were protesting the investigation, demanding that Bitar be removed. It's not clear why the Christians were ambushing the Hezbollah protests at this time, except that there's a lot of anger among victims of the catastophic seaport explosion, and they are willing to use violence to determine who is responsible.

Hezbollah threatens large-scale violence

Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah has made it clear that he will not tolerate the Bitar investigation much longer. An investigation that finds that Hezbollah officials were responsible for the explosion would be a major humiliation to Hezbollah and to Iran.

The Christian president Michel Aoun and Hezbollah leader Nasrallah formed an alliance of convenience in 2006, to their mutual benefit. However, the Catholics want an investigation and Hezbollah does not, and this has caused a split between Aoun and Nasrallah.

This conflict has benefited Aoun's Christian political rival, Samir Geagea, a Hezbollah opponent with close Saudi ties. Geagea is leader of Lebanese Forces (LF), a Christian party opposing Aoun.

Geagea was a military commander during the Lebanese civil war, and is accused of participating in massacres and an organized coup. Nasrallah is now blaming Geagea and the Lebanese Forces with being responsible for the shootout last week, allied with Saudi Arabia, the United States and Israel. According to a pro-Hezbollah report, Geagea has sought to �impose himself as the sole representative of the Christians and return to the sectarian stronghold by committing a deliberate and organized massacre like the one he committed during the Lebanese Civil War.�

In a nationally televised speech on Monday, Nasrallah said:

"Civil war constitutes the real plan of the Lebanese Forces party, because civil war will lead to demographic changes, which will cram the Christians into a specific area, like in [their] past dreams, where they will establish a Christian canton, a Christian state, or a Christian ghetto, which will be dominated by the Lebanese Forces party. ...
[Geagea,] you should pay attention to the following figure. This is the first time I divulge this figure, and I do it to prevent a civil war, rather than to threaten to start one. You know me, I never say something that is not true. I belong to the school that maintains that lies are not useful even in psychological warfare. Only truth and reliability are useful in psychological warfare."

At the same time, Hezbollah continues to demand that Judge Bitar's investigation be ended, while the public at large is demanding that it reach a conclusion and identify the responsible parties.

Lebanon's future

Lebanon's government was already in a fragile state, but the dispute over Judge Bitar and the investigation has paralyzed the government completely, as it is now impossible even to call a cabinet meeting.

The situation is evolving on a daily basis. Nobody wants another civil war, particularly the elderly people who survived the last civil war. But there will still be sporadic violence.

Unanswered questions: Will Judge Tarek Bitar's investigation continue? Will the government collapse completely? The situation is so volatile, we may have at least a few answers soon.

The one emerging hope is that there will be reforms leading to the emergence of a non-sectarian government of technocrats. If such a government is acceptable to the international community, then sanctions will be removed, and aid will flow into Lebanon.

However, that's a dream. Iran and Hezbollah will never give up their power without a war, and it's more likely that the sporadic violence will recur and grow.

Sources:

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11-Oct-21 World View -- Tensions heat up between China and Taiwan

When will the Chinese Communists invade Taiwan?

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Taiwan celebrates 'Taiwan National Day'
China sends hundreds of fighter planes and bombers into Taiwan airspace
Xi Jinping is running out of time
China's disastrous one-child policy produces harsh consequences
Taiwan's friends -- America, Japan, Australia, India
The Beijing Olympics
When will the Chinese Communists invade Taiwan?
Moving

Taiwan celebrates 'Taiwan National Day'

Isabel Zhang was born in mainland China, while her husband James Xu is Taiwanese. The Australian couple are worried about their respective families in case of war (Australian Broadcasting)

Isabel Zhang was born in mainland China, while her husband James Xu is Taiwanese. The Australian couple are worried about their respective families in case of war (Australian Broadcasting)

On October 10, 1911, the Wuchang Uprising began, launching the Chinese Revolution and forming the Chinese Nationalists, led by Sun Yat-Sen. He created the Republic of China based on his "Three Principles of the People," developed in 1905 -- nationalism, democracy and welfare. Later in the century, the Chinese Communists, led by Mao Zedong, defeated the Chinese Nationalists, led by Chiang Kai-shek, in the Chinese civil war that climaxed in 1949. Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese Nationalists fled to Formosa and formed the nation of Taiwan. On Sunday, October 10, Taiwan celebrated the anniversary of the uprising that led to the Republic of China.

Beijing prefers to celebrate its own China National Day on October 1, which commemorates the creation of the People's Republic of China in 1949. The Chinese Communists hate Taiwan's National Day, and this has led to dueling rhetoric.

Taiwan celebrated with huge parades highlighted by military equipment. Taiwan's president Tsai Ing-wen said the following:

"We will do our utmost to prevent the status quo from being unilaterally altered.
We will continue to bolster our national defense and demonstrate our determination to defend ourselves in order to ensure that nobody can force Taiwan to take the path China has laid out for us.
The path that China has laid out offers neither a free and democratic way of life for Taiwan, nor sovereignty for our 23 million people."

China sends hundreds of fighter planes and bombers into Taiwan airspace

During the past few days, the Chinese Communists have sent hundreds of fighter planes and bombers into Taiwan airspace. China's state media explained this aerial invasion in this way:

"According to statistics from Taiwan island, the PLA has sent warplanes into the island's "airspace" in 198 days so far this year. Such a number reflects that the PLA has carried out wide-ranged and profound operations to familiarize itself with battlefield conditions, with a large number of PLA Air Force units having experience flying close to the island. Once the order to attack is given, the PLA's pilots will fight as "experienced veterans." ...
The PLA is forming a siege of Taiwan with a show of strength as it did in Beijing in 1949. There is no doubt about the future of the situation across the Taiwan Straits. The initiative of when and how to solve the Taiwan question is firmly in the hands of the Chinese mainland."

Well, that's an interesting historical comparison. They're relating the "siege" of Taiwan to a siege that the Communists used to defeat the Nationalists in 1949.

So the Communists say that the purpose of sending hundreds of warplanes over Taiwan is to allow their pilots to gain experience and become "experienced veterans." There are two possible interpretations of this. One is that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is imminent, and the other is that the current incursions are merely practice for a future invasion to occur sometime in the future.

That the Communists intend to invade Taiwan is certain. China has repeatedly declared the intention to invade Taiwan and annex it to China.

Last week, as the hundreds of warplanes were threatening Taiwan, Communist leader Xi Jinping said the following:

"Taiwan independence separatism is the biggest obstacle to achieving the reunification of the motherland, and the most serious hidden danger to national rejuvenation. ...
Reunification through a peaceful manner is the most in line with the overall interest of the Chinese nation, including Taiwan compatriots. ...
No one should underestimate the Chinese people's staunch determination, firm will, and strong ability to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity. The historical task of the complete reunification of the motherland must be fulfilled, and will definitely be fulfilled."

Xi Jinping is running out of time

Xi's problem is that, in many ways, he's running out of time, mostly for generational reasons.

Until the 1990s, the Nationalists ruled Taiwan, and most Taiwanese believed that it was only a matter of time before Taiwan would be reunitied with the mainland, although many would have demanded that the Nationalists govern the reunited country.

Since then, the survivors of the 1940s civil war have died off, and new generations have grown and come to power. A major turning point was the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, which the citizens of Taiwan watched with horror. This led to the rise of the nominally pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), whose leader is the current president Tsai Ing-wen. As the new generations have come to power, and young people displace old people, more and more people oppose reunification. In recent years, Beijing's brutal treatment of Hong Kong has reinforced this opposition. According to polls, fewer than 10% of the people today favor reunification, and many of those would agree to reunification only if mainland China became a democratic country, something that's not going to happen.

So Xi Jinping is running out of time in Taiwan, but he's also running out of time on the mainland. Younger generations are increasingly nationalistic and xenophobic, and are demanding that Xi Jinping stop stalling and take action in Taiwan.

China's disastrous one-child policy produces harsh consequences

The one-child policy, adopted in 1979, has been a disaster for China. Women who had unapproved pregnancies could be violently dragged from their homes and forced to abort and be sterilized. If an unapproved child was born, then the child could not be registered, and essentially did not exist, so could not get schooling or other social benefits.

The policy accelerated the aging of the population, and a decline in the working-age population, which threatens economic growth. Furthermore, with fewer children, fewer elderly people could be cared for by their children. In 2015 there were eleven working age Chinese for every retiree. By 2050, if not earlier, there will only be two for each retiree.

In addition, parents often aborted girl babies, since they wanted their one child to be a boy. The result is that millions of young males have been unable to find a wife, and so females are enticed or coerced (kidnapped by criminal gangs) to become wives of Chinese men who have no other options, which is raising tensions with China's neighbors.

The result is that the number of elderly people is growing, while the population as a whole is shrinking. This puts a strain on the country's pension system, and creates a constantly shrinking labor force. China is already finding it difficult to fill many difficult jobs, including jobs in the military, resulting in lower GDP growth.

There are other domestic problems facing Xi Jinping. The collapse of Evergrande is spreading and could have far-reaching consequences, including outside of China. (See "25-Sep-21 World View -- China Evergrande construction firm heads to default")

Internationally, China is facing criticism about its brutal crackdown on the free press in Hong Kong, China's arrest and enslavement of millions of Uighurs, and illegal belligerent actions in the South China Sea. The Chinese Communists have made it abundantly clear that they don't care at all what others think of them, and what international laws they violate. What we're seeing is the millennia-old Chinese culture saying that the rest of the world are barbarians, and are to be treated as donkeys, with no purpose except to serve the Chinese Communists.

Taiwan's friends -- America, Japan, Australia, India

According to analysts, China would prevail in an invasion of Taiwan, although Taiwan would inflict a great deal of damage on China at the same time. However, that assumes that Taiwan would fight Taiwan alone.

By the way, to my knowledge nobody supports China's invasion of Taiwan. Cambodia and Pakistan are close allies with China, but I'm not aware that they or any other country would join China in an invasion of Taiwan.

However, there are several countries that are likely to help defend Taiwan.

The most obvious friend is the United States, and it's debated endlessly whether the US would defend Taiwan, or would just stand by and allow Taiwan to be swallowed up by China. My personal belief is that this would constitute a "generational regeneracy" event (regenerating civic unity behind the president), and we would be at war with China within a few hours or days.

America has been helping Taiwan to defend itself, mainly by providing weapons systems. In the last few days, it was reported that about two dozen U.S. troops have been deployed to Taiwan for at least the last year to train local military forces to bolster the island's defenses. The special operators have worked with Taiwanese ground troops and the Marines have worked with maritime forces on small-boat operations.

Taiwan has other friends, most notably Japan. As I've been writing for years, China has been thirsting for a war with Japan in revenge for the atrocities (chemical warfare, rape of Nanking) committed by Japan on China during World War II. Furthermore, and nationalism and xenophobia have increased in both countries, and there are now signs that the Japanese are thirsting for a new war with the Chinese. It shouldn't take long for both thirsts to be quenched.

One trigger for a Japanese war with China would be a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. Although Japan has a "pacifist" constitution, in 2015 the law was reinterpreted to permit Japanese forces to defend an ally (Taiwan or the US) as "collective self-defense," provided that Japan's government determined that the war was a security threat that threatened Japan's own survival. For example, the Japanese might view the invasion of Taiwan as a stepping-stone to a planned invasion of Japan. (See "28-Jun-21 World View -- Japan's plans for defending Taiwan from an attack by China")

Beyond Japan, there is also the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, linking the United States, Japan, India and Australia, This grouping does not have any military commitments, but it will hold talks to "hold China accountable."

The Beijing Olympics

The 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing will begin on Friday, February 4, and end on Sunday, February 20. This is an interesting milepost in the discussions of a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

On the one hand, the Olympics games are a matter of enormous prestige for the Chinese Communists, and they would not want to besmirch the games by an untoward event, like a major war. This suggests that any planned invasion of Taiwan would have to come after February 20.

On the other hand, it's expected that there will be substantial boycotts of the games, for two reasons. One reason is that China is actively committing genocide, ethnic cleansing and enslavement of millions of Muslim Uighurs, and many people will boycott in protest. The second reason is that China kidnaps and jails foreigners without charges in order to gain political advantage, in a policy known as "hostage diplomacy," and many people want to stay away from China for fear of being held hostage to some political dispute.

When will the Chinese Communists invade Taiwan?

Xi Jinping and Tsai Ing-wen both upped rhetoric this past week, in celebration of the "National Days" for China and Taiwan, respectively, with China going much farther by launching hundreds of warplanes to fly over Taiwan.

There is enormous and growing pressure on Xi Jinping to do something to solve the Taiwan problem. However, I agree with those analysts who say that Xi cannot risk an invasion at this time (or at any time, really) because the results would be too unpredictable and potentially catastrophic. So you have the "pressure cooker" analogy, where you don't know when the pressure will be too great, but you know that the pressure has to blow at some point. Or maybe you prefer the "straw that breaks the camel's back" analogy where you know that if you keep piling on straw, then eventually a straw will break the camel's back, though you don't know in advance which one.

As I've written in the past, crisis wars begin with a chaotic unexpected event. World War I began because a 12-year-old high school student decided in 1914 that it would be fun to shoot an Archduke. WW II began in 1937 because a Japanese soldier had to pee and got lost in the woods. Those wars were a complete surprise, even to the belligerents. That's how WW III will begin. It will be totally irrational, insane and unexpected, and it could happen any day.

Moving

During the last two weeks, I've been moved to a new apartment, and I still can't figure out where many things are in the new apartment. At the same time, my computer's hard disk crashed, though fortunately I had everything backed up. All of this has been extremely overwhelming, and it turns out that at age 77 it's even more so, when everything happens at once.

So anyway, anyone who wants to contact me by snail mail should use my new address, which is the same as my old address, except for the apartment number:

John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 2-03C [New apartment number]
Cambridge, MA 02142

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25-Sep-21 World View -- China Evergrande construction firm heads to default

Crypto-currency crackdown

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

China Evergrande construction firm heads to default
Scrambling to avoid a 'systemic' financial crisis and social unrest
The 'moral hazard' problem
Crypto-currency crackdown

China Evergrande construction firm heads to default

An unfinished Evergrande construction project in Taicang, China (Quartz)

An unfinished Evergrande construction project in Taicang, China (Quartz)

Last week, it was clear that China Evergrande Group real estate construction and retail investment firm was a gargantuan Ponzi scheme that was headed for default soon, unless the Chinese Communist government executed an extremely risky bailout. (See "16-Sep-21 World View -- China's Evergrande financial crisis threatens China's financial stability")

By Friday, 24-Sept, Evergrande was scheduled to pay $83.5 million in interest payments on dollar-denominated bonds held by overseas investors (i.e., non-Chinese). Evergrande missed those payments, but Evergrade will not be in technical default until a 30-day grace period has passed.

Evergrande owes another $47.5 million to offshore investors next week, and $669 million by the end of the year. By the end of next year, Evergrande has to pay back $7.4 billion, as a number of bonds mature. All in all, Evergrande has $305 billion in liabilities.

Scrambling to avoid a 'systemic' financial crisis and social unrest

Evergrande interest payments due, 2021-2024 (Bloomberg)

Evergrande interest payments due, 2021-2024 (Bloomberg)

Beijing cannot save Evergrande, but the Chinese Communist regulators have announced that they will henceforth be closely supervising decisions by Evergrande. They will override international financial norms and agreements to achieve the political ends of preventing a "systemic" financial crisis or social unrest.

Under direction from regulators, Evergrande has reportedly made arrangements with local (Chinese) bondholders to delay interest payments.

Offshore (non-Chinese) bond holders will not be made whole. Current estimates are that if you hold an Evergrande bond, then you'll receive only 25% of its value, though that number could fall as time goes on. However, most offshore bond holders are actually large international banks, like the Swiss bank UBS, which holds $275.7 million in Evergrande's bonds.

There is little appetite in Beijing to pay back Western bondholders, but this is offset by worries that Chinese companies will not have access to dollar funding in the future. So some accomodation will be made for Western bondholders.

As for local (Chinese) banks, Beijing has injected billions of additional yuan into the banking system to prevent "contagion" -- bank failure resulting from Evergrande failure, in the cases where bank loans won't be repaid.

Beijing is telling Evergrande to pay off Chinese retail investors first. The objective is to avoid social unrest.

Beijing is also telling Evergrande to finish up its unfinished homes under construction, for the same reason. Evergrande is estimated to have a staggering 1.5 million unfinished properties, for which down payments have been collected, but many of which have stopped construction, for lack of funding. Private property developers are being told to prepare to take over projects left unfinished by Evergrande.

Evergrande's Ponzi scheme involved using the down payments for new homes to pay off old debts. Many of these down payments were also used for risky ventures in electric vehicle manufacturing, bottled water, football clubs, and amusement parks. So now, many of these homes are incomplete in ghost cities.

Evergrande is offering a fire sale of unfinished or unoccupied properties, in order to generate cash. Estimates are that you can get something for 40% of its market value. However, China's real estate is in a bubble, and there is a fear that this action will cause property values generally to fall sharply, causing bankruptcies in other areas of the economy.

Chinese banks, including Bank of China and China CITIC Bank Corp, are now closely monitoring their own clients and scrutinizing all loans, to make sure that no other construction firm is about to fail because of its own Ponzi scheme. Credit is being eliminated or tightened for fourth-tier and third-tier cities across China. Smaller Chinese banks are themselves being scrutinized for viability.

The 'moral hazard' problem

Whenever any investors or debtors are bailed out for any reason in any country, there is always a "moral hazard" problem. This is the problem that risky or reckless behavior should not be rewarded with a bailout, since that will encourage others to pursue to risky and reckless behavior.

According to reports, Chinese regulators do not want to get involved in any sort of bailout of Evergrande or any of its subsidiaries until the very last moment, and then only if absolutely necessary.

Most analysts seem to believe that the Chinese Communists will be able to contain the damage from an Evergrande default, with no systemic damage to China's economy and no sustained social unrest or rebellions, although investors outside of China may lose all or almost all of these investments.

Crypto-currency crackdown

Last week's article described a related matter -- a crackdown on China's Macau, the gambling capital of Asia. I'm told that the purpose of the crackdown was end Macau's use of money laundering, particularly the practice by wealth mainlanders of using sending money abroad through Macau.

This week on Friday, the Chinese Communists announced a crackdown on crypto-currencies like Bitcoin. Not only will use of cryto-currencies be made illegal, but any transactions involving the cryto-currencies will be illegal.

Once again, this is apparently a way to prevent money laundering, particularly when used to send money abroad.

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China's Evergrande financial crisis threatens China's financial stability (16-Sep-2021)

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17-Sep-21 World View -- ANKUS agreement: US and UK will help Australia build nuclear-powered submarine fleet

Furious reactions from China and France

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

ANKUS agreement: US and UK will help Australia build nuclear-powered submarine fleet
Furious reaction from China
Furious reaction from France

ANKUS agreement: US and UK will help Australia build nuclear-powered submarine fleet

Anika Havey, owner of Folklore Cafe in Port Adelaide, where nuclear-powered submarines will be built (Australian Broadcasting)

Anika Havey, owner of Folklore Cafe in Port Adelaide, where nuclear-powered submarines will be built (Australian Broadcasting)

The US, the UK and Australia have reached a new agreement called the "AUKUS pact." The US will provide nuclear-power technology to Australia, and Australia will build a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines using the technology, with help from the US and UK. The submarines will be nuclear-powered, but they will not be capable of launching nuclear weapons. The intention is for eight nuclear-powered submarines to be built in Adelaide.

The Aukus announcement did not mention China specifically. However, it referred repeatedly to regional security concerns which they said had "grown significantly."

Commenting on the agreement, UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said China was "embarking on one of the biggest military spends in history. It is growing its navy [and] air force at a huge rate. Obviously it is engaged in some disputed areas. Our partners in those regions want to be able to stand their own ground."

The agreement will also provide for industrial cooperation among the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom on other key technologies, including artificial intelligence, cyber, and long-range precision strike capabilities.

Furious reaction from China

According to China's Foreign Ministry:

"The nuclear submarine cooperation between the US, the UK and Australia has seriously undermined regional peace and stability, intensified the arms race and undermined international non-proliferation efforts. The export of highly sensitive nuclear submarine technology to Australia by the US and the UK proves once again that they are using nuclear exports as a tool for geopolitical game and adopting double standards. This is extremely irresponsible."

It's always really funny when the Chinese Communist sleazebags accuse someone of undermining peace and stability, or of being irresponsible. The Chinese Communists are emulating the Nazis by illegally annexing the South China Sea, by threatening Taiwan, and by committing genocide, rape, torture, and other atrocities against millions of Uighurs.

What the Chinese sleazebags want is to take control of the entire Indo-Pacific region, without any opposition. The Aukus agreement is a clear challenge to China's illegal military threats.

Furious reaction from France

The Ankus agreement scraps an existing $90 billion deal that Australia had with the French shipbuilding firm Naval Group. That agreement would have had France provide non-nuclear submarine technology for Australia's submarine fleet.

In an interview, France's furious Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said:

"It's just not done between allies. It's a stab in the back. This unilateral, brutal, unpredictable decision is very similar to what Mr Trump used to do. ... We had established a relationship of trust with Australia and this trust has been betrayed. This is not the end of the story."

France's Defense Ministry added:

"[Australia's decision] is contrary to the letter and spirit of the cooperation that prevailed between France and Australia, based on a relationship of political trust as well as on the development of a very high-level defence industrial and technological base in Australia. [Also,] the American choice to exclude a European ally and partner from a structuring partnership with Australia, at a time when we are facing unprecedented challenges in the Indo-Pacific region, whether in terms of our values or in terms of respect for multilateralism based on the rule of law, shows a lack of coherence that France can only note with regret."

As far as I can tell, France was going to sell Australia old, out-of-date diesel-power technology for the new submarine fleet, while the Aukus agreement sells new nuclear-power technology. I assume that's the reason that Australia canceled the agreement with France and went with the Aukus agreement.

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16-Sep-21 World View -- China's Evergrande financial crisis threatens China's financial stability

Will there be a government bailout?

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

China's Evergrande financial crisis threatens China's financial stability
Will there be a government bailout?
China Huarong Asset Management bailout
Generational Dynamics analysis
China's Macau crackdown and contagion to United States

China's Evergrande financial crisis threatens China's financial stability

Year to date performance of Chinese stocks, battered by new Chinese regulations in numerous sectors (Reuters)

Year to date performance of Chinese stocks, battered by new Chinese regulations in numerous sectors (Reuters)

China Evergrande Group is an enormous real estate construction firm that has built millions of homes and other structures in China, and which has expanded into other areas, such electric vehicles, a theme park, a soccer club, a food company, and other areas. However, Evergrande is now close to default because of its massive debt, and its inability to meet its obligations.

China's Evergrande financial crisis has been bubbling for several months, but reaching a turning point on Monday when the company issued a statement denying that it was close to bankruptcy, but saying that it was going to hire financial advisers to explore "all feasible solutions" to its crisis. However, they would not guarantee that the company will meet its financial obligations. That announcement provoked protests at Evergrande offices across the country.

Evergrande appears to me to be a giant Ponzi scheme, where new debt is incurred to cover old, out of control debts.

So Evergrande as a construction firm has completed nearly 900 commercial, residential, and infrastructure projects. But it has 1.5 million unfinished properties, for which down payments have been collected, but many of which have stopped construction, for lack of funding. For years, Evergrande has apparently used down payments for new homes and projects to fund completion of previously committed projects, leaving no money for the new projects.

Millions of ordinary homebuyers who made down payments on new home construction are now facing losing their down payments, and getting no homes. According to press reports, Evergrande now has about 900 unfinished projects, and there are about 1.2 million people waiting to move in.

In order to fund its Ponzi scheme, Evergrande for years has been offering investment opportunities in "wealth management products" (WMPs), which are offered by many Chinese banks and financial institutions, and which are are unique components of China's shadow banking system. A retail investor can invest in a WMP, which supposedly guarantees a high rate of return, but which is not directly backed by any solid asset, such as real estate. Evergrande pays the WMP through profits from its real estate business and by issuing its own bonds. But if the real estate business is not making profits, and if its bonds are losing value in the financial markets, then Evergrande will default on the WMPs.

Every Ponzi scheme depends on an accelerating stream of cash to fund further sales to meet previous debt obligations. As soon as there's a slowdown in the incoming stream of cash for any reason, like a recession or new regulations, then the Ponzi scheme crashes. That seems to be where Evergrande is now. This means that homebuyers, lenders, bondholders and retail investors are all subject to some or all of their investments. According to some reports, bondholders will lose 75% of their investments.

Will there be a government bailout?

As things stand now, Evergrande is going to collapse, possibly into bankruptcy but at least into massive restructuring. With millions of people losing some or all of their investments, this could lead to China's dreaded "social unrest." Evergrande's headquarters are located in Shenzhen, which is on the mainland adjacent to Hong Kong, in southern China which has historically been the crucible of China's previous massive rebellions, including Mao's Communist Rebellion (1934-49) and the huge Taiping Rebellion (1854-64). The Chinese Communists are well aware of this history.

The Beijing government may decide that Evergrande is "too big to fail," and bail the company out. But Evergrande has publicly acknowledged $300 billion in debt, and so a bailout would test even the Communist government's resources.

But it's more complicated than even that. For years, there have been news stories about ghost cities where entire towns had been built with homes and stores, all of which remained empty and unoccupied. Many individuals purchased these homes, not to live in, but as an investment, hoping to cash in when they finally became occupied and increased in value. Instead, they're now worth much less than their original prices, and they're sitting empty, with no hope of occupancy.

Another problem is that if Evergrande defaults, then the entire real estate market could collapse, as millions of new properties could possibly come on the market at the same time.

So a bailout might cost China's government considerably more than the $300 billion in debt.

China Huarong Asset Management bailout

So bailing out the Evergrande Ponzi debt might be too expensive even for China. Even worse, it may result in contagion. Investors in other large financial firms with huge exposures might demand similar bailouts.

It was just last month that Beijing executed a much smaller bailout. China's Huarong Asset Management announced a $16 billion net loss for 2020. After months of saying nothing, the Chinese Communist government finally gave in and agreed to a bailout, for fear that a Huarong bankruptcy could destablize China's financial system.

The way that the bailout would work is that Huarong will issue new shares to five state-owned companies -- Citic Group, China Insurance Investment, China Life Asset Management, China Cinda Asset Management and Sino-Ocean Capital Holding. By purchasing these shares, the five state-owned companies would provide a huge cash infusion to Huarong.

So if that worked for Huarong, would it also work for Evergrande? Well, Huarong lost a mere $16 billion, while Evergrande is at least $300 billion in debt, and possibly much more. So it may not even be possible.

Generational Dynamics analysis

There are several typical behaviors that generations and populations exhibit during a generational Crisis era, like the one we've been in since the beginning of the century. At this time, all the people who survived the previous generational crisis war (World War II) have all died or retired, and the new generations in power (Gen-X, Millennials) have no memory of the lessons learned. They forget the nationalism and xenophobiat that caused the World War II, and they forget the profligacy that resulted in the previous major financial crisis (1929). They say that history doesn't repeat itself but it rhymes, and we're seeing that now.

I've written much about China's increasing xenophobia and nationalism directed at Japan and Taiwan, and I won't repeat it here, but I want to focus on profligacy.

The United States is already $28 trillion in debt, and is contemplating new legislation that will add $5 trillion more to the debt. That's absolutely ridiculous, and will result in the worst financial crisis in the history of the world.

China is also incurring historically high levels of debt, with no end in sight. At some point there will be a major financial crisis in China, with tens or even hundreds of million people losing their life savings as the crisis spreads from company to company.

That will give rise to the Beijing's nightmare scenario, massive social unrest, possibly turning into rebellion.

China's Macau crackdown and contagion to United States

Macau is similar to Hong Kong in that it is a special administrative region in southern China. However, Macau is the gambling capital of Asia, competing against Las Vegas for customers.

On Tuesday, China's regulators announced changes to the gaming law that would give the government much greater control over the casinos, and possibly a larger share of the earnings.

You may think that this is an internal Chinese matter, but it's not. Almost all the casinos are operated by American companies -- Sands China, Wynn Macau, Galaxy Entertainment, SJM Holdings, Melco Entertainment and MGM China. And Macau stocks lost a third of their value, around $14 billion, because investors feared that China would impose tighter regulations.

This illustrates how tightly interlocked the Chinese and American companies are, and a global financial crisis in one country will cause a chain reaction financial crisis in the other.

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7-Sep-21 World View -- Taliban declares total victory in Afghanistan

Did Joe Biden intentionally sabotage the Afghanistan evacuation?

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Taliban declares total victory in Afghanistan
Afghanistan view: Biden administration and mainstream media
Afghanistan view: Republicans, Conservatives and Fox News
Afghanistan view: The British, European and BBC view
Afghanistan view: Qatar and Al-Jazeera
Potential flood of refugees into Central Asia and Europe
Pakistan and refugees fleeing Afghan Taliban
Battle of Panjshir Valley
The Taliban, Haqqani Network, Al-Qaeda and ISIS-K
Is this the end of the war in Afghanistan?
Did Joe Biden intentionally sabotage the Afghanistan evacuation?
Will there be a new Afghanistan civil war?
Political fallout

Taliban declares total victory in Afghanistan

Women's demonstration in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, on 6-Sept (Reuters)

Women's demonstration in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, on 6-Sept (Reuters)

The Taliban have announced that they're in total control of Afghanistan, now that they've won the last battle, the clash in Panjshir Valley. It's not clear that this is true. The Taliban have cut off electricity and communications to the Panjshir Valley, so it's impossible to read what's going on. I'll discuss the Panjshir Valley below.

Separately, there's already a potential hostage crisis in progress, with the Taliban preventing Americans from leaving Mazar-i-Sharif airport. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is negotiating with the Taliban to obtain safe passage. But as of this writing, the situation is unclear.

The situation in Afghanistan is extremely complex. It's very hard to provide a politically balanced exposition, since the evacuation was clearly a disaster. Even many Democrats agree. I'm going to quote from different, sometimes conflicting media sources, in order to sort the issues out.

Afghanistan view: Biden administration and mainstream media

The view held by president Joe Biden, the Democrats, the administration and by the left-wing mainstream media (CNN, MSNBC, CBS news, etc.) is that the Afghanistan problem has now ended, and that it's time to move on.

Biden says that the evacuation ws an "extraordinary success." He says that he was handed an existing agreement that the Taliban had made with former president Donald Trump, and that he had to implement it as best as he could. He admits that only 90% of the Americans and Afghan allies had been evacuated, leaving 10% behind, but he says that any large historical evacuation has always been chaotic and had always left people behind.

The Biden administration has been downplaying the problem. They insist that only 100 or 200 Americans are left behind, and many of those have families in Afghanistan and didn't want to leave.

In fact, the mainstream media are cooperating with the desire of the administration to turn the page. MSNBC and CNN sometimes aggressively covered the Afghan evacuation prior to 30-Aug, but since then, coverage on those channels has fallen off a cliff, and typically the Afghan war is never even mentioned.

The Biden administration now wants to turn the page back to the $1.3 trillion infrastructure bill that has passed in the Senate, but is being held up in the house, and the $3.5 trillion "human infrastructure" bill, which is an ill-defined collection of spending on Democrat cronies, including labor unions, teachers unions, debt-ridden Democrat states, and social services organizations.

Afghanistan view: Republicans, Conservatives and Fox News

The decision to "end the war" is overwhelmingly popular, but many people believe that the evacuation was botched and America was defeated, betrayed and forced to surrender. In particular, Bagram airbase should not have been closed as the first act of the evacuation. The result was that billions of dollars in advanced American weapons have been left behind, as have hundreds, thousands, or tens of thousands (depending on the report) of Americans and Afghan allies have been left behind. Republicans say that people should have been evacuated first, then weapons, and then Bagram could be closed.

Republicans refer to a newly leaked transcript of a phone call between Joe Biden and Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani on July 23, when Biden said, "And there is a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture." Soon after, Ghani fled the country.

Many Republicans -- and many Democrats, especially veterans -- say that Biden not only botched the evacuation but has betrayed America and the veterans who fought in that war for 20 years, by letting the Taliban take over as if we were back in 2001.

The Republicans point out that Biden's approval rating has crashed from 60% a few months ago to 43% now.

A particularly bitter complaint is the number of Americans and Afghan allies that have been left behind, and mostly ignored, and by the repeated Administration lies about the number of these. As recently as August 19 Biden said in an interview, "If there are American citizens left, we're gonna stay till we get them all out." He said the same was true of Afghan allies. It's believed that Biden never had any intention of fulfilling this promise, since he wants to make a grand "Mission Accomplished!" speech on 11-Sep-2021.

A separate issue for conservatives is that Afghan refugees are coming into the country without being properly vetted. This subject will be debated in the coming weeks.

Afghanistan view: The British, European and BBC view

The BBC receives a great deal of funding from NPR, so it normally just repeats the same Democrat talking points as CNN and MSNBC.

However, this situation is different, because the British and Europeans also feel completely betrayed. In fact, the mission in Afghanistan was actually a NATO mission, and Biden made a unilateral decision without even consulting NATO or any European leaders. So neither NATO nor the individual countries had time to evacuate their own troops or their citizens.

The result was that countries like Britain, France, Italy and Germany each left behind a thousand or more citizens. The future of Nato itself is in doubt.

Once Kabul fell to the Taliban, and Biden blamed it on the Afghan government, criticism from Europe was sharp.

Tom Tugendhat, Tory chair of foreign affairs committee said:

"To see their commander-in-chief [the US president, Joe Biden] call into question the courage of men I fought with � to claim that they ran � is shameful. Those who have not fought for the colours they fly should be careful about criticising those who have.
I leave the house with one image. In the year that I was privileged to be the adviser to the governor of Helmand, we opened girls� schools. The joy it gave parents to see their little girls going to school was extraordinary ...
The second image is one that the forever war that has just reignited could lead to. It is the image of a man whose name I never knew, carrying a child who had died hours earlier into our firebase and begging for help. There was nothing we could do. It was over. That is what defeat looks like; it is when you no longer have the choice of how to help. This does not need to be defeat, but at the moment it damn well feels like it."

Labor MP Dan Jarvis said the following:

"Many of us who served in Afghanistan have a deep bond of affection for the Afghan people, and I had the honour of serving alongside them in Helmand. We trained together, fought together and, in some cases, died together. They were our brothers in arms. I shudder to think where those men are now. Many will be dead, and I know others now consider themselves to be dead men walking. Where were we in their hour of need? We were nowhere. That is shameful, and it will have a very long-lasting impact on Britain�s reputation right around the world."

Norbert R�ttgen, chairman of the German parliament�s foreign relations committee and a senior member of Chancellor Angela Merkel�s Christian Democrats, said:

"I say this with a heavy heart and with horror over what is happening, but the early withdrawal was a serious and far-reaching miscalculation by the current administration. This does fundamental damage to the political and moral credibility of the West."

A number of European politicians are discussing the creation of a European Rapid Reaction Force.

The UK and the EU have said that when the Taliban announce their new government, there will be "operational engagement" with the new government, but they will not recognize it until it's "stable."

They are particularly concerned that girls and women "will be erased from life." The BBC already reports stories of rape, forced marriages.

Afghanistan view: Qatar and Al-Jazeera

As a Muslim country, Qatar is much more sympathetic to the Taliban than the West is.

Al-Jazeera has a very different view of the Afghanistan problem: refugees.

Al-Jazeera is headquartered in Doha, Qatar's capital city, and is funded by Qatar's monarchy.

Qatar has friendly relations with the Taliban, and Qatar also has friendly relations with the United States and the West. Qatar hosts a major American naval base. So I understand that al-Jazeera Arabic has been cheering for the Taliban. Of course, I watch al-Jazeera English, which is much more guarded.

Qatar is playing a pivotal role in Afghanistan's relationship with the United States. The thousands of Americans and Afghans that were evacuated from Afghanistan were first transited through Doha, before going on to other destinations. Qatar's government cooperated by providing hotel rooms and the essentials of food and medical treatment. The housing planned for the 2022 FIFA World Cup (soccer) contests next year is being used.

Since 30-Aug, the Qataris have taken on another important role. With the Americans gone, Kabul's airport was no longer operational for commercial use. The Qataris and the Turks are sending technicians to Kabul to make the airport operational. I understand that there's a dispute about who will operate the airport, once it's operational.

Al-Jazeera has been reporting heavily on the refugee issue.

Potential flood of refugees into Central Asia and Europe

The issue that may be very explosive in 2022 is a potential flood of hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees. The size of this flood will depend on the depth of the growing humanitarian disaster and the growing violence by the Taliban against people in the Tajik, Hazara and Uzbek ethnic groups that formed the backbone of the Northern Alliance that fought against the Taliban in the 1990s civil war.

Europeans still have sharp memories of the millions of refugees that flooded into Europe in 2015 and 2016. Those were mostly Syrian refugees, but a large percentage were Afghans. Now many Afghan refugees are once again crossing borders, hoping to find a better life in the European Union.

The flood of refugees was only slowed in 2016 when the EU reached an agreement to pay Turkey a great deal of money to host millions of refugees.

The EU is looking for ways to prevent a new refugee crisis. Greece is strengthening its border wall with Turkey. EU negotiators are desperately trying to reach agreements to pay other countries to host a potential flood of Afghan refugees. Turkey has already said it wants no more refugees. Central Asian countries -- Tajikistan, Uzbekistan -- are closing their borders and, so far, are rebuffing EU offers to pay for housing of refugees.

According to the United Nations, Afghanistan is facing a looming humanitarian disaster. Even before the evacuation, Afghanistan's economy was in severe trouble, with a severe drought going on, but now the economy and the currency are collapsing. In addition, the entire health system is near collapse. According to a United Nations spokesman, "One in three Afghans do not know where their next meal will come from. Nearly half of all children under the age of 5 are predicted to be acutely malnourished in the next 12 months."

The United Nations has warned that up to half a million Afghans could flee the country by the end of the year and has called on neighbouring countries to keep their borders open. The current crisis comes on top of the 2.2 million Afghan refugees already in neighboring countries and 3.5 million people forced to flee their homes within Afghanistan's borders.

The UN says that more than 600,000 Afghans were displaced this year, 80% of which are women and children. But with the growing humanitarian crisis, it's possible that millions more will become refugees in the next year.

Other countries are helping out. Uganda, Mexico, Colombia and Rwanda are temporarily hosting Afghan refugees.

Belarus, arguably the worst country in Europe, is weaponizing refugees. They're inviting refugees into the country, and then transporting them across the border into Poland.

Pakistan and refugees fleeing Afghan Taliban

Pakistan's government has denied years of accusations that it was funding the Afghan Taliban. However, the accusations have really been directed at Pakistan's extremely powerful intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency, which is known to fund terrorist organizations in Afghanistan and India, and to have protected Osama bin Laden when he was hiding out in Pakistan.

Pakistan was formerly part of the British empire, and so the people in the government, the agencies, and the �lite almost always speak English. Among rural citizens, Punjabi and Sinhi are most widely spoken. In Afghanistan, most people speak Dari (Afghan variant of Persian), while the majority Pashtun ethnic group speak Pashto. So there is no particular advantage to other ethnic groups besides the Pashtuns to flee to Pakistan.

Nonetheless, Pakistan is the first country of choice for many displaced Pakistanis, especially Pashtuns. However, Pakistan has closed its borders with Afghanistan because it already hosts three million Afghan refugees and refuses to take more because of its own ravaged economy.

In 2020, Pakistan and Iran saw the highest numbers of Afghanistan's refugees and asylum seekers. Almost 1.5 million fled to Pakistan in 2020, while Iran hosted 780,000, according to UNHCR figures.

Furthermore, Pakistan has its own Pakistan Taliban (Tehrik-e-Taliban or TTP), different than the Afghan Taliban, that has conducted numerous violent terrorist attacks in Pakistan. The TTP has been opposed to the Afghan government for the last 20 years, but with the return of the Taliban government, the TTP is pledging allegiance to the Afghan Taliban.

According to analyst Walid Phares, the combined Afghan Taliban and TTP would like would like to take over all of Pakistan. Among other things, this would give them control of nuclear weapons.

Pakistan's government has expressed concerns that some TTP terrorists were let out of jail by the Taliban.

Battle of Panjshir Valley

The Taliban leadership promised that once the American forces were withdrawn, the Taliban would stop fighting and would govern peacefully. Nobody seriously believes any Taliban promises, but this one was broken instantly. As soon as the last American left, Taliban forces moved hundreds of fighters to subdue the Panjshir Valley.

Panjshir Valley has an almost mythical quality. When the Soviet Union invaded in the 1980s, and when the Taliban attacked during the 1990s, the Panjshir Valley was not conquered. The people of Panjshir Valley are Tajiks. The valley itself is surrounded by high mountains, and there is only one road used as an entrance and one road used as an exit. The Soviets attacked from the air, but were defeated when their helicopters were shot down with missiles. In the 1990s, the Taliban were defeated by blockading the entrance and exit roads. The Panjshir Valley was supported by the Americans against the Soviets, and by Central Asians against the Pashtuns.

In the 1990s, Panjshir Valley was the stronghold of the Northern Alliance, fighting the Taliban. Today, it's the stronghold of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), once again fighting against the Taliban.

There have been heavy clashes during the last week between the Taliban and the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF) in Panjshir Valley, with both sides claiming to have the upper hand.

This time, the Taliban have several advantages that they didn't have during the 1990s. First, they have a huge multi-billion stash of advanced weaponry that the Americans left behind, and those weapons are being used to attack the NRF. Second, the NRF does not have any foreign support, as it did in the past.

The Taliban have already cut off electricity and all communications to the valley. If the the clashes continue, they can impose a full siege, depriving the value of food and fuel, crippling their ability to fight.

The Taliban, Haqqani Network, Al-Qaeda and ISIS-K

Joe Biden said at once point that America had no further interest in Afghanistan because al-Qaeda was gone. This claim was considered by almost everyone to be outrageous. It's hard to guess whether that was a lie, or because he had no idea, but no one ever seriously believed that al-Qaeda was gone.

Biden's remark was particularly shocking in retrospect, after ISIS-K caused a massive explosion at Kabul airport, killing 13 American forces and hundreds of Afghans.

Al-Qaeda is deeply embedded in the Taliban and the Haqqani network, which has historical ties to Pakistan�s powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency, though Pakistan denies that.

The fear now is that Afghanistan next year will become a cauldron of international terrorism. The international jihadists networks are thrilled and excited that the Taliban have humiliated and defeated the Great Satan, the United States. There have already been reports of jihadists from Syria and northern Africa going to Afghanistan to join up with other jihadists and to receive training. This had led a number of people to conclude that it will be necessary for American forces to re-enter Afghanistan, possibly next year.

Is this the end of the war in Afghanistan?

When Saigon was evacuated in 1975, it was claimed that the Vietnam War "was over," something that continues to be believed today, even though nothing can be further from the truth, as I described in my book "Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War," published earlier this year.

Once Saigon fell to the Communists, the war was completely over for most Americans. But that wasn't true for the Vietnamese people. They knew what was going to happen because they'd seen it all before, especially in 1954 when the evacuation of French forces led to massacres of Catholics and other "pro-French" civilians in North Vietnam, forcing almost a million of them to flee to South Vietnam. Now that the North Vietnamese Communists were going to take over Saigon, they knew that they would probably have to flee again.

The new Communist government in Saigon acted in a very brutal way, using policies that they had learned from Communist China. There were harsh "re-education programs," as there are still in Communist China today. The peasants had their land taken from them and collectivized into state farms, as in China's disastrous Great Leap Forward, with similar results.

North Vietnam sent administrators to Saigon to establish a new regime. Officials in the defeated government were killed, and hundreds of thousands of people were sent to concentration camps, ostensibly to re-educate them to live in a socialist society. A system of registering the population was instituted to ensure that those whose families had supported the Second Republic were penalized by denial of employment, education, and food rations.

There was a massive exodus of refugees, and they became known as the "Vietnamese Boat People." Experts estimate that up to 1.5 million refugees escaped but a high estimate of 10 percent died from drowning, piracy, dehydration, or otherwise never made landfall.

The point of remembering that history of "the end of the Vietnam War" is that the Vietnam War was not over in 1975, and the Afghanistan war is not over today.

As I've written many times before, the ethnic groups in Afghanistan are COMPLETELY NON-UNITED and loathe each other. Pashtuns still have scores to settle with the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks that formed the Northern Alliance, especially the Shias. These opposing groups have fresh memories of the atrocities, torture, rape, beatings, dismemberments, mutilations, and so forth that the other side performed on their friends, wives and other family members, and they have no desire to be friends or to work together. They'd rather kill each other.

The media-savvy Taliban spokesmen are promising a kinder, gentler "Taliban 2.0" that will govern wisely and will respect women and girls, allowing them to go to school and work. That this is nonsense is made clear by the Vietnam example.

It's even worse, because the North Vietnamese were relatively disciplined, but the Taliban are a collection of tribes headed by warlords who may or may not obey the directions of the central leadership in Kabul. Any one of these tribal warlords might decide to revert to the harsh, violent practics of "Taliban 1.0," including brutality and abuse of girls and women.

Furthermore, there are Americans and American allies scattered in provinces across Afghanistan. Any one of the Americans can be used to provoke a hostage crisis, even worse than the Iran Hostage Crisis of 1979 that lasted over a year.

Did Joe Biden intentionally sabotage the Afghanistan evacuation?

Iconic photo of Joe Biden at press conference on 27-Aug, in response to a question (Telegraph)

Iconic photo of Joe Biden at press conference on 27-Aug, in response to a question (Telegraph)

Up until a few months ago, I would never have believed that any President of the United States would intentionally sabotage a major foreign policy effort like the Afghanistan evacuation.

My mind was opened to the possibility by my work on my recent book, "Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War," published earlier this year. I concluded, after months of research involving dozens of sources, that John F. Kennedy intentionally sabotaged the Vietnam war effort. Two major decisions -- first, neutralization of Laos and ceding it to Hanoi, and second, ousting South Vietnam's strong anti-Communist leader Ngo Dinh Diem, resulting in Diem's assassination. After these two disastrous mistakes, the war was lost, as I described in great detail in my book.

JFK was a Democrat, and obviously deeply embedded in the Democrat Party culture that was humiliated and infuriated by losing the Civil War and having the end of slavery imposed on them. That culture had spawned the KKK and the Jim Crow laws, and had as its slogan, "The South will rise again!" The Democrats were further humiliated by proposed Civil Rights legislation that was bitterly opposed by the Democrats, and did not pass until JFK himself was assassinated.

Although President Truman was strongly anti-Communist and created the Truman Doctrine, Communism became a highly politicized issue in 1954 because of the Army-McCarthy hearings, which were shut down soon after a Senate Democrat said to Republican Joseph McCarthy "Have you no sense of decency, sir?" After that, McCarthyism was used synonymously by Democrats as being anti-Communist.

So JFK became president, and the Vietnam war was forced on him, probably against his will, because it was another anti-Communist fight. As I describe in my book, the Vietnam War was pushed on JFK by the worldwide march of Communism at the time -- the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe, the victory of North Korea, and the victory of North Vietnam. Then, in 1960, there was Fidel Castro's Communist revolution in Cuba.

So two other factors may have contributed to JFK's desire to sabotage the Vietnam War effort. One was the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961, which was a losing attempt to defeat Communism in Cuba. And the other was the Civil Rights Act that Democrats bitterly opposed, and in fact did not pass until after JFK himself was assassinated.

So I've concluded that JFK sabotaged the Vietnam war, and did so intentionally.

As a child, Joe Biden was in the same Democrat party culture that had supported ending America with the Civil War. His mentor was Senator Robert Byrd, who had been a Grand Wizard in the KKK.

Now, Joe Biden is in office, and he has adopted one policy after another to sabotage the United States. These include: open the border, flood the country with illegal immigrants from 170 countries, flood the country with Chinese fentanyl and meth, open the prisons, let violent criminals out of jail, defund the police, destroy black families, encourage the murder of thousands of young black men by other black men in Democrat-run cities, close Keystone pipeline then beg Saudi Arabia for more oil, destroy America's energy independence, teach racial hatred in school (critical race theory), censor political opposition, paying people not to work, etc.

When a policy has unintended consequences, and the unintended consequences go on for a long time, with no attempt to stop them, then it's reasonable to conclude that the consequences are intentional. Many of the above policies have gone on for a long time with no attempt to repair them. In some cases, further policies have worsened the "unintended conquences," making it all but certain that they were "intended consequences."

At this point, there's no doubt that the Biden administration repeatedly lied and made one decision after another that "botched" the evacuation effort. Based on JFK's actions, and based on Biden's actions in other areas, I now believe that the circumstantial evidence points to intentional sabotage, imitating JFK's sabotage of the Vietnam war effort.

Will there be a new Afghanistan civil war?

U.S. General Mark Milley is predicting a new civil war because the Taliban won't "be able to consolidate power and establish governance." Milley and the other generals have had no idea what's been going on in Afghanistan for the last 20 years, and this comment indicates that they still don't.

Milley's observation about the Taliban is correct, but it will not lead to a civil war, since Afghanistan is in a generational Awakening era. As I described in my previous article on Afghanistan, we're going to see the Generational Dynamics Democide Pattern played out. (See "23-Aug-21 World View -- The Afghanistan catastrophe" for an explanation.)

This means that there won't be a new civil war, but there will be continual clashes and brutal treatment by the Taliban of its old Northern Alliance enemy. The Taliban will use violence, beatings, rape, and extrajudicial torture and jailing as needed or desired.

Furthermore, because of the undisciplined, tribal nature of the Taliban, these events, sometimes using American hostages as pawns, are expected to increase.

The Panjshir Valley clashes are only the beginning. These clashes will spread and grow, and it's quite possible that Americans left behind will be used as pawns by either side.

Milley's observations about the Taliban confirm what a number of other politicians, both Democrat and Republican, have been suggesting -- that it will be necessary for the US to go back into Afghanistan, as it becomes a crucible of international terrorism.

Political fallout

The Democrats are hoping that the whole Afghanistan catastrophe will pass quickly from public memory, and they can go back to one destructive policy after another. If the opposite happens -- that the situation continues to worsen -- then Biden's presidency will be untenable. The next two in line - Kamala Harris and Nancy Pelosi -- are just as incompetent as Biden.

Any other president would at least have fired several people after this debacle. If Biden continues to make decisions destructive to America, then it will be necessary to find a way, within the Constitution, to find a way to replace Biden with someone competent to govern.

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23-Aug-21 World View -- The Afghanistan catastrophe

Biden says he is just following Donald Trump's policy

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

The Afghanistan catastrophe
Reconstitution of al-Qaeda and 'Over the Horizon' warfare
Resurgence of ISIS Khorasan (ISIS-K)
Biden says he is just following Donald Trump's policy
Generational Dynamics and the Democide Pattern
Using economic leverage against the Taliban

The Afghanistan catastrophe

Bitter, defiant President Joe Biden angry at non-compliant press coverage (Huffington Post)

Bitter, defiant President Joe Biden angry at non-compliant press coverage (Huffington Post)

The disastrous events in Afghanistan are still unfolding, so all we can do is summarize what happened, and make some guesses about what's about to happen. I will say that this situation has sickened and infuriated me more than any other article I've written.

Once President Biden made the decision to evacuate all American forces, he made a number of additional decisions, related to the execution of the evacuation, that turned out to the cause of the disaster. And these assessments are based on numerous analyses that I've heard on Fox News, MSNBC, the BBC and al-Jazeera.

The two worst decisions were the following:

Setting a "date certain" of August 31 when all American troops would be withdrawn, with no conditionality on the part of the Taliban.

Evacuating Bagram airbase on July 5, leaving behind billions of dollars in advanced weaponry, before American civilians had been evacuated from Afghanistan.

Analysts I heard agree that all civilians should have been evacuated first, then all the weapons should have been removed, and only then should Bagram airbase have been evacuated.

The most immediate results of these decisions are the following:

10-15,000 American citizens are left behind in villages and provinces across Afghanistan, with no credible plan to evacuate them. The same is true of the tens of thousands of Afghans who had worked for and aided Americans in the last 20 years, such as interpreters. Their lives have been threatened by the Taliban. The Americans will be used as hostages for years to com.

The 70,000 or so Taliban fighters are now flooded with some $85 billion in advanced American weaponry left behind, including: warplanes, drones, m16s, blackhawks, night vision goggles, 200 small aircraft, and advanced battlefield communications technology.

This was not just an American mission. It was a NATO mission. If you listen to the BBC, the Brits are heartbroken and furious at Biden for destroying the entire NATO mission without even consulting with the other countries. The Germans, French and British calling it the "biggest debacle in Nato's history," questioning whether Nato can survive. Biden did not consult with any of them in advance.

The disaster is compounded by the numerous lies that Biden told in the last two weeks, getting visibly angry and defiant whenever anyone challenges him. He said that Americans are free to leave the country, which is a lie. He said that America's allies approve of what he's doing, which is a lie. He said that he wasn't warned about a likely debacle by DoD and the CIA, which is a lie. He said that al-Qaeda is gone, which is a lie. He said that America has no further interest in Afghanistan, which is a lie. He said that girls and women will be safe, which is a lie. He said that it will be possible to control terrorism in Afghanistan with "over the horizon" technology, which is a lie. He said that he made no mistakes in the way he ordered the evacuation to be performed, which is a lie.

Biden responded to criticism by claiming that he had two choices: continue the war with more troops, or end the war. This was spin. He used this claim to deflect from the incompetency of the evacuation, and also, evacuating the troops was never going to end the war.

There's an increasing belief that Biden is so cognitively challenged that he is completely out of touch with reality, his presidency is a danger to the country. Unfortunately, his vice-president is not much better.

Reconstitution of al-Qaeda and 'Over the Horizon' warfare

Biden made several false claims -- that al-Qaeda was completely gone, that the mission in Afghanistan over the last 20 years had been accomplished, and that Afghanistan was no longer relevant to America.

The claim that al-Qaeda was gone was contradicted by a UN report that claimed that elements of al-Qaeda continued to exist in numerous provinces. Al-Qaeda have always been closely related to and a part of the Taliban, and analysts say that when the American troops have been withdrawn, al-Qaeda will reconstitute itself fully.

At that point, al-Qaeda will be back where it was 20 years ago -- having a safe haven in Afghanistan to use as a platform to launch international attacks on Europe, the Mideast and possibly America.

Jihadists from all over the world will be energized, and will come to Afghanistan for training.

Biden made vague claims that al-Qaeda terrorism can be prevented by "Over the Horizon" technology, which uses such things as drones to augment local intelligence. The problem is that all local intelligence has been pretty much destroyed.

Resurgence of ISIS Khorasan (ISIS-K)

There has been an ISIS branch in Afghanistan for some years, known as ISIS Khorasan (ISIS-K). This is a jihadist group in competition with al-Qaeda and the Taliban, and they pretty much hate each other. The importance of ISIS Khorasan is that they may decide to launch some kind of terrorist attack around Kabul to embarrass both the Taliban and the United States.

Biden says he is just following Donald Trump's policy

Biden has reversed one Donald Trump policy after another, causing one disaster after another for the country. Since Biden has become president, he has turned decision making over to millennials like AOC who are sabotaging America. The result is open borders, floods of illegal immigrants from dozens of counrties, spreading Covid and bringing jihadists into the country; changing us from an energy-dependent country to a country begging other countries for energy; massive street crime in cities across the country; and now this unmitigated disaster in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan is the one Trump policy Biden chose not to reverse, but did so in the most disastrous way possible. Biden claims that he was just implementing a decision to withdraw the troops that had already been committed by his predecessor, Donald Trump. But he did so in a way most likely to sabotage America. Trump has indicated that he would have made sure that the civilians and weapons were removed before the troops were removed, and that claim is credible since it's standard military procedure and is the policy used, for example, in the evacuation of Saigon in 1975. In view of this history, it's hard to explain Biden's decision to withdraw troops first was done other than intentionally to sabotage America, just as opening the borders, ending energy production and supporting street crime are apparently done purposely to sabotage America.

However, analysts claim that Trump's decision in March 2020 to evacuate was also delusional, and I agree with that, and I said so at the time.

I started writing about this in 2009, during the Barack Obama administration. President George Bush had executed a successful counter-insurgency operation in Iraq in 2007, driving out al-Qaeda in Iraq with a troop "surge." In 2009, I ridiculed Obama's announcement that he would try to duplicate Bush's success with his own "surge" in Afghanistan. ( "People are shocked! shocked! at Obama's war plan in Afghanistan. (06-Dec-2009)")

As I explained many times since then, Iraq and Afghanistan were fundamentally different, with the result that a "surge" would work in Iraq, but not in Afghanistan. I've written about this at length many times, but briefly, the fighters in the al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) insurgency were imported from Jordan and Saudi Arabia, while the fighters, in the Afghan insurgency were Pashtuns indigenous to Afghanistan. This is so simple and so obvious that it's unbelievable how stupid the people in Washington are not to understand this. The "surge" in Iraq sent the foreign fighters out of the country, while the "surge" in Afghanistan just sent them to other villages within the country.

Here's what I wrote in "16-Feb-20 World View -- US and Taliban to sign laughable 'reduction in violence' agreement in Afghanistan" in response to Donald Trump's agreement with the Taliban to withdraw American forces:

"Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail
Afghanistan's last generational crisis war was an extremely bloody, horrific civil war, in 1991-96. The war was a civil war, fought between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the Northern Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban are radicalized Pashtuns, and when they need to import foreign fighters, then can import their cousins from the Pashtun tribes in Pakistan.
Indeed, it's much worse than that. The ethnic groups in Afghanistan are COMPLETELY NON-UNITED and loathe each other. Pashtuns still have scores to settle with the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks that formed the Northern Alliance, especially the Shias. These opposing groups have fresh memories of the atrocities, torture, rape, beatings, dismemberments, mutilations, and so forth that the other side performed on their friends, wives and other family members, and they have no desire to be friends or to work together. They'd rather kill each other.
The above is a brief summary of stuff that I've written about in great detail in the past about why peace will fail in Afghanistan. It's not rocket science for the so-called "Washington experts," but it does require studying history and trying to understand what's actually going on in the world. But we live in a society where SAT scores have been plummetting for decades, ever since the Boomers graduated, and where all college courses are being taught by incredibly stupid Marxist idiots. People in the mainstream media know nothing about the world except Marxist sociology and women's studies. In Congress you have total idiots like AOC who says something every day to prove how stupid she is. And in the Administration, you have "experts" who have also graduated from colleges teaching Marxist sociology and women's studies.
So there's really no hope. The above summary is not rocket science, but it's far beyond the mental capabilities of the analysts, journalists and "experts" in Washington, almost all of whom are way too steeped in metoo and socialist garbage to have any clue what's really going on in the world. The same is true about many of the other hundreds of countries and societies that I've studied, analyzed and written about in the last 15 years. All the people in Washington can do is stumble in the dark, until they stumble into World War III. Then they finally learn what's going on. That's the way the world works.
"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography." -- Attributed to American satirist Ambrose Bierce, early 1900s."

If you read the above, you get some idea why I'm always right and the Washington experts are almost always wrong. The catastrophe going on in Afghanistan right now shows the result. I would add that you can also get some idea why being always right has never made me loved. It's brought me no joy, no money, but plenty of contempt. Generational Dynamics has been a curse on my life and has only brought me misery, as the ability to foretell the future did for the mythical Cassandra and the Biblical Jeremiah. I've been doing this for 20 years, and since I'm now age 77, I hope I won't be doing this much longer.

Generational Dynamics and the Democide Pattern

So now we can use some Generational Dynamics analysis to predict some patterns that we can expect to see in Afghanistan.

Regular readers know that I've written several times about the differences that depend on whether the preceding crisis war was an external war with another country versus an internal crisis civil war between tribes and ethnic groups. In the former case, when the war ends, the two armies each withdraw from the other country, and further contact between the populations is done diplomatically. But in the latter case, the two populations continue to live with each other when the war ends -- in the same country, the same villages and even on the same streets. This means that the hatred and the desire for revenge continue at a very personal level.

After a generational crisis civil war, the two sides are never really at peace. The losing ethnic group uses demonstrations and riots to attack the winning government, while the winning government uses violence and extrajudicial torture and jailing to control the losing group. I use the term "Democide Violence" to describe this violence by the winning ethnic group government against the losing ethnic group.

In the case of Afghanistan, we can expect to see this Democide Pattern played out by the Taliban against their enemies in the 1990s civil war -- the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks that formed the Northern Alliance.

The Democide Pattern was extremely bloody in the late 1990s, following the 1991-96 civil war, when the Pashtuns committed massacres against the Hazaras in northern Afghanistan.

Those massacres ended with the defeat of the Taliban 20 years ago by Nato, but they may begin again. The Panjshir Valley in northern Afghanistan is a hotbed of the old Northern Alliance. The Taliban says that they are sending hundreds of fighters to the Panjshir Valley. This drama will unfold in the next few days and weeks.

In the past, the Taliban have been unable to subdue the Panjshir Valley because of its geography -- high mountains on three sides with a narrow pass on the fourth side. However, there is a difference this time because the Taliban will be armed with the advanced weapons that the Americans left behind. This will be the first major test of the Taliban's use of American weapons.

Using economic leverage against the Taliban

Biden is going to try to get the August 31 deadline extended. The Taliban have said that they will refuse to allow that, but Biden can use economic leverage. There $16 billion in Afghanistan Central Bank assets being held by the United States or by the IMF, and unfreezing these funds can be used as leverage.

However, this may cause the Taliban government to ask China or Pakistan for a temporary infusion of funds. It's not clear how all this will play out.

This may well end up being another humiliation for the United States. It is just one more example of how President Biden's evacuation of Afghanistan is, according to many analysts I've heard, the greatest foreign policy disaster since the end of World War II, and completely preventable.

In my opinion, the country is being led by an arrogant, bumbling fool for a president, and an arrogant, bumbling fool for a vice-president. This is an extremely dangerous time for all of us.

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12-Aug-21 World View -- Delta variant of Covid-19 spreading much faster than expected

Delta variant spreads across China

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Delta variant of Covid-19 spreading much faster than expected
Delta variant spreads across China

Delta variant of Covid-19 spreading much faster than expected

Spread of Wuhan Coronavirus Delta variant in China (Bloomberg)

Spread of Wuhan Coronavirus Delta variant in China (Bloomberg)

The atmosphere in Washington with regard to things like masks and vaccinations is so toxic and vitriolic that it's almost unbearable to watch.

The situation with masks is especially confusing, since the "science" about the effectiveness of different types of masks is ambiguous, and some children are unable to breathe wearing masks.

The Delta variant of Covid-19 was first detected in India. It is now spreading rapidly within the United States and other countries. It threatens to get much worse in the fall, and to force more lockdowns, including school closures. The reason is that the Delta variant is twice as effective as the original virus in spreading from person to person.

So you should be prepared, Dear Reader, for a fall and winter that's worse than last year. You may be forced into lockdowns and school closures that you don't want.

Making judgments about Covid variants is well outside my skill set, so I won't attempt it. However, I've provided some credible mostly non-ideological sources at the end of this article, and you can read through those sources for information.

The most important news is that there are additional variants coming. The "Delta Plus" and "Lambda" variants are spreading in other countries, but their potential effect in the United States is not yet known.

Some experts are predicting far more dangerous variants on the horizon. Again, making a judgment about these is outside my skill set, but there are articles referenced below that tell you about them.

I'm not going to tell you, Dear Reader, to wear masks or get vaccinated. That's not my place. But I am going to tell you to make contingency plans for yourself and your family in case these new dangerous variants start spreading. Follow the motto of the Boy Scouts and always "Be Prepared" for what comes next.

Delta variant spreads across China

Xi Jinping gave several speeches last year, claiming that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had won a historic battle against Covid (Wuhan Coronavirus) and that this proved the superiority of the Chinese Communism to Western democracies, which were still struggling with the virus.

This year, the CCP and Xi Jinping are facing the possibility of major humiliation, as the Delta variant spreads across China. The CCP is doing everything possible, including mandatory testing and lockdowns, to kill off the virus. If they're successful, it will be another great victory for the CCP. But if they fail, then it may threaten the leadership of Xi Jinping.

In my previous newsletter, I referenced a plan presented by Chinese General Chi Haotian in a speech just as he was retiring in 2003. That was a plan to solve China's perennial problem of overpopulation. His solution is to colonize other lands, specifically the United States, by defeating it with nuclear weapons, and then using biochemical weapons to "clean up America" and kill any people left behind. so that the Chinese can take over. (See "31-Jul-21 World View -- Wuhan Coronavirus -- Thinking the Unthinkable")

This plan is completely insane from the Western point of view, which honors individual human life. The Falun Gong paper Epoch Times, which first leaked the full text of the speech in 2005, refers to it as the "Doomsday Crazy Gambling Plan" and to the CCP as the "Gongshi Blood Company."

However, in the Chinese culture, which does NOT value individual human life, this plan is quite reasonable, since a way must be found to solve the problem of overpopulation. Mao Zedong had said that he would gladly sacrifice half of China's population if it meant killing all the Americans.

Whether Chi Haotian's speech was authentic and valid has been the subject of a lengthy debate in the Generational Dynamics forum, starting around here: http://gdxforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=62949#p62949

So that brings us back to Covid-19, the Wuhan Coronavirus. We now know with almost complete certainty that the virus was developed in the Wuhan Virology Lab, and that it escaped, either accidentally or intentionally, at some point prior to September 12, 2019, which was the date when the Wuhan Virology Lab deleted its Virus Database in the middle of the night.

Once the virus started spreading through the Wuhan population, China's actions then are clear. There was a deep coverup. The CCP encouraged travel to and from Wuhan from anywhere in the world, except within China itself. This was deliberate, and it spread the virus to 180 countries, while protecting China.

It's now believed that the CCP thought that they could release the virus into the world, while protecting China, and completely escape blame, and furthermore, claim credit as the first and best country to defeat the virus.

In my opinion, this plan has backfired badly. Releasing the virus into the world was apparently some kind of "beta test" to develop technology of using biological weapons. This is insane, but in the Chinese culture which values an individual human life as being worth zero, this is quite possible. Instead, China is being universally blamed for spreading the virus. Furthermore, mutations of the virus, including the Delta variant, are spreading across China, humiliating Xi Jinping and the CCP in two ways: They prove that China did NOT defeat the virus in 2020, and they expose the weakness of China's own locally developed vaccines, Sinovac and Sinopharm.

There are many things that the Chinese Communists do that are insane by Western standards. For example, Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward (1958-59), possibly the stupidest policy of any country in the history of the world, killed tens of millions of innocent people for no reason at all, destroying China's economy for decades. Since then, the Tiananmen Square massacre or the massive torture, beating, and enslavement of millions of Uighurs have all been insane policies.

But those are Western culture judgments. In the Chinese culture, the Great Leap Forward may not have been a disaster after all. Today, the population of China is 1.4 billion. If 50 million Chinese were killed today, you would still have 1.4 billion people.

The Wuhan Virus Event backfired badly on the CCP. To save face, Xi Jinping may have to do something drastic. We can only wait to see.

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31-Jul-21 World View -- Wuhan Coronavirus -- Thinking the Unthinkable

The Secret Speech of General Chi Haotian (2003)

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Wuhan Coronavirus -- Thinking the Unthinkable
The Secret Speech of General Chi Haotian (2003)
The uniqueness of Chinese DNA
Justifying the insanity of the Chinese Communists
The need for more living space
Learning lessons from Hitler and Nazi Germany
Using biological weapons to 'clean up' America
Spreading Covid-19 as a 'beta test' of biological weapons

Wuhan Coronavirus -- Thinking the Unthinkable

Li-Meng Yan, the virologist who fled from China to the United States, after she told how the virus came out of China

Li-Meng Yan, the virologist who fled from China to the United States, after she told how the virus came out of China

I've always been skeptical of the most extreme explanations of the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus (Covid-19). For a long time, I was willing to accept the explanation that it jumped to humans from an animal in a so-called "wet market" or, if it came from the Wuhan Virology Lab, that it escaped from the lab accidentally, for example by accidentally infecting one of the lab workers. The last possibility has been supported by numerous reports of sloppy security practices at the lab.

In particular, I've never believed that the Chinese Communists purposely unleashed the virus on the world. Whatever happened, I've always felt, must have been mostly caused by accidents, stupidity and incompetence. I've frequently criticized the Chinese Communists for policies that were extremely stupid, but surely the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as stupid as they are, would not be so stupid as to purposely spread a novel virus across the world.

My opinion has changed 180 degrees. I now believe that the CCP is easily stupid enough to have purposely spread the virus across the world. In fact, I now believe that's exactly what happened.

The Secret Speech of General Chi Haotian (2003)

What's changed my mind is a document from 2003, The Secret Speech of General Chi Haotian (2003).

General Chi Haotian was born in 1929, and was one of the last hardline military men that led Mao Zedong's army to victory, forming the People's Republic of China in 1949. If you'd like to compare him to an American general, then select a hardline general who was born in the 1920s.

The 2003 document is a large, complex strategy document, describing how China would defeat America diplomatically and militarily. It was written 18 years ago, almost the length of an entire generation. Chi's hardline war survivor generation is now gone, replaced by younger generations who may not agree with everything that Chi says.

But as I analyzed this document, it was clear to me that this document is not out of date, except in a few irrelevant details. The plans and motivations of the Chinese Communists, and the methods for achieving their objectives, have not changed substantively since 2003.

I had wanted to provide a summary of the main points, but this document is so large and complex that a summary would be almost as long as the original document. So I'll just provide a narrative of points most relevant to this article, and suggest that you read Chi's entire speech for yourself.

So the following sections contain some of the main points of Chi's speech. As you read them, you'll think that they're highly delusional, to the point of insanity, and I agree. But they're also the policies of the entire CCP, which have frequently been shown to be delusional to the point of insanity. It's also worth pointing out that these policies and views are not new. They're deeply embedded in Chinese culture, dating back millennia to the Analects of Confucius (551-479 BC) and The Art of War (500 BC) by Sun Tzu.

The uniqueness of Chinese DNA

The core belief of Chi Haotian, the CCP, and the entire Chinese culture is that the Chinese people are a unique race, superior to all other races. I've sometimes described this as believing that all other races have no other purpose than to serve the Chinese, in the same way that a donkey has no other purpose than to serve a farmer. I've been using that analogy for years, and I'm not aware of any example of Chinese behavior that contradicts the donkey analogy. This is the Chinese culture. This is how the Chinese think of us, and this is how it has been for millennia.

Chi Haotian carries this to the next level by claiming that Chinese DNA is so unique that the Chinese people did not originate in Africa like everyone else. Chi repeats a claim, based on archaelogical discoveries of "Peking Man" in the 1920s, that the Chinese people evolved completely independently of the other races on earth. This claim was debunked by Chinese scholars in the 1980s, but was still believed by Chi, and is probably still believed by many in the CCP.

Chi is describing the strategy for "the great revitalization of the Chinese nation," which, of course, "is not limited to the land we have now but also includes the whole world." Chi claims that the Chinese nation would not exist without the Communist Party. The Communist Party must exist for this great revitalization of the Chinese nation.

Chi sees the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre as an existential crisis for the Communist Party. If a reformist faction (led by Zhao Ziyang) had succeeded in resolving the riots peacefully, then there would have been a "peaceful transition," ending the power of the Communist Party. Fortunately (he believes), Zhao Ziyang was removed at a crucial movement, and the 1989 riots were crushed.

Chi sees this as a generational issue. He says that Communism ended in the Soviet Union when the "pioneering senior comrades" (i.e., the generals who had served in WW II) passed away, Gorbachev came along, and the power of the Communist Party was taken away by peaceful evolution. This peaceful transition must not happen to the Chinese Communist Party!!! "If we, the CCP, are finished, China will be finished, and the world will be finished."

Justifying the insanity of the Chinese Communists

This is the justification for all the insanity. It's not to improve China's economy. It's not to defend China from a war. It's not even to prevent an internal civil war. The justification for all the insanity is to prevent a peaceful transition in China that ends the power of the Communist Party. And this is breathtakingly insane, but we can see the consequences.

So, for example, every religion must be brutally crushed. Here is the justification:

"Maybe you have now come to understand why we recently decided to further promulgate atheism. If we let theology from the West into China and empty us from the inside, if we let all Chinese people listen to God and follow God, who will obediently listen to us and follow us? If the common people don�t believe Comrade Hu Jintao is a qualified leader, question his authority, and want to monitor him, if the religious followers in our society question why we are leaving God in churches, can our Party continue to rule China?"

So that's why any religious worship is an existential threat to Communism. That's the justification for brutally crushing Buddhists and Christians, and for beating, raping, torturing, and enslaving two million Muslim Uighurs. Praying to God is like declaring war on the Communist Party.

And I want to emphasize the insanity of this. In America or any other country, religious prayer exists alongside the government without a conflict. But in China, "listening to God and following God" is an existential threat to the Communist Party, because the Communist leaders' authority will be questioned, and they will lose their power. I don't know what this looks like to you, Dear Reader, but to me it looks like total madness.

The need for more living space

Chi Haotian complains bitterly that China has the world's largest population, including Chinese in China and overseas, but too little per-capita living space for Chinese people.

According to Chi: "China�s great economic expansion will inevitably come with significant development in our military forces, creating conditions for our expansion overseas."

In 2003, China was about 20 years into the "One Child Policy," that caused the government to kill children and forcibly abort women when a family might have more than one child. Chi does not mention the One Child Policy, but I can well believe that he hates it, and sees it as an additional reason for expansion overseas.

Colonization of foreign lands is a crucial part of Chi's strategy for the revitalization of the Chinese nation, and Chi looks to the experience of Hitler and the Nazis for lessons on how to proceed.

Learning lessons from Hitler and Nazi Germany

In America and the West, we generally think of Hitler and the Nazis as a uniquely evil world development that will never happen again. However, that's not how the Chinese view him. In my book, "War between China and Japan," I mentioned that Chiang Kai-shek admired Hitler, but I didn't carry it farther.

But Chi Haotian and the CCP do not consider Hitler and the Nazis to be a uniquely evil development. They admire Hitler and his attempt to rule the world, and want to learn lessons from his "humiliating" defeat so that the Chinese Communists won't repeat them.

Chi says, "Our Chinese people are wiser than the Germans because, fundamentally, our race is superior to theirs." An important difference between the German Nazis and the Chinese Communists is that "we are complete atheists, while Germany was primarily a Catholic and Protestant country. ... Although Hitler also believed that ordinary citizens had low intelligence, and that leaders should therefore make decisions, and although German people worshipped Hitler back then, Germany did not have the tradition of worshipping sages on a broad basis."

So that's why Hitler made mistakes, and why there are three lessons that the CCP must learn from Hitler's failure.

First lesson: The West has much nicer living space than we have because we have so many Chinese people crammed into a small space, which is why we need to colonize other lands.

Second lesson: Focus on the leadership capacity of the ruling party. Although the Nazis spread their power to every aspect of the German national government, they did not stress their absolute leadership position like we have. They did not take the issue of managing the power of the party as first priority, which we have.

Third lesson: The big "Issue of America." The renaissance of China is in fundamental conflict with the West, and so Chinese colonization of other lands will be blocked by America and the West.

Chi explains the Issue of America as follows:

"Would the United States allow us to go out to gain new living space? First, if the United States is firm in blocking us, it is hard for us to do anything significant to Taiwan, Vietnam, India, or even Japan, [so] how much more living space can we get? Very trivial! Only countries like the United States, Canada and Australia have the vast land to serve our need for mass colonization. Therefore, solving the �issue of America� is the key to solving all other issues."

This explains a lot of things for me, things that I've described as insanity in the past.

First, it explains the obsession with Taiwan. Yes of course the Chinese may legitimately wish Taiwan to be part of China, but what's insane is that the CCP is willing to pursue total war to make Taiwan a province of China. Britain gave up the entire British Empire without going to war to keep each colony. Going to war for that reason can legitimately be called insane.

In August 2006, I transcribed a BBC interview with Sha Zukang, China's ambassador to the United Nations. What was remarkable was that the ambassador was screaming angrily at the top of his lungs. He was asked about Taiwan's independence, and he screamed as follows:

"The moment that Taiwan declares independence, supported by whomever, China will have no choice but to [use] whatever means available to my government. Nobody should have any illusions on that. ...
It's not a matter of how big Taiwan is, but for China, one INCH of the territory is more valuable than the LIVES of our people."
[With regard to the U.S.'s constant criticism of China's rapid militarization:] It's better for the U.S. to shut up, keep quiet. That's much, much better. China's population is 6 times or 5 times the United States. Why blame China? No. forget it. It's high time to shut up. It's a nation's sovereign right to do what is good for them. But don't tell us what's good for China. Thank you very much."

This followed a 2005 warning given by top-level Chinese army officer General Zhu Chenghu if America interfered with Taiwan: "If the Americans are determined to interfere [then] we will be determined to respond. We ... will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all of the cities east of Xian [a city in central China]. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds ... of cities will be destroyed by the Chinese."

And that's not all. China has 21 active border disputes with neighboring countries. Once again, Dear Reader, I call that insanity. But it's become a Chinese Communist obsession to colonize other lands, and not give up even one inch of land.

This gets to the heart of Chi Haotian's "Issue of America." Chi said that America will block any attempt by China to colonize Taiwan, Vietnam, India or Japan. Therefore, America must be defeated.

According to Chi, the reason that Chinese talk loudly about the "Taiwan issue" is that they want to hide their real objective, the "American issue."

Using biological weapons to 'clean up' America

Chi says that once America is conquered, it will be necessary to use biological weapons to "clean up" America:

"To resolve the issue of America we must be able to transcend conventions and restrictions. In history, when a country defeated another country or occupied another country, it could not kill all the people in the conquered land because back then you could not kill people effectively with sabers or long spears, or even with rifles or machine guns. Therefore, it was impossible to gain a stretch of land without keeping the people on that land. However, if we conquered America in this fashion, we would not be able to make many people migrate there.
Only by using special means to �clean up� America will we be able to lead the Chinese people there. This is the only choice left for us. This is not a matter of whether we are willing to do it or not. What kind of special means is there available for us to �clean up America�? ...
Only by using non-destructive weapons that can kill many people will we be able to reserve America for ourselves. There has been rapid development of modern biological technology, and new bio-weapons have been invented one after another. Of course, we have not been idle, in the past years we have seized the opportunity to master weapons of this kind. We are capable of achieving our purpose of �cleaning up� America all of a sudden."

So Chi Haotian concludes that the way to solve the "Issue of America" is to conquer America, and then "clean up America" by unleashing biological weapons.

Chi doesn't say how America would be conquered, but today's CCP has been stockpiling nuclear weapons and building silos, implying that they plan a massive nuclear missile attack where military targets and American cities are all fired upon at the same time, to knock out America quickly.

Spreading Covid-19 as a 'beta test' of biological weapons

Having completed my analysis of Chi Haotian's 2003 speech, you can see why I've done a U-turn, and I now believe that China's release of Covid-19 on the entire world was intentional, and was actually a kind of "beta test" for a full bio-chemical attack in the future.

Here's what we know:

Once the virus started spreading in Wuhan in 2019, China clamped down on any attempt to report it. Some doctors were jailed simply for telling other people.

For a period of several weeks in Dec-Jan, China was purposely spreading the virus to 180 nations around the world, while preventing its spread within China. China was lying about its transmissibility, and was able to coerce their puppets at the World Health Organization (WHO) to support their lies. China also sent people around the world to purchase gowns and masks and any other materials (personal protective equipment or PPE) that could be used by medical personnel.

China has used economic boycotts to punish Australia and any other country or organization calling for an investigation into the Wuhan Lab. China is still blocking any investigation into the Wuhan Lab.

For me, the logic is as follows: So many of the things that the CCP has done for years that I consider insane are explained by Chi Haotian's 2003 speech, and if I were to try to devise a way to "beta test" using a biological weapon in the world, I would probably have done it the way the CCP spread Covid-19 around the world.

If you take a virus and turn it into a bioweapon, the type of research is named "gain-of-function." The enhanced virus may be more lethal, may spread more easily, or may target only certain kinds of entities. For example, in 2000 Dutch researchers genetically engineered the spike protein of a mouse coronavirus so that it would attack only cats, but not rodents.

The nightmare scenario for the world is that Chinese scientists might similarly engineer a virus that attacks all humans, excluding all those with Chinese DNA. This would be entirely expected from Chi Haotian's glorification of the unique Chinese DNA.

However, if this was some kind of "beta test," then many lessons have been learned all around. Scientists and politicians in the United States have learned a lot about handling virus outbreaks, and those lessons would be applied to a biological weapon.

A lesson that the Chinese may be learning is that viruses can mutate when they're out in the wild. As I'm writing this article, hundreds of people in China are suddenly being infected by a "delta variation" of the virus that they infected the world with. That's the danger of using a bioweapon -- you can't be sure that it won't turn against you, once you lose control of it.

China-Japan Book

China-Japan Book

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 Table of Contents
https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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24-Jul-21 World View -- China and Japan significantly escalate military tensions over Taiwan

Japan says 'F--k you China, bring it on'

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

China and Japan significantly escalate military tensions over Taiwan
China's military threatens the 'Japan Exception Theory'
Chinese warplanes practice blockading Taiwan
Japan says 'F--k you China, bring it on'
Nuclear weapons in Japan
International love affairs and hatreds

China and Japan significantly escalate military tensions over Taiwan

Japan's Ministry of Defense removes Taiwan from China in map (Taiwan News)

Japan's Ministry of Defense removes Taiwan from China in map (Taiwan News)

The mutual hatred that the people of China and Japan feel for each other has always been bubbling below the surface, but in the last month or so, it has become far more public and open at the military and government levels.

The flash point is Taiwan. China has repeatedly declared the intention to invade Taiwan and annex it to China. Japan has said that China's annexation of Taiwan would be a security risk to Japan, and so Japan will join with Taiwan in a war with China. I discussed all of this in my article last month. ( "28-Jun-21 World View -- Japan's plans for defending Taiwan from an attack by China")

What's changed in the last month is that each side, China and Japan, has published something that indicates a harsh "fuck you" attitude toward the other side. In years past, Japan and China pretended to be nice to each other, but those days apparently are ending.

China's military threatens the 'Japan Exception Theory'

On July 12, the Chinese Communist military uploaded a video to a Chinese Military channel, "Military strategies." The video was taken down after two days, after it had been re-posted, with English subtitles, by Chinese-born human rights activist and author Jennifer Zeng.

Here are some of the main points of the Chinese military video as described by Jennifer Zeng:

If Japan tries to defend Taiwan by deploying even one soldier, one plane, or one ship, then China will attack Japan with full force.

China will adopt a "Japan Exception" policy with regard to use of nuclear weapons. China once promised that it wouldn�t use nuclear weapons first, or use it against non-nuclear countries. It's not surprising that China is abandoning this promise, since China lies about everything. So now Japan can be an exception.

China will attack Japan with nuclear weapons not just once, but repeatedly, and "continuously," until Japan declares unconditional surrender "for the second time."

The psychological argument is that because Japan is the only country in the world to have suffered a nuclear attack, unleashing nuclear weapons upon Japan "will yield twice the result with half the effort."

After victory, China will break up Japan's four main islands into independent countries under the "supervision" of China and Russia, which will both establish military garrisons there. Okinawa will be broken off from Japan and either be managed by China or made into an independent country.

There's so much of the above that's entirely delusional that it's hard to know what to start. The most obvious is that the continuous nuclear bombing will not cause Japan to declare unconditional surrender "for the second time." The Japanese will be infuriated and will fight to the last bullet.

The video implies the following Chinese delusional military strategy: The Chinese strategy would be a quick victory in Taiwan combined with a nuclear victory over Japan, to be executed before the United States could respond. When the dust cleared, there would be a new reality, with Taiwan part of China, and Japan colonized/controlled by China.

This is entirely delusional, but being delusional has never stopped the Chinese Communists till now.

There is a never-ending debate whether nuclear weapons will be used in the next war. But Jennifer Zeng's article explains why China MUST use nuclear weapons at the beginning of the war. In conventional warfare, Taiwan+Japan could defeat the Chinese. The Chinese know this, and the Japanese know this. That's why the Chinese are developing the "Japan Exception Theory," which means that Japan is the exception to the "promise" that China will not be the first to use nuclear weapons. Japan does not currently have nuclear weapons, so there will presumably be no danger of nuclear retaliation from Japan.

Chinese warplanes practice blockading Taiwan

The Japan Exception Theory is just words, but China has also done a lot militarily in the last few weeks to increase its preparation for war with Taiwan.

The Chinese Communists have sent warplanes into Taiwan's airspace dozens of times in 2020, and hundreds of times so far in 2021. The media describes this as "sending a message," but how long will the increasingly nationalist Chinese public be satisfied with just "sending a message"?

In March, the Chinese military showed an aggressive new tactic: planning for a blockade. Ten Chinese warplanes invaded Taiwanese airspace to the island's south and west, while another two Chinese planes cut through its southern airspace to skirt Taiwan's eastern airspace. A Taiwanese official said that the move was designed to practice cutting Taiwan off from Japanese and American intervention if China carries through on its threats to invade Taiwan.

It's not known what a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would look like, and it's not clear that China has the capability to successfully invade Taiwan.

However a full blockade of Taiwan could be a much simpler strategy. The idea is that if Taiwan were cut off from the world, it could quickly run out of both military and non-military necessities, but once it did it would be forced to surrender. Once again, that's entirely delusional, but a blockade could be part of a larger strategy to weaken and isolate Taiwan first, in preparation for the actual invasion.

Once again, you have to step back here and look at the larger picture. What the hell is going on here? China has been "sending messages" for years, decades even. Now we have the Chinese military talking about a Japanese exception to allow a nuclear attack, and Chinese warplanes practicing for a blockade to prevent Japan or the US from defending Taiwan. We also know that the Chinese Communists have explicitly warned that they would invade Taiwan, and those warnings have become increasingly shrill.

As I've written many times, a war could start at any time, and it wouldn't even require an affirmative decision to do so. World War I was started by a twelve year old boy who decided to assassinate a Serbian archduke. World War II was started by a Japanese garrison near Beijing when a Japanese soldier needed to pee and got lost in the woods. The Japanese accused the Chinese of abducting the soldier, and they were at full-scale war within a month, with the Rape of Nanking occurring two months later.

Japan says 'F--k you China, bring it on'

Look closely at the pair of maps at the beginning of this article. They are the "Defense of Japan" white papers published, respectively, in 2020 and 2021. Both of these are maps of China, with the red arrow pointing to the island of Taiwan.

In 2020, Taiwan was shown in red, indicating that Taiwan is part of China. In 2021, Taiwan is shown in grey, meaning that Taiwan is NOT part of China.

I'm referring to this as a "Fuck you China, bring it on" message. There are no words that could be more insulting and more infuriating to the Chinese Communists than what is essentially a declaration by Japan's Ministry of Defense (MOD) that Taiwan is an independent country.

In the context of the current increasingly belligerent actions by the Chinese, and their declaration of the "Japan Exception Theory," Japan is saying that they're not intimidated.

The "Defense of Japan" white paper, this year for the first time, makes clear that Japan is concerned about a potential Chinese attack on Taiwan:

"Stabilizing the situation surrounding Taiwan is important for Japan�s security and the stability of the international community. Therefore, it is necessary that we pay close attention to the situation with a sense of crisis more than ever before."

What is significant about this statement is that Taiwan was never even mentioned in previous white papers.

Nuclear weapons in Japan

Japan adopted a pacifist constitution after World War II, and later signed the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which bans it from developing nuclear weapons, more than 40 years ago.

However, Japan has been able to build nuclear weapons since it launched a plutonium breeader reactor and uranium enrichment plant in the 1980s. Since then, Japan has pursued a nuclear fuel recycling program that separates plutonium from the waste from its nuclear power plants.

Today, Japan has 45.5 tons of separated plutonium � 8.9 tons at home, and 36.6 tons in Britain and France. The amount is enough to make about 6,000 atomic bombs. And Japan continues to produce more plutonium.

Analysts estimate that it would require about six months for Japan to develop an atomic weapon.

In fact, I would speculate further. I could well believe that the Japanese have manufactured the nuclear weapons, perhaps with technical help from the Americans or the Indians, but haven't yet inserted the plutonium. That way, they can claim that they still have no nuclear weapons, but they might be able to complete the manufacture within a few days, when the time comes.

I don't have any evidence of that. I'm just saying that it wouldn't surprise me.

International love affairs and hatreds

Americans fought and won a war with the Nazis, and now, 75 years later, Americans like the Germans, are friends with the Germans, and Germany is an ally.

Americans fought and won a war with the Imperial Japanese, and now, 75 years later, Americans like the Japanese, are friends with the Japanese, and Japan is a very important ally.

Americans fought and won a war in support of the Chinese, and saved the Chinese from the Japanese. Since then, Americans always loved the Chinese, although attitudes changed with the Tiananmen Square massacre, the torture and enslavement of two million Muslim Uighurs, the smashing of democracy in Hong Kong, and the repeated threats and obvious plans to wage war to annex Taiwan.

Americans like the Chinese people, and have no desire for a war with them, but Americans are increasingly scared to death by the hateful belligerence of the Chinese Communist Party. The Chinese people like the American people, and have no desire for a war with them, but the Chinese Communists have decided that there must be a war because the United States military will defend Taiwan and Japan from a Chinese invasion.

The Chinese and the Japanese fought a war with each other, and now, 75 years later, each side has a deep, vitriolic hatred of the other. The Japanese performed unspeakable atrocities on the Chinese during World War II. The Chinese are craving revenge like nothing else. Given the chance, they will inflict the same kinds of enormous atrocities on the Japanese, and they'll be satisfied with nothing less than the destruction of the Japanese culture.

That's why the last actions by Japan's Ministry of Defense are interesting, which is why I describe them as "F--k you China, bring it on." There are no signs that the Japanese fear a war with the Chinese. It's possible that they fear war with China less than we do. The Japanese have a very powerful conventional armed forces, and they may have nuclear weapons, and they may believe that they can defeat the Chinese, in alliance with Taiwan. So I get the feeling that the Japanese would like another go at China, and are looking forward to it.

It's ironic that the crucible of the war between China and Japan will likely be an invasion of little old Taiwan. Taiwan was a colony of Japan in the early 1900s, and apparently consider that relationship to have been good enough for Taiwan to be on the side of Japan in fighting their common enemy, China.

But what about Korea? Which side will they be on?

Throughout Korea's history, they were either a colony of Japan or a vassal state of China. I'm not sure which is worse. So which side would Korea choose to fight against -- Japan or Korea? I get the feeling that they would rather be like Switzerland, and try to stay neutral as long as possible.

But of course it's much more complicated than that, because Korea isn't Korea any more. Korea is now South Korea, apparently aligned with the United States, and North Korea, apparently aligned with China. Each Korea wants the country to be reunited, but under its own government. So it seems likely that there will be a war between North and South Korea, while Japan is fighting China.

So what will happen to all those nuclear weapons that the North Koreans have been manufacturing? With they be launched toward America, toward Japan, toward China or toward South Korea? That's a very interesting question, and I think that the answer is far from obvious.

So I really don't know what the Koreans will do. Perhaps some of the Koreans who read my articles could write to me and enlighten me, or post their opinions anonymously in the Generational Dynamics forum.

There are people in the Generational Dynamics forum who criticize me for making imperfect predictions. "What good are your forecasts, Xenakis, if you can't tell the date when the war will break out?"

That's funny. All I can tell you today, with 100% certainty, is that China and Japan are headed for a full-scale war over Taiwan. I can't give you an exact date, but I can tell you that China is rapidly making preparations, Japan is rapidly making preparations, and Taiwan is rapidly making preparations. But I can keep track of events and hope for clarity.

China-Japan Book

China-Japan Book

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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17-Jul-21 World View -- Lebanon's self-destruction continues as government collapses again a year after port disaster

World Bank: Lebanon among the worst economic disasters since 1857

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

A year after port disaster, Lebanon still can't form a government
World Bank: Lebanon among the worst economic disasters since 1857
Lebanon's 'confessional' system of government

A year after port disaster, Lebanon still can't form a government

Aftermath of August 4, 2020, port explosion in Beirut Lebanon (Reuters)

Aftermath of August 4, 2020, port explosion in Beirut Lebanon (Reuters)

Lebanon continued its path to self-destruction on Thursday, when Saad al-Hariri, who had been designated to form the first government following the massive port explosion in Beirut on August 4 of last year, resigned.

He offered his resignation after meeting with Lebanon's President Michel Aoun. According to Hariri, Hariri's attempts to form a government were thwarted by Aoun, who demanded that Hariri change his proposed slate of ministers so that Iran-backed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah would have a "blocking third," which means that Nasrallah could veto any proposal of any other sect of the government, giving Nasrallah effective dictatorial control of the government.

Hariri has been prime minister three times in the past, but resigned in 2019, complaining that massive corruption was destroying the country's economy. Shortly after the port blast, Hariri agreed to return if he were allowed to choose his government cabinet ministers. In his statement on Thursday, he said:

"I withdrew from forming the government. Aoun demanded some amendments, which he considered essential, and said we will not be able to reach an understanding with each other. ... And may God save this country.
I resigned in 2019 because I wanted a government of experts, and if we formed Michel Aoun�s government then the country won�t be saved.
The main problem of this country is Michel Aoun, who is allied with Hezbollah, who in turn protects him. This is the equation in the country and if someone can�t see it then they�re blind."

Incredibly, a year has gone by since the port explosion, and the corrupt politicians running the country have done nothing except continue to line their own pockets.

The economy had been in free fall even before the explosion, with a crashing currency and an unemployment rate above 30%.

About 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertilizer had been left unprotected, sitting in a storage warehouse since 2013, adjacent to a fireworks factory, in the midst of a densely packed residential area. Later investigations showed that Hezbollah had been using the ammonium nitrate fertilizer to build bombs to be used in Syria. When the explosion occurred, 300,000 people lost their homes from the explosion, hundreds were killed, and thousands were wounded. 85% of the country's grain storage was destroyed. Several hospitals were destroyed. The explosion was far larger than anyone had ever seen, and property was damaged and windows broken all across the city, and for miles around. The explosion could be heard as far away as Cyprus.

The explosion was massive and destructive, but apparently not destructive enough to shake loose Iran-backed Hezbollah's control of Lebanon.

World Bank: Lebanon among the worst economic disasters since 1857

According to the World Bank in a report published in March, Lebanon's financial crisis is among the top ten, and possibly the top 3, in world history in the period since 1857 to the present. According to the report:

"In fact, Lebanon�s GDP plummeted from close to US$ 55 billion in 2018 to an estimated US$ 33 billion in 2020, with US$ GDP/ capita falling by around 40 percent. Such a brutal and rapid contraction is usually associated with conflicts or wars. ... This illustrates the magnitude of the economic depression that the country is enduring, with sadly no clear turning point on the horizon, given the disastrous deliberate policy inaction.
[In Fall 2020], the World Bank [termed] Lebanon�s economic crisis The Deliberate Depression. For over a year, Lebanese authorities countered an assailment of compounded crises -- namely, the country�s largest peace-time economic and financial crisis, COVID-19 and the Port of Beirut explosion -- with deliberately inadequate policy responses. The inadequacy is less due to knowledge gaps and quality advice and more the result of a combination of (i) a lack of political consensus over effective policy initiatives; and (ii) political consensus in defense of a bankrupt economic system, which benefited a few for so long. In the face of these challenges, Lebanon lacks a fully-functioning executive authority and is currently in the process of forming its third Government in a little over a year. This debilitating institutional void has lasted over 8 months so far."

In other words:

The financial crisis occurred in peacetime, but was worse than usually occurs in all out war.
The response to the port explosion was "deliberately inadequate."
The politicians benefited from a bankrupt economic system.

During the last year, nothing has changed. The year has simply been wasted by government officials, especially Aoun and Nasrallah, who don't want anything to change.

In August of last year, after the port explosion, France's president Emmanuel Macron led an international conference which pledged nearly $300 million in humanitarian assistance. However, the money was withheld until a reform government could be formed, because otherwise the $300 million would simply go into the pockets of the politicians and their cronies.

A month later, there was no movement to reform. Macron said at a news conference, "I�m ashamed of the Lebanese political leaders. Ashamed." He accused them of �collective betrayal� and choosing �to favor their partisan and individual interests to the general detriment of the country.�

The main stumbling block, then and today, was that the Shiite sect demanded complete control of the finance ministry, which means that Nasrallah would be able to use Lebanon's treasury for any purpose he wanted. What always happens in situations like these is that Nasrallah and Hezbollah don't dare to open the books of the finance ministry to scrutiny, since that would reveal years of robbery, embezzlement and corruption that had previously been hidden.

Lebanon's 'confessional' system of government

In the past few months I've become aware of the brilliance of the US Constitution and its ability to withstand these kinds of crises. This is because of its system of checks and balances among the three branches of government at the federal level, and the checks and balances between the federal governments and the state governments. I expect the US Constitutional form of government to withstand the current attack, especially as vote audits in Arizona, Georgia and other states are revealing what actually happened in the 2020 election. These audits could not be occurring except for the checks and balances in the US Constitution.

However, there are no checks and balances whatsoever in Lebanon's government, and that's why corruption is out of control and why the country is unable to form a government in the wake of the massive explosion that leveled much of Beirut -- an explosion that is the fault of incompetence and corruption in Lebanon's government.

Lebanon has a "dynastic confessional" system of government. Lebanon's "confessional" system of government is defined in its constitution, which requires that the three main government offices be occupied by specific sectarian groups:

The president, currently Michel Aoun, must be a Syriac Maronite Catholic. Michel Aoun is 83 years old.

The speaker of parliament must be a Shia Muslim. The current speaker is Nabih Berri, who has held the position since 1992. The Shia Muslim sect in Lebanon is controlled by the terrorist militia Hezbollah, which is led by Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah.

The prime minister, must be a Sunni Muslim. Saad al-Hariri was designated for this position, following the resignation of Hassan Diab after the August 4 explosion a year ago. Hassan Diab has stayed on in a caretaker capacity until political leaders can agree on a new premier.

So there are three "branches" of government in Lebanon, but there are no checks and balances, since the leader of each branch can do whatever he wants, including skimming money and paying his cronies to do things like beat up people in the opposition, and there is nothing to stop them. That's why each branch forms a kind of "dynasty."

As time goes on, each sect creates its own dynasty within the section of government that it controls. So one way to think of Lebanon's government is, not as a simple dictatorship, but as a triple dictatorship, which each dynastic sect have complete dictatorial control over one part of government, with complete power of embezzlement and corruption, and no controls, no checks, no balances.

This system of government was set up that way for a reason. The sects that I've mentioned -- the Sunni Muslims, the Shia Muslims, and the Syriac Maronite Catholics -- consider people in any but there own sect to be "scum of the earth." The different sects of Lebanon are not capable of simply getting along with each other. The level of mutual hatred between the sects runs extremely deep. This is standard fare after an ethnic civil war in any country.

Lebanon's last generational crisis war was the civil war of 1975-90, mainly between Muslims versus Christians, killing some 200,000 people. A major event occurred on September 15-16, 1982, when Maronite Christian militias massacred 2-3,000 Palestinian civilians in the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps. This act has haunted Lebanon to this day.

That was 40 years ago. Most of the people today vividly remember the horror of that mass slaughter, and many are still traumatized by it. And they still hate each other for it. So the "confessional" form of government in Lebanon was designed to keep the three sects as separate as possible -- the complete opposite of mutual checks and balances. No sect will have any say over what the other sects do, even when it's corruption or other criminal activity.

If I understand correctly the reason given by al-Hariri for resigning from his appointment to form a government is that he was trying to break through this confessional blockade so that the government could actually function.

Even though the port explosion was massive and horrific, it wasn't bad enough to cause Hezbollah chief Nasrallah to give up any of his dictatorial power. Better to let the people starve.

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15-Jul-21 World View -- South Africa tribal violence spreading and growing

Cuba street protests at start of its generational Crisis era

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

South Africa tribal violence spreading and growing
Xenophobic violence during Jacob Zuma's term
Cyril Ramaphosa, from the Venda tribe, becomes president
Brief generational history of South Africa
Rewriting the history of the Mfecane
Cuba street protests at start of its generational Crisis era

South Africa tribal violence spreading and growing

Burning warehouse in Durban following riots gives rise to fears of food and fuel shortages (Reuters)

Burning warehouse in Durban following riots gives rise to fears of food and fuel shortages (Reuters)

Communal violence is spreading in South Africa, led by members of the Zulu tribe. More than 70 people have been killed and more than 1,200 people have been arrested, as the violence continues into the eighth day.

Rioters have been looting shopping centers, stores and warehouses, possibly emulating the antifa-blm looters in Portland and Chicago. There are already pockets of hunger in South Africa, and it's feared that the looting will make shortages of food and fuel worse.

The rioting was triggered by the jailing of South Africa's ex-president Jacob Zuma, a charismatic and popular Zulu leader who was ousted from his own ANC party over accusations of corruption and rape.

For several weeks, Zuma has been calling on his supporters to prevent his arrest by locking arms and blocking the police from arresting him. He has often been seen singing his favorite revolutionary song "Umshini Wami" (Bring me my machine gun), often accompanied by him swirling his hips and skillfully doing a traditional Zulu dance. He used that song frequently during his political campaigns.

The two largest tribes in South Africa are the Zulu tribe and the Xhosa tribe. Between them, they make up a third of South Africa�s 55 million people.

The African National Congress (ANC) is the only political party that has won elections since South Africa's independence in 1994. Thus, the leader of the ANC always goes on to become the president. Up until recently, the Zulu and Xhosa tribes have dominated the ANC.

The ANC hero, Nelson Mandela, a Xhosa, became the first president of the ANC and of South Africa in 1994. He was followed by Mandela's hand-picked successor, Thabo Mbeki, another Xhosa. The ANC became sharply divided in Decenber 2007, when when Mbeki lost a bruising battle for ANC leadership with a Zulu, Jacob Zuma.

Xenophobic violence during Jacob Zuma's term

In 2008, xenophobic violence against immigrants from other African countries, originating in Alexandria, a suburb of the capital city Johannesburg, spread east into the Zulu heartland of Durban and west into Cape Town. The violence was spurred by a poor economy and a lack of jobs, with the accusations that other African immigrants were taking the good jobs.

Tens of thousands of immigrants were forced to flee for their lives from their homes and businesses, often with no time to collect their belongings before their homes and businesses were looted and destroyed. The violence and looting were generally perpetrated by young South Africans from the Zulu and Xhosa tribes. (See "South Africa will create 'temporary shelters' for migrants, not 'refugee camps' (31-May-2008)")

The xenophobic violence was repeated in 2015 when thousands of people, mostly foreigners from Zimbabwe and Malawi, fled for their lives, after mobs with machetes attacked them in the city of Durban. Durban is the largest city in the South African province of KwaZulu-Natal, which is the heartland of the Zulu tribe. The anti-immigrant violence spread to Johannesburg. It's believed that the attacks were triggered by remarks made by Zulu king Goodwill Zwelithini, who said in a public speech, "We are requesting those who come from outside to please go back to their countries." ( "17-Apr-15 World View -- South African xenophobic violence echoes 1820s Mfecane Zulu massacre")

Cyril Ramaphosa, from the Venda tribe, becomes president

Jacob Zuma was ousted from the party before his second term ended in 2018. He is facing 16 charges of corruption, fraud, graft and racketeering relating to a 1999 purchase of weapons and gear from European arms firms when he was deputy president. In 2006, he was in court for the alleged rape of a colleague's HIV-positive daughter. He was acquited of those charges, but not before bragging that he had unprotected sex with the woman, but avoided catching HIV by taking a shower after sex.

A surprise candidate, Cyril Ramaphosa, won the ANC leadership in 2017, in a close battle with the favored Zulu candidate. Ramaphosa is a member of the Venda tribe, a small tribe with fewer than 700,000 people, living near the border with Zimbabwe.

Ramaphosa became president in the hope that he could be relatively neutral between the Zulus and Xhosas, and could resolve the divisiveness between those two tribes. One businessman voter was quoted as saying,

"There are not enough Venda to hijack the country. When Thabo Mbeki was president [from 1999 to 2008], you had to be Xhosa to get anywhere. Under Zuma, the Zulus have led the way. I am hoping that Cyril as a Venda will have to involve all South Africans because his own people are so few."

There have been very divisive issues during Cyril Ramaphosa's term as president, and Ramaphosa has been successful in defusing most of them. The most explosive one was the proposal to confiscate the land of white farmers without compensation. Ramaphosa found a way to mitigate the land confiscation without compensation to make it less divisive.

However, probably the most explosive issue of all has been the jailing of Jacob Zuma for corruption, and that has led to the current tribal violence that appears to be increasing.

Brief generational history of South Africa

Human existence has forever been controlled by one major law: That the population always grows more quickly than the food supply. This is the reason why every society has to have an existential, genocidal war every 80 years or so. The purpose of the war is to kill off enough people so that the survivors have enough food to eat.

That appears to be what happened in southern Africa at the end of the 1700s. Population levels were increasing rapidly, and resources were increasingly scarce. The introduction of corn by the Europeans had the double effect of producing more food, but using more water to grow. Corn became a major staple, but there was massive disruption and suffering with declining rainfall at the end of the 1700s, followed by a calamitous ten-year drought that began about 1800. Presumably, this is the fault of "climate change."

Kingdoms that had existed side by side in peace for decades began to fight each other for resources. The result was a massive war called the Mfecane ("the crushing") that climaxed in 1828. The Mfecane gave rise to Shaka, considered to be possibly the greatest African warrior in history. Shaka introduced many new warfare techniques. One of the best known was to use short spears, which required close combat with the enemy, rather than long spears, which would be thrown but would not always be effective.

By the mid-1820s, Shaka ruled a kingdom of more than 100,000 people with a standing army of 40,000 men. The great Zulu Empire lasted for decades, until it was destroyed by the British in 1879 in the bloody Anglo-Zulu war. At the climax of that crisis war, the Zulus were dispersed, and the Zulu nation ended.

South Africa's last generational Crisis war was World War II. Since South Africa was part of the British Empire, it fought on the side of the allies, although some tribal factions wished to side with the Germans or stay neutral. The British colonists introduced Apartheid during the 1940s, but it was abolished in the generational Awakening era of the 1990s that led to South African independence, an Awakening era climax.

When I talk about the world in today's generational Crisis era, I talk about increasing nationalism and xenophobia in almost every nation. The same is true on a tribal basis in South Africa. The Zulus have become extremely nationalistic, and this is driving the current round of looting and rioting. But this time the violence is directed at membrs of other South African tribes, not just a "immigrants" from other African countries, as occurred in 2008 and 2015.

As the world approaches a new world war, South Africa can be expected to be involved in two different wars. One war will be as a participant in the world war on the side of either China or the West -- to be decided -- and the other will be an internal civil war, refighting the battles of the Mfecane.

Rewriting the history of the Mfecane

Just as China blames all its failures on the 1840s Opium Wars, some South African historians are blaming all their failures on the Mfecane, and blaming the Mfecane on the Europeans.

In 1988, a historian named Julian Cobbing published a paper on "The Mfecane As Alibi." He argued that the Mfecane was caused by the European and Brazilian slave trade, and if it hadn't been for the Europeans, then the Mfecan would never have occurred.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is nonsense. As we said, there was overpopulation and a calamitous drought at the beginning of the 1800s, and this is exactly the formula for a generational crisis war, a war of extermination, whose purpose is to kill off enough people so that the survivors will have enough to eat. So the Mfecane would have occurred with or without the Europeans.

The same thing is happening today, around the world. A report earlier this week by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says that "world hunger and malnutrition levels worsened dramatically last year, with most of the increase likely due to the COVID-19 pandemic." This continued and accelerated a trend that had already been occurring prior to the pandemic.

According to the report, "Unfortunately, the pandemic continues to expose weaknesses in our food systems, which threaten the lives and livelihoods of people around the world. No region of the world has been spared."

The increase in hunger and malnutrition means that there is less food per capita in the world. For populations living on the margin, this means that they will have to fight for enough food to feed themselves and their families. This usually translates into anti-government protests, such as the ones we see today in South Africa and Cuba, and leads to either civil wars or external wars.

Cuba street protests at start of its generational Crisis era

Cuba's government is in turmoil in the face of large anti-government protests that started over the weekend.

Analysts are blaming three factors:

Mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic, and lack of vital medicines. (Cuba is supposed to be this great country for medical research, but was not so great during the pandemic.)

Bad economy -- growing inflation, blackouts, and shortages of food, medicine and basic products.

Access to internet social media, used to spread the news of the protests.

Analysts are comparing this to the 1994 student protests, which fizzled fairly quickly.

However, today's protests are different because this is the beginning of a generational Crisis era.

Cuba's last generational crisis war was Fidel Castro's revolution that climaxed in 1960. The new Crisis era began 58 years later, in 2018.

Prior to 2018, Cuba was in an Unraveling era, when many of the Communist policies imposed by Fidel Castro began to unravel. They moved hundreds of thousands of people from government employment to private sector employment, including self-employment. They abandoned the core principal of Marxist Socialism, "From each according to abilities, to each according to needs." Instead, workers in the private sector will be able to earn high salaries.

Today's new anti-government protests are larger and more widespread than the 1994 student protests. Since this is the beginning of a generational Crisis era, it's quite possible that it will spread, in the following weeks and months, into a re-fighting of Castro's revolution.

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7-Jul-21 World View -- Russia and Tajikistan protect border As Afghan forces collapse under Taliban offensive

Tajikistan mobilizes 20,000 military reservists to Afghan border

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Tajikistan mobilizes 20,000 military reservists to Afghan border
Russia prepares to help Tajikistan protect its border with Afghanistan

Tajikistan mobilizes 20,000 military reservists to Afghan border

Map of Afghanistan showing recent rapid advance of Taliban (Afghan-Analysts)

Map of Afghanistan showing recent rapid advance of Taliban (Afghan-Analysts)

Multiple analysts on TV have been echoing the reports that, as American and Nato troops withdraw from Afghanistan, the Taliban are taking control of the country far more rapidly than expected.

The Taliban are now in control of a third of the country. Many in the Afghan army, who are supposed to be fighting the Taliban without the aid of Nato, are apparently fleeing without a fight.

More than 1,000 Afghan security personnel fled across the border with Tajikistan, causing Tajikistan's president to call up 20,000 military reservists to guard the border. This follows a general warning to Tajikistan villagers who live along the border to be prepared "to take up arms." (See "3-May-21 World View -- US withdrawal from Afghanistan threatens Central Asia stability")

In May, a provincial governor announced:

"In coordination with the police and intelligence departments, we've registered all hunters who live in the border areas. They will have to take up arms to defend our country. In fact, all of us will have to take up weapons if the situation dictates."

As I wrote at the time, the withdrawal of American and Nato forces in Afghanistan threatens to destabilize the entire Central Asian region that includes Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.

Many analysts are pointing these events out, and it's not lost on any of them that after America and Nato have had forces in Afghanistan for almost 20 years, all the work that was done is now about to be lost in a period of a few months. In particular, there are already reports that the freedoms of women and girls are already being curtailed in newly-captured Taliban areas.

Russia prepares to help Tajikistan protect its border with Afghanistan

Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan are all members of Russia's Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Russia operates one of its largest military bases abroad in Tajikistan, equipped with tanks, helicopters, drones and ground attack aircraft, and Russia is promising to stabilize the border with Afghanistan if needed.

In the 1980s, Russia had an ill-fated invasion of Afghanistan (Russia's "Vietnam") fighting Islamic Pashtuns who later became the Taliban. Tajikistan and other Soviet Socialist republics, who were part of the Soviet Union in the 1980s, supported Russia's invasion. At that time, Osama bin Laden was a Sunni Muslim Saudi citizen whom the Saudis got rid of by encouraging him to travel to Afghanistan to fight against the Orthodox Christian Russian infidels. Since the Soviet Union was the West's major enemy at the time, America and other Western countries supported bin Laden and his fight with the Soviets.

After the Soviets withdrew in 1989, the situation rapidly evolved. There was an extremely bloody Afghan civil war between 1992-96, pitting radicalized Pashtuns in the south against the Northern Alliance in the north, consisting of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks.

As I've written many times, this civil war, a generational Crisis war, is the controlling event today. Each side is bitterly angry at the atrocities, beatings, tortures and rapes perpetrated by the other side, and all many people want is revenge. That's always the nature of an ethnic civil war, and it's the reason why the Taliban will never fulfill their promises to give up violence. And that's why the remnants of the old Northern Alliance are now fleeing across the border into Tajikistan.

As I wrote at the time, the agreement between Donald Trump and the Taliban in March 2020 was entirely delusional, but was apparently driven by a desire to withdraw troops from Afghanistan no matter what the cost and no matter how humiliating to the US. Joe Biden fully endorsed the delusional agreement, and we're now seeing the results, predictable and predicted. And yes, 20 years of work is now going down the drain. ( "16-Feb-20 World View -- US and Taliban to sign laughable 'reduction in violence' agreement in Afghanistan")

So Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko says:

"The situation there is rather tense because according to some sources, up to 70% of the Tajik-Afghan border is now controlled by the Taliban."

So the Northern Alliance may be reincarnated under Russian leadership. Things are changing rapidly in Afghanistan, as the last American and Nato troops prepare to leave, and many analysts are foreseeing a catastrophe.

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28-Jun-21 World View -- Japan's plans for defending Taiwan from an attack by China

China's Dong Jingwei defects to the United States

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Japan's relations with Taiwan
Defending Taiwan as 'collective self-defense'
Is Taiwan a 'nation'?
China's plan for invading Taiwan
Japan provides vaccines to Taiwan
Instability of the Chinese Communist Party
China's Dong Jingwei defects to the United States

Japan's relations with Taiwan

Japan's Self-Defense Forces (KYODO)

Japan's Self-Defense Forces (KYODO)

When we discuss China's planned invasion of Taiwan, we generally (tacitly) assume that the US will be Taiwan's only foreign defender. While it's not clear how South Korea, Vietnam, Australia or India might react to China's invasion of Taiwan, Japan has been discussing how it would react, in increasingly explicit terms.

Taiwan was a colony of Japan, thanks to the Treaty of Shimonoseki, signed by Japan and China on April 17, 1895, after Japan's victory in the Sino-Japanese war of 1894-95. China ceded Taiwan to Japan as a result of that treaty, and Japan controlled Taiwan until Japan was defeated in 1945. Japan's colonization of Taiwan was harsh, but there were numerous economic benefits to Taiwan, and improvement in living standards. When Japan declared war on China in 1937, Taiwan was an ally of Japan against their common enemy, China.

After WW II, Taiwan and Japan had cordial relations, but there was little talk of joint security and defense planning, since Japan had adopted its "Pacifist Constitution," which made it illegal for Japan to deploy armed forces for any reason other than to defend an attack on Japanese soil.

Defending Taiwan as 'collective self-defense'

Finally in 2015, Japan reinterpreted the constitution to permit "collective self-defense," which would permit Japanese military forces to deploy armed forces for an attack on an ally, such as the United States. (See "5-May-14 World View -- Japan debates 'collective self-defense' to protect America and Japan" for a detailed explanation of what was adopted in 2015.)

So a commitment to defend Taiwan from an invasion by China is not a simple thing as it would be in other countries, especially since the pacifist constitution is very popular among the Japanese people, who are still trying to figure out why they acted as they did in WW II. But the increasingly belligerent threats from China are forcing the Japanese to look for a solution.

So with that reinterpretation of the Constitution, Japanese government officials are considering two possible paths by which they could militarily support the United States after a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

The US has bases in Japan on Okinawa island, in southern Japan. A Chinese attack on those bases would be an attack on Japanese soil, so Japan could fight the Chinese without the "collective self-defense" reinterpretation. This would be especially true if the Chinese attack extended to Japan's Senkaku Islands, which China claims.

Under the "collective self-defense" reinterpretation, Japan could fight alongside the US in defending Taiwan from a Chinese invasion if Japan's government determined that the invasion was a security threat that threatened Japan's own survival. For example, the Japanese might view the invasion of Taiwan as a stepping-stone to a planned invasion of Japan.

Is Taiwan a 'nation'?

In a debate on Covid-19 in parliament earlier this month, Japan's prime minister Yoshihide Suga referred to Australia, New Zealand and Taiwan and said, "These three countries have been imposing strong restrictions on privacy rights" to curb the virus outbreak.

It's not known whether this was a slip or was intentional, but it drew the usual hysterical complaint from China's Foreign Ministry: "China expresses strong dissatisfaction with Japan's erroneous remarks and has lodged a solemn protest against Japan."

China claims Taiwan as a province of China, and has repeatedly said that they will invade Taiwan at a time of their choosing to force Taiwan to be part of China. As a result, both the United States and Japan have adopted a policy of "strategic ambiguity," in order to encourage both China and Taiwan to continue thinking that the issue can be resolved in time peacefully (which, of course, it cannot). In particular, the US has not committed to defending Taiwan, but is providing weapons to Taiwan for its own self-defense.

For decades, this strategic ambiguity has been debated in Washington and Tokyo. But now, with the growing military might of China and its growing belligerence, there is pressure on both the US and Japan to abandon strategic ambiguity and commit to defending Taiwan in case of attack.

These discussions are in process, and it's possible that something will be decided within a few months, or not.

China's plan for invading Taiwan

According to an analysis by Ian Easton, senior director at the Project 2049 Institute, China is preparing for an all-out invasion within five to ten years.

He says that Beijing�s optimistic version of events goes something like this:

Prior to an invasion, cyber and electronic warfare units would target Taiwan�s financial system and key infrastructure, as well as US satellites to reduce notice of impending ballistic missiles.

Airstrikes would quickly aim to kill Taiwan�s top political and military leaders, while also immobilizing local defenses.

An invasion would follow, with PLA warships and submarines. Outlying islands such as Kinmen and Pratas could be quickly subsumed before a fight for the Penghu archipelago, which sits just 50 kilometers from Taiwan and is home to bases for all three branches of its military.

As Chinese ships speed across the strait, thousands of paratroopers would appear above Taiwan�s coastlines, looking to penetrate defenses, capture strategic buildings and establish beachheads through which the PLA could bring in tens of thousands of soldiers who would secure a decisive victory.

Easton says that Taiwan has been preparing for just such an attack by fortifying defenses around key landing points and conducting drills to repel Chinese forces.

Japan provides vaccines to Taiwan

China has blocked Taiwan from getting doses of the Pfizer vaccine. The Pfizer vaccine was co-developed by the German company BioNTech. Taiwan was negotiating with Pfizer to get the vaccine, but China was able to delay the deal indefinitely by pressuring BioNTech and the German government. The Chinese claim that they had offered to sell their vaccine to Taiwan, but Taiwanese law bans Chinese-made medical products, including vaccines.

So earlier this month, Japan delivered 1.24 million doses of AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine to Japan. The Japanese foreign ministry said that that Japan was responding to a Taiwanese request, and that the donation reflects �Japan�s important partnership and friendship with Taiwan.�

On Friday, Japan said it would send 2 million additional doses of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to Taiwan and Vietnam, and arrangements were being made to send 1 million doses each to Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines.

In addition, the United States recently shipped 2.5 million vaccine does to Taiwan. Taiwan Foreign Minister Joseph Wu tweeted, �The Taiwan-U.S. relationship is rock solid, & we�ll keep cooperating closely in combating COVID19. Forces for good will prevail!�

Instability of the Chinese Communist Party

Analysts who talk about a Chinese invasion of Taiwan usually provide a time frame of five to ten years. That's pretty much what they have to say, isn't it.

But any such timeline assumes that the Chinese Communists are pursuing rational policies. As I've written in the past, crisis wars begin with a chaotic unexpected event. WW I began because a 12-year-old decided to shoot an Archduke in 1914. WW II began because a Japanese soldier had to pee and got lost in the woods in 1937. Those wars were a complete surprise, even to the belligerents. That's how WW III will begin. It will be totally irrational and unexpected, and it could happen any day.

A lot depends on the stability of the CCP government, and I've argued in the past that any dictatorship is fatally flawed and unstable, especially as compared to the US Constitutional government, with its federal system of checks and balances. The problem is that when a dictator does something really stupid, there's no one there to stop him, and anyone who tries is executed. This was true, for example, of Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward (1958-59), which was possibly the stupidest policy of any country in the history of the world, killing tens of millions of innocent people for no reason at all, destroying China's economy for decades.

So now we have Xi Jinping in that same position of dictator. If he appears weak, he'll be replaced. So he has to be strong, and if he makes a stupid decision, as Mao did, there will be no one to stop him, and the result will be disaster.

Xi reached the position of dictator by a brutal anticorruption campaign, begun in 2012, which targeted some two million officials in the Chinese Communist Party. This was popular with many Chinese, but alienated may elites.

China's Dong Jingwei defects to the United States

Xi Jinping is facing many problems. Domestic problems include income inequality, environmental threats, land grabs, food safety, Air pollution, water scarcity, and soil contamination. In addition, China�s aging population means that more retirees are supported by fewer young people.

On top of all this, there have been reports that Xi Jinping and CCP officials have been shocked at the defection in February of Dong Jingwei and his daughter to the United States. Dong is China's Vice Minister of State Security in the Chinese Ministry of Defense. He is perhaps the highest-level Chinese defector the U.S. has ever had.

He is reported to be providing informtion about the identity of all the Chinese spies in the US, and methods used by the Chinese to infiltrate the US government, businesses and universities.

According to a report from Taiwan, this defection has triggered factional fights within the CCP leading to a period of unprecedented instability not seen since the Cultural Revolution.

The point of mentioning all this in an article on Japan's plans to defend Taiwan from Chinese invasion is that the invasion could occur at any time -- maybe in the 5-10 years as predicted by the analysts, but possibly much sooner than that with an overwhelmed dictator Xi Jinping in charge, and the possibiity that he'll order some military action in the Taiwan Strait to deflect from his personal or political problems.

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24-Jun-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma army fights new militia in Mandalay as civil war spreads

China's strategic interest in Myanmar / Burma

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar/Burma army fights new militia in Mandalay as civil war spreads
The 2021 coup vs the violent 2007 and 1988 demonstrations
The rise of the Ethnic Armed Groups (EAGs)
The war in Myanmar vs the war in Syria
China's strategic interest in Myanmar / Burma
Russia's strategic interest in the Myanmar/Burma war
Thailand supports the coup and the slaughter
Karmic justice continues

Myanmar/Burma army fights new militia in Mandalay as civil war spreads

Map of Myanmar / Burma, showing verious ethnic groups and militias (EAGs) (Economist)

Map of Myanmar / Burma, showing verious ethnic groups and militias (EAGs) (Economist)

A significant new escalation in the civil war in Myanmar / Burma occurred on Tuesday as the junta regime's armed forces clashed with the Mandalay People�s Defence Force (Mandalay PDF), a newly formed anti-junta militia in Mandalay, Myanmar's second largest city.

Since the February 1 army coup that installed the junta dictatorship, junta forces have been clashing with militias for months in rural areas. What's different this time is that the clash is occurring in a large urban center, Mandalay. As the civil war progresses, this could lead to large-scale carnage among the huge, dense population of Mandalay. According to the junta, troops killed four people and arrested eight others.

The United Nations is warning that unless something is done, Myanmar will accelerate to a civil war of "unprecedented scale." Well, of course, there are many civil wars of "unprecedented scale" all the time, including Burma's last generational crisis civil war (1948-58), so let's ignore the UN hyperbole.

Nothing will be done because the United Nations has become completely toothless. Any resolution in the Security Council is a joke, vetoed by Russia and China. There was a non-binding resolution passed last week by the UN General Assembly. It had been debated for three months and was supposed to call for an arms embargo, but it only passed after the arms embargo stuff was deleted, so the resolution says exactly nothing.

The Biden administration has imposed sanctions on Myanmar's gemstone industry, which funds the army's violent actions, as well as a number of individuals in the junta's government. These sanctions will do no good, but it's interesting to mention them because it shows, once again, that the US is policeman of the world, and can actually take action while the UN can only pass toothless resolutions.

The 2021 coup vs the violent 2007 and 1988 demonstrations

As I've described starting with the massive demonstrations in 2007 by the "'88 Generation," Burma's last two generational crisis wars (1886-91 and 1948-58) were extremely bloody and violent civil wars involving multiple ethnic groups. (See "Burma: Growing demonstrations by the '88 Generation' raise fears of new slaughter")

As expected, the demonstrations in 2007 fizzled out, because Myanmar/Burma was in a generational Unraveling era, when the last aging survivors of the preceding crisis war exert all their political power to prevent a new crisis war.

But starting in 2016, 58 years after the end of the last crisis war, the survivors were almost all gone (dead or retired), and the people in power were in younger generations, with no sense of history.

Starting in 2011, Buddhists began attacking Muslim Rohingyas in villages across Burma, particularly the 1.1 million ethnic Rohingyas in Rakhine State. Mobs of Buddhists attacked Muslims, conducting atrocities including torture and rape, killing hundreds and forcing hundreds of thousands to leave their homes to flee from the attacks. In some cases, the Buddhists burned down entire Rohingya villages to the ground.

However, the worst violence began after a terrorist attack on Ausgust 25, 2017. The Tatmadaw (the army) responded with a sweep of violence against Rohingyas, causing thousands of them to flee their villages and head for the Bangladesh border, where they hoped to cross and reach a refugee camp. The Burmese army shot them as they were fleeing, including women and children, killing dozens. This was the beginning of mass genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Rohingyas. There are now a million Rohingyas who were forced to flee across the border into Bangladesh, where they're living in filthy refugee camps.

However, that wasn't the end of the Tatmadaw's program of mass torture, rape and slaughter. After the coup of February 1 of this year, that same army turned on its own people. The Tatmadaw has been conducting torture, rape and slaughter of the ordinary Burmans, the Burmese people. And this time it isn't fizzling the way it did in 2007. Isn't it amazing, Dear Reader, what crazy things people do during a generational Crisis era?

The rise of the Ethnic Armed Groups (EAGs)

So as Generational Dynamics has been predicting, the army and the people of Myanmar/Burma are refighting their last generational crisis war, which was a massive bloody war among ethnic groups (1948-58), with intervention by the Chinese.

But now there's a new acronym appearing in news reports: EAG, which stands for "Ethnic Armed Group." The EAGs are militias formed by different anti-junta ethnic groups in Myanmar. There are 135 ethnic groups in Myanmar, so there is the possibility of 135 different EAGs. The population of Myanmar numbers somewhere between 51 and 55 million people. Of this, around 68% are considered part of the dominant ethnic group - the Bamar (also known as the Burmans).

Here are some of the most significant EAGs:

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) is a separatist group in Kachin State in northern Myanmar, along the border with China. The Tatmadaw is attacking the KIA with bombing raids and ground forces.

The Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) is a separatist group in Karen State (Kayin State, Kayah State) in southern Myanmar, along the border with Thailand. Bombing by the Tatmadaw has driven many Karenni across the border into Thailand, where they are not being welcomed by the Thai junta leader.

The Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF), a merger of established insurgent groups and new militias from Kayah state, ambushed 150 soldiers on May 31.

The United Wa State Army (UWSA) is backed by China and has been silent on the coup, though it has traditionally distributed arms to other EAGs.

The Three Brotherhood Alliance � made up of the Ta�ang National Liberation Army (TNLA), Rakhine Arakan Army (AA) and Kokang Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) � appear to be using the prospect of supporting the protestors to leverage concessions from the Tatmadaw.

The war in Myanmar vs the war in Syria

Many people are comparing the civil war in Myanmar against the civil war in Syria.

Here's a comparison by the analysts at Lowy in Australia:

"Like their fellow Syrian protestors, civilians in Myanmar are forming their own militias. Myanmar already had a patchwork of ethnic militias, some of which have stepped up attacks on the military, known as the Tatmadaw, ostensibly in support of the protestors. Geopolitically, the fault lines mirror the Syrian conflict, with Russia and China blocking Western-led efforts to censure the Tatmadaw at the United Nations.
Nonetheless, there are substantial differences between 2021 Myanmar and 2011�12 Syria.
Three key elements helped create the Syrian conflagration: a mass armed uprising, extensive foreign intervention on both sides and an influx of foreign fighters. None of those elements currently exist in Myanmar, and it is unclear whether they ever will � particularly the second and third."

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this analysis is nonsense, and it's instructive to understand why.

Syria's last generational crisis war climaxed in February 1982 with the destruction of the town of Hama, by Hafez al-Assad. His son, Bashar al-Assad, launched an attack on peaceful protesters in 2011, during a generational Awakening/Unraveling era. During such an era, the traumatized survivors of the previous crisis war do what they can to prevent a new war. Bashar al-Assad's army suffered from poor morale and heavy desertions, and in 2015, al-Assad announced that he was going to lose the war. At that point, Russia intervened. That's why there was "extensive foreign intervention on both sides and an influx of foreign fighters." This was the result of an unpopular war during an Awakening/Unraveling era.

So when comparing the Syria war to the Myanmar war, the reason for Russian (and Iranian) intervention in the Syrian war was that al-Assad was going to be defeated. It is typical for an Awakening/Unraveling war to fizzle, just like the Myanmar rebellions in 2007 and 1988.

Myanmar has been in a generational Crisis era since 2016. There is no chance that this war will fizzle like the Syria war. It's possible that the Chinese will intervene, but that's because of the fighting along China's border.

China's strategic interest in Myanmar / Burma

Globe showing China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (Switzerland's Federal Intelligence Service)

Globe showing China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (Switzerland's Federal Intelligence Service)

China has for years been supplying weapons to the Tatmadaw, but has been reluctant to fully endorse the February 1 coup, because the Chinese Communists fear that the people of Myanmar will turn against the Chinese.

Myanmar is an essential element of the Chinese Communists' delusional grand plan to lead and control the world within five years. According to this plan, China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) will bring peace and harmony to the entire world, and all countries will resolve their mutual differences and accede to China's leadership. The only thing that can go wrong, according to this delusiona plan, is that the US will be jealous, and will go to war with China to stop it.

The major BRI project in Myanmar is the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), which is strategically essential to China's grand plan, since it provides a corridor for the transport of people and goods between China's Yunnan province and the Indian Ocean, through Myanmar's ports on the Andaman Sea. This is similar to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which connects China's Xinjiang province to Pakistan's Gwardar port, which China now controls.

Both CMEC and CPEC are essential to China's delusional grand plan, since they have to counter the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, formed by the US, along with Australia, India and Japan, with the obvious goal of countering China.

So the Myanmar civil war is more than just an inconvenience to the Chinese Communists. It's a threat to their whole delusional plan for world domination. What the Chinese really want is for the war to just end and go away, but in a generational Crisis era, that's very unlikely. It's much more likely that it will re-fight the previous crisis war, the extremely bloody 1948-58 civil war that involved all of Burma's ethnic groups, and forced the Chinese to intervene to protect their border.

Russia's strategic interest in the Myanmar/Burma war

Myanmar's arms suppliers -- China, Russia, India, S. Korea, Belarus, etc. (Nikkei)

Myanmar's arms suppliers -- China, Russia, India, S. Korea, Belarus, etc. (Nikkei)

China and Russia have historically been the biggest weapons suppliers to the Tatmadaw, but they have different objectives.

Neither the Russians nor the Chinese care at all how many Myanmar civilians are tortured, raped, beaten or slaughtered. The Russians and the Chinese don't even care how many of their own people are tortured, raped, beaten or slaughtered, let alone the Myanmar people.

So the Russians are perfectly happy to fully support the coup, and continue to supply weapons to the Tatmadaw. Russia does not share a border with Myanmar, and so any genocide or mass slaughter is miles away, and easily ignored.

But as we said, the civil war is a problem for the Chinese. The war could spill over across the border into China, and the people of Myanmar could turn against China, at a time when their support is needed for the CMEC and China's grand delusional plan to run the world. Thus, it is critical for China that the Myanmar people not blame the Chinese for the ongoing violence. There have already been attacks on Chinese factories by groups claiming that the Chinese are supporting the army violence. So the Chinese will continue supplying weapons, but will keep as low a profile as possible.

For the Tatmadaw, the situation is ideal. They can play the Russians and Chinese off against each other, and get all the weapons they want for their fun program of torture, rape, beatings and slaughter.

In fact, there are eight countries that have openly expressed support for the coup and the violence: Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand.

Thailand supports the coup and the slaughter

Thailand's Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, Myanmar's leader Gen. Min Aung Hlaing. (Reuters)

Thailand's Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, Myanmar's leader Gen. Min Aung Hlaing. (Reuters)

Just as China has a potential problem along the border with Myanmar, Thailand has an actual problem.

More than 20,000 villagers, mostly women and children, in Karen State (Kayin State, Kayah State) have been forced to flee from their homes into the jungle to escape the relentless airstrikes and artillery fire by the Tatmadaw. The targets are supposed to be military targets of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), but as always happens with genocidal armies, the Tatmadaw are most targeting civilians, in order to "send a message."

As food is scarce in the jungle, with stories emerging of mothers having to feed their children with insects, many villagers have fled across the border into Thailand. Thailand has set up military checkpoints along the border, and is pushing villagers back across the border into Myanmar.

Thailand's Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha fully supports the coup and the violence by Myanmar's coup leader, Gen. Min Aung Hlaing. That is because Prayuth conducted his own coup in 2014, overthrowing the democratically elected government of Thailand, and Hlaing was the first foreign leader to congratulate him. (See "23-May-14 World View -- Thailand's army seizes power in major victory for 'yellow shirt' elites")

But there hasn't been similar violence in Thailand as is occurring in Myanmar. According to reports, Hlaing has been asking for advice from Prayuth in back-channel discussions, but so far they haven't worked.

Once again, the explanation is the difference in generational era. Thailand's last generational crisis war was the extremely violent "Killing Fields war" in the 1970s next door in Cambodia, so Thailand is in an Awakening/Unraveling era, while Myanmar is in a generational Crisis era. So Prayuth might be able to provide some interesting details, but nothing he says will help quell the Crisis era fury of the anti-junta rebels in Thailand.

Karmic justice continues

As I've written before, the situation in Myanmar/Burma reeks of Karmic justice.

Since 2011, Burma's army has been committing atrocities on Muslim ethnic Rohingyas living in Rakhine State, including gang rape, violent torture, execution-style killings and the razing of entire villages, in a scorched earth campaign. These atrocities have been cheered by the ordinary Myanmar people, led by Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu, most of whom apparently hate the Rohingyas.

Aung Sang Suu Kyi became a "useful idiot" for the army by presenting a sympathetic, tired, weary, female face to the world, defending the army to deflect the horrors and atrocities that are occurring in their country. In 2019, the International Court of Justice in the Hague held a trial on Burma's genocide, and Aung Sang Suu Kyi came and defended the army, saying that nothing had happened.

So now the same atrocities that the Buddhist monks cheered when used against the Muslim Rohingyas are being used against the Buddhists, and the "useful idiot" Aung Sang Suu Kyi is in jail, where she'll probably be killed when it's convenient for the Tatmadaw. That's full Karmic justice.

In the meantime, it's not just the people of Myanmar who are going to suffer. This is a highly explosive situation, and it's very likely to spread to other countries in the region, including China, Thailand and India. In the Generational Dynamics forum, we keep discussing various scenarios that could lead eventually into a world war, and this is one possibility.

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (24-Jun-2021) Permanent Link
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20-Jun-21 World View -- North Korea in crisis, facing 'tense' food shortage and surging food prices

Happy Juneteenth, everyone!

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

North Korea in crisis, facing 'tense' food shortage and surging food prices
Kim Jong-un 'solemnly vows' to overcome difficulties
The Denuclearization Delusion
Happy Juneteenth, everyone!

North Korea in crisis, facing 'tense' food shortage and surging food prices

Kim Jong-un last week announcing the 'tense' food shortage (Reuters)

Kim Jong-un last week announcing the 'tense' food shortage (Reuters)

North Korean dictator last week said that "The people's food situation is now getting tense," referring to scarcity of food and sharply rising food prices He added that the "agricultural sector failed to fulfil its grain production plan" in 2020.

A massive shortage of food has led to a dramatic rise in prices of basic food commodities. A kilogram of bananas costs $45. The price of a kilogram of rice was $0.77 in April, $0.90 in May, and $0.96 in June.

North Korea is subject to both UN and US sanctions, but normally North Korea's agricultural sector can produce enough food, and receive supplements from China and Russia. However, this failed to be enough during 2020 for three reasons:

The US and UN sanctions continued.

North Korea, which has been claiming that thre are no cases of Covid in the country, closed their borders with China and Russia to prevent the spread of Covid. However, there have been reports of widespread Covid in some parts of the country, especially near the border with China. Normally, North Korea depends on China for food, fertilizers and fuel, but most of that trade was cut off.

Several unexpectedly large typhoons last year caused flooding.

The food shortage has not surprisingly led to violence in some areas. According to reports, construction workers building houses in the capital city Pyongyang, North Korea�s largest city with a population of about 3 million, are poorly fed, and are committing robberies and murders to steal food in the neighborhoods where the houses are being built.

Kim Jong-un 'solemnly vows' to overcome difficulties

At the conclusion of a Central Committee meeting on Friday, Kim "solemnly swore that the Party will surely break through head-on the difficulties lying in the way of the revolution" and remain loyal to the revolutionary idea to the end regardless of the "severer difficulties it may be confronted with in the future," according to KCNA, the (North) Korean Central News Agency.

It's not clear how the North Koreans plan to do that, but there have already been some missteps.

North Korea's state-run food stores normally sell just basic foods like unprocessed corn and rice, but due to shortages are now selling some processed foods like sugar, seasonings, flour and cooking oil. However, stocks of those foods are extremely low as well.

A different concern was raised by a recent special "intensive inspection of the storage maintenance status of combat reserve supplies" for the armed forces. The inspection revealed shortages of reserve supplies, and evidence of corruption, since the written records do not match the actual supplies. According to an RFA report:

"The main focus of this inspection is on supplies like wartime fuel, food, combat suites and medicine. All units typically lack fuel, food and medicine so they often secretly dip into their reserves."

Managers responsible for the combat reserve supplies may now fact punishment:

"In addition to the punishment of those who are found at fault in the military-wide intensive inspection, the project to distribute combat reserve materials according to demand will also be under review.
All units have been specifically asked whether they comply with the directive that requires them to create combat reserve supplies by contributing five percent of the daily supplies guaranteed by the state and of military supplies they themselves produce."

Obviously, this has implications for the ability of North Korea's army to attack South Korea, when Kim Jong-un decides to do so.

The Denuclearization Delusion

We haven't heard much from North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un since those exciting gone-by days of yesteryear prior to the Wuhan Coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, when he was meeting regularly with Donald Trump, and the two were expressing their love for one another, in their father-son relationship. In particular, there haven't been any new tests of nuclear weapons or long-range ballistic missiles in a long time. There were some short-range missile tests in March of this year, but they didn't generate much excitement.

President Joe Biden has not announced a North Korea policy, except for "consulting with our allies and partners" and "some form of diplomacy ... conditioned upon the end result of denuclearization," as he said after the North Korean missile test in March.

At that time, I wrote a lengthy article comparing the strategies of Donald Trump and Joe Biden. (See "28-Mar-21 World View -- North Korea's ballistic missiles stoke the Denuclearization Delusion")

The point of the article was the same as in the articles about North Korea that I've been writing for years -- that it makes absolutely no difference what strategy is used by Trump and Biden. North Korea is going to continue developing and manufacturing nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missiles, and one day will use them, probably on Japan and the US. The idea of North Korea denuclearization is completely delusionary, even though the "Denuclearization Delusion" persists in the dream world of Pollyannaish fantasy.

In fact, Biden's special representative for North Korea, Sung Kim, was in South Korea on Saturday to discuss the stalled denuclearization talks. Kim Jong-un ordered his government to prepare for both dialogue and confrontation with the United States. Kim is demanding that the US lift its sanctions on North Korea.

Happy Juneteenth, everyone!

Saturday was the new federal holiday, Juneteenth, celebrating the day June 19, 1865, when the Republicans, who had won the Civil War and emancipated the slaves under Abraham Lincoln, officially completed the emancipation by forcing the Democrats, who had finally surrendered after losing the Civil War, to really give up their slaves and set them free.

I can't help but think that this is an odd holiday for the Democrats to be celebrating, since it's a day of their total humiliation and surrender. Following the emancipation, the bitterly angry Democrats formed the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and spent the next century lynching black boys and raping black girls with impunity.

This anger continues to today. Joe Biden grew up at the time when the KKK was active, and his friend and mentor Robert Byrd held the title "Exalted Cyclops." Biden and Byrd may have participated in some lynchings or rapes, or if not were certainly aware of them and approved of them. Biden was a racist and White Supremacist his entire life, and was quite public about it until Barack Obama nominated him to be vice president. But with the recent release of Hunter Biden's texts, which were laced with highly racist epithets, we know that racism and White Supremacy are deeply embedded in the Biden family.

Maxine Waters, who has often appeared to be totally unhinged, must have suffered some kind of trauma in the past. My guess is that either she was raped as a young girl by a White Democrat in the KKK, or if not, at the least she must have known many young black girls who were raped. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who also seems to be unhinged, was born too late to be raped by a KKK member, but undoubtedly knew many black women who had been raped in years past. Frankly, I don't blame Waters or Lightfoot for acting as they do, given the trauma they must have suffered decades ago, surrounded by black girls and women who had been raped by White Democrats.

Lori Lightfoot's Chicago is a good example of how the Democrats are causing massacres of blacks today, just as though the KKK were as active as before. Lightfoot and other Democrat politicians have adopted a set of racist policies that specifically target black communities, making them unsafe and punishing successful black businesses. These policies include the following: destroying the black family, defunding police, not arresting violent criminals, letting violent criminals out of jail, keeping the police from making gun checks, forbidding community policing, and allowing huge amounts of fentynal and meth into the country through the southern border. Of course whites also suffer from these policies, but not nearly as much as blacks do. These policies all target blacks and have the specific purpose of making black neighborhoods unsafe and poor. These are all White Supremacist policies, and any Democrat who follows them is, by definition, a White Supremacist.

The results speak for themselves: Hundreds of blacks are killed each week through mass shootings on the streets of Chicago and other Democrat-run cities, where the above racist policies are in force. These have the same purpose as the 1921 Tulsa massacre of a century ago. It's as if the KKK were still as active as ever in the mass slaughter of blacks.

So now we come to the new Juneteenth federal holiday, which celebrates the Democrat Party's loss of their black slaves, and also commemorates the Democrat Party's launching of the KKK. I find it bewildering that the Democrats allowed this holiday to be celebrated, and I can't help but wonder if this is actually the beginning of a social war by the blacks against their white masters.

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (20-Jun-2021) Permanent Link
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15-Jun-21 World View -- The hysteria over inflation in a deflationary era

Understanding inflation, deflation and the CPI

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

The hysteria over the Consumer Price Index
Historical consumer price index changes
Understanding inflation, deflation and the CPI
Financial crisis of 2007-2008

The hysteria over the Consumer Price Index

Velocity of Money, 1959-2021 (St. Louis Fed)

Velocity of Money, 1959-2021 (St. Louis Fed)

In mid-May, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) published its monthly computation of the change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) of 4.2%, the highest rate since September 2008. This means that consumer prices had risen 4.2% in the preceding 12 months.

The media went hysterical and started predicting hyperinflation. A typical media statement by so-called "experts" was some variation of the following:

"Inflation exploded in April at an annual rate of 4.2%, the highest rate since Sept 2008, so inflation is already occurring, and we can expect much higher inflation or hyperinflation in the next few months!"

Long-time readers are aware that I have a low opinion of economists, and the above statement is one more example. If the inflation rate was even higher in September 2008, then why wasn't there hyperinflation in 2009? These "experts" are too dumb to even ask that question. As it turned out, there was mild deflation in 2009, so the Law of Reversion of the Mean took hold.

Then in mid-June, the BLS reported a CPI increase of 4.99%. Here's how CNBC reported it:

"The consumer price index, which represents a basket including food, energy, groceries, housing costs and sales across a spectrum of goods, rose 5% from a year ago. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been expecting a gain of 4.7%.
The reading represented the biggest CPI gain since the 5.3% increase in August 2008, just before the worst of the financial crisis sent the U.S. spiraling into the worst recession it had seen since the Great Depression."

This was actually a pretty good report, since it balanced the inflation hysteria with a sober report about what happened in 2009.

However, it didn't stop the hysteria from the so-called "experts" on TV, who have been predicting hyperinflationary doom, because they just can't seem to grasp that this CPI change is a temporary spike.

Historical consumer price index changes

The following page contains a table of historical changes in the CPI month by month for the preceding 12 months, from 1913 to the present:

Historical Consumer Price Index Change

If you'd like, you can copy and paste the table on that page into a text file or into a spreadsheet, or you can just read the table on the web page.

You should spend a few minutes studying that table. It shows how the current spike in inflation is not unusual in the last three decades, and that there were previous larger spikes that didn't lead to sustained inflation.

As I've written many times, the "experts" have been consistently wrong about inflation since 2003, when I started keeping track, and predicted a deflationary era. For the last 70 quarters, the "experts" predicted that there would be inflation or super-inflation in the following quarter, and for 70 quarters they've been wrong every quarter and I've been right every quarter. And now it's the same thing all over again.

It would be VERY nice if even one of these "experts" at least acknowledged that they've been wrong for the last 70 quarters, and explained why "this time it's different" this quarter. But they never do.

Understanding inflation, deflation and the CPI

When I first wrote about deflation in 2003, I really didn't understand what was going on, and in fact I said that inflation is "very mysterious." But I knew we were in a stock market bubble, and I knew that public debt was very high, and I knew that we were in a generational Crisis era, so I assumed that we would be following the deflationary path of the 1930s, and that we were in a "deflationary era."

That turned out to be correct. But now, having seen what happened in the last almost 20 years, I now have a much better idea about what a "deflationary era" or "disinflationary era" means. It means two things:

that there will be NO sustained hyperinflation as in the 1970s, and
the deflationary era will end with a financial crisis that will trigger a deflationary crash.

There are two economic measures that define a deflationary era:

the falling velocity of money, which measures the reluctance of people to spend money or increase wages
the rising level of debt, which will lead to a deflationary crash.

Both of these economic measures are generational, in the sense that they occur during generational Crisis eras, and are the opposite of what occurred in the generational Awakening era of the 1970s. During the 1970s, people were still recovering from the Great Depression and public debt was extremely low, so people were willing to incur debt and spend money, resulting in a high velocity of money in the 1970s, and inflation.

Financial crisis of 2007-2008

The global financial crisis of 2007-2008 caused many people to go bankrupt or to lose their homes, and that made people extremely averse to spending. This reluctance to spend was measured by the velocity of money, which has been falling sharply since then. You can see that clearly by the graph at the beginning of this article.

This doesn't cause deflation, but it does put a lid on inflation during this deflationary era. It also means that when there's a burst of inflation caused by scarcity, like today, it will not encourage people to spend more, but instead will cause people to become more cautious and pull back even further, often resulting in a brief period of deflation as the scarcity unwinds. This happened in 2009, following an inflationary spike in 2008.

The second factor, besides velocity of money, is increasing public debt.

But today, public debt is extremely high and growing. This feeds into the velocity of money, since people in debt are very reluctant to spend and pay high prices, which would only increase their debt.

Furthermore, the high public debt leads to the second outcome of a deflationary era, namely that it ends with a sharp deflationary crash. This is because of the chain reaction that starts at the beginning of a financial crisis. As debts come due, people are no longer able to borrow money to roll debts over, so they have to sell assets and collect money owed through other people's interlocking debts, and that forces other people to sell their assets, resulting in a chain reaction and a full-fledged deflationary spiral.

I was actually expecting this to happen in 2008, with the collapse of Lehman and other banks. But something happened that I didn't expect -- that the Fed would flood the markets with "quantitative easing" (printed money), which provided banks with plenty of liquidity so that they could lend money to roll debts over. The problem is that this exacerbated the problem of interlocking debt and extended it around the world, so that the next crisis won't be resolved by quantitative easing, especially if it happens in the context of war.

Here's a final ironic point. When the US government "prints money," knee-jerk economists say that this will result in "too many dollars chasing too few goods" and inflation. This was true in the 1970s, but the opposite is true in a generational Crisis era, which the knee-jerk economists don't grasp at all. Printing money today does not generate inflation today. Printing money today increases public debt, which makes people more cautious and lowers the velocity of money. So printing money today does not cause inflation. It creates disinflationary pressure, and eventually will make the deflationary crash much larger. So printing money today actually causes more deflation.

You know, I used to think that the amount of money in the economy (M2) at least had some effect on the inflation rate, but as time has gone on, I increasingly believe that the amount of money has absolutely nothing to do with the inflation rate, at least in the American economy.

The inflation rate is not a monetary phenomenon. It's a generational phenomenon. It's not the Fed that affects the inflation rate. It's the people and the mood of the people that affect the inflation rate.

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (15-Jun-2021) Permanent Link
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1-Jun-21 World View -- Coronavirus coverup unravels in US as China threatens Australia

Evidence grows that Wuhan coronavirus came from Wuhan Virology Lab

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

China's 'Wolf Warrior' strategy moves towards world war
Australia's long hostile relationship with China
Australia retaliates by cancelling BRI projects
Evidence grows that Wuhan coronavirus came from Wuhan Virology Lab
Weaponizing biotech and 'gain of function' research
China becomes increasingly unstable and desperate
Sidebar: Attacks on Asian-Pacific people in the United States

China's 'Wolf Warrior' strategy moves towards world war

China views Australia as being a puppet, with America as the puppetmaster (Global Times)

China views Australia as being a puppet, with America as the puppetmaster (Global Times)

This is an article about two subjects -- threats by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to bomb Australia and the unraveling of the CCP's Wuhan coronavirus coverup. As different as these issues are, they have a common core: the intense increase in the last year of China's xenophobia, paranoia, nationalism and belligerence. This has been predicted by Generational Dynamics for years, as the prelude to world war. By now, the level of hostility between China and the West is as bad as the hostility between Japan and the US in 1941, in the months prior to the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

This is being described as a sharp rise in "Wolf Warrior" strategy, named after a 2015 Chinese-produced military action film that demands a belligerent response to anyone disrespecting China.

Here's how left-leaning Foreign Policy magazine puts it:

"Sometime in 2020, China came unmoored from its grand strategy. Until then, Beijing�s diplomatic, military, and economic efforts were all directed toward national security. ... The consistency of purpose underpinning China�s behavior was hard to miss.
Of late, however, China has lost that purposefulness -- one of the hallmarks of grand strategy. The predominant feature of Chinese conduct today is not grand strategy but a belligerent, defensive nationalism that lashes out without heed of consequences. Just why that breakdown has occurred is uncertain, but it is clear that the change has put both China and the world in jeopardy. China risks undoing all it has gained -- at considerable cost -- since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) came to power. And the rest of the world, particularly the United States, finds itself confronted not with the hard task of managing a rising, reasonably predictable power but the infinitely harder job of managing a flailing one."

Analysts analyzing the situation say that the rise in this kind of xenophobic nationalism actually began in 2008 with the global financial crisis. I would agree with that because 2008 was 59 years after the end of China's civil war in 1949, and so was the time that China entered its generational Crisis era (Fourth Turning), just as 2003 was the time when America entered its generational Crisis era, 58 years after the end of World War II. There's a parallel between Washington and Beijing in that sensible policies in this era have been replaced by total lunacy in both capitals. Unfortunately, that's how world wars start.

Last year I gave as an example of the insanity of CCP policy is that it was threatening war over 21 different border disputes with neighboring countries. This would be like America threatening border disputes with Canada, Russia, Mexico, Haiti, Dominican Republic and Cuba. The CCP no longer has any coherent strategy, and is striking out in all directions. (See "5-Jul-20 World View -- Gleeful China wins big Hong Kong victory at UN Human Rights Council -- India's list of China's border disagreements")

Australia's long hostile relationship with China

Australia has a long history of antipathy towards Chinese in Australia since European settlement, starting with race riots amid the gold rush of the 1850s and '60s. With hundreds of Chinese prospectors injured and evicted from mining sites, the unrest prompted immigration rules that led to the infamous "White Australia" policy, which existed in various forms from 1901 until 1973.

Although these racist policies were repealed decades ago, there has never been a comfortable relationship. In May 2018, an Australian MP accused politicians of Chinese ancestry of being spies for the CCP, and the parliament passed sweeping influence laws targeting secret attempts by foreign spies to influence Australia's politicians, media, ethnic groups and civil society organizations. ( "29-Jun-18 World View -- Australia passes foreign influence laws, targeting China")

In April of last year, Australia's relationship with China deteriorated significantly after prime minister Scott Morrison called for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. The Chinese were furious, assuming that it was an attack on the CCP (which, in fact, it was). Morrison further infuriated the Chinese for commenting on human rights abuses in Xinjiang and Hong Kong, and for criticizing China's repeated threats to invade Taiwan.

At this point, China was deep into its "wolf warrior" phase. China blocked or slowed exports from Australia of numerous products, including wine, barley, beef, timber and coal.

CCP tweet with fake picture of Australian soldier holding a knife to the neck of an Afghan baby, saying, 'Don't be afraid, we are coming to bring you peace'. The baby and the knife are blurred in the above picture. (SMH)

CCP tweet with fake picture of Australian soldier holding a knife to the neck of an Afghan baby, saying, 'Don't be afraid, we are coming to bring you peace'. The baby and the knife are blurred in the above picture. (SMH)

Australia was infuriated in December when China's foreign ministry tweeted a fake picture of an Australian soldier holding a knife to the neck of an Afghan baby, saying, "Don't be afraid, we are coming to bring you peace." In his strongest criticism of China, Morrison said:

"The Chinese government should be totally ashamed of this post. It diminishes them in the world's eyes. It is an absolutely outrageous and disgusting slur. Australia is seeking an apology from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and we are seeking it be removed from Twitter."

Needless to say, China did not apologize, and Twitter did not remove it. However, Morrison's statement was significant because it was strong comment Morrison had ever made about the CCP since taking office.

Australia retaliates by cancelling BRI projects

Four months later, in April of this year, Australia struck back at China by canceling Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) agreements that China had contracted with Victoria, a province in southeast Australia. The reason given was that the projects were not compatible with Australia's security, and made Victoria too dependent on China. Agreements with Iran and Syria were also scrapped at the same time.

These were small projects, so this should not have been a big deal, and it would not have been in any other era. But China responded with rage and threats, calling the cancellation "unreasonable and provocative," and vowing revenge.

China's state media Global Times accused Australia to be a puppet of the United States, and wrote the following, referring to Australia's capital city Canberra:

"Canberra must have known or even anticipated that its action would draw such a furious response and potentially crippling countermeasures from Beijing. However, it still decided to move ahead with the action. Clearly, Canberra is increasingly unhinged and in way over its head by taking such a suicidal attack on not just China but also its own economic interests.
Since the cancellation of the BRI deals, speculation has been rife that Canberra may soon suffer from the wrath of its largest trading partner. Given the viciousness and seriousness of the move, we won't be surprised if China takes forceful countermeasures to inflict serious pain on Australia. With China's comprehensive strength, there are numerous ways for China to achieve that."

The reason for China's hysterical response is that the cancellation of this small project is a loss of faith for the CCP and Xi Jinping himself.

As I've written in the past, has a totally delusional geopolitical strategy based on BRI. Guided by China's leadership, countries throughout Africa, Asia and the Mideast will put aside their disagreements. Old hatreds will be mended by necessity, to attract capital for investments. These include countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, India, and Pakistan. China will create a "global colossal," of dozens of countries in a massive multi-country partnership, bound together by China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). China foresees connecting the world through trade and peace, but foresees only one obstacle: that America will try to block it, leading to war.

China has used bribery, corruption, and threats to coerce countries in Asia, Africa and Europe agree to build BRI projects in those countries. However, China is receiving increasing resistance to these projects because of "debt trap diplomacy," which gives China almost effective control over each national government. This is actually what Australia feared, in canceling Victoria's BRI project.

A firm cancellation of Australia's Victoria BRI project would be the first such cancellation and would be a major crack in the entire delusional geopolitical plan, since it would provide cover for other countries to similary cancel or refuse BRI projects.

So China's hysteria over the cancelation, with threats of revenge, is intended to force Australia to reverse its decision, just as the boycotts of barley, coal and other products was intended to force Australia to back down from its demands in the area of human rights and particularly its demand for an international investigation of the source of the Wuhan Coronavirus.

At the beginning of May, the editor in chief of the Global Times posted the following editorial:

"Given that Australian hawks keep hyping or hinting that Australia will assist the US military and participate in war once a military conflict breaks out in the Taiwan Straits, and the Australian media outlets have been actively promoting the sentiment, I suggest China make a plan to impose retaliatory punishment against Australia once it militarily interferes in the cross-Straits situation. The plan should include long-range strikes on the military facilities and relevant key facilities on Australian soil if it really sends its troops to China's offshore areas and combats against the PLA. In addition to making the plan, China should also reveal this plan through non-official channels to deter the extreme forces of Australia and prevent them from taking the risk and committing irresponsible actions.
China loves peace and will not take the initiative to pick a fight with faraway Australia, but Australian hawks must be clear-minded. If they are bold enough to coordinate with the US to militarily interfere in the Taiwan question and send troops to the Taiwan Straits to wage war with the PLA, they must know what disasters they would cause to their country. China has a strong production capability, including producing additional long-range missiles with conventional warheads that target military objectives in Australia when the situation becomes highly tense."

This is a remarkable statement, for several reasons:

It assumes that China will soon be invading Taiwan. This is undoubtedly true, since China's foreign ministry threatens Taiwan frequently, and China's military conducts threatening exercises around Taiwan.
It assumes that America will defend Taiwan. Some people doubt this, but I have no doubt that it's true. At any rate, the Chinese Communists believe it to be true.
It assumes that Australia will join America in defending Taiwan. Given Australia's nationalism and anti-Chinese xenophobia, as well as its support for Taiwan, I believe this to be true. However, the purpose of the Global Times editorial is to threaten the Australians into not defending Taiwan.
It demands that China's military prepare to attack Australia with long-range missiles with conventional warheads.

This editorial well illustrates the belligerent mood in Beijing, and its "wolf warrior" attitude that China must never be disrespected.

Evidence grows that Wuhan coronavirus came from Wuhan Virology Lab

Now let's turn to the second subject area, the Wuhan coronavirus.

Last week, president Joe Biden ordered intelligence officials to investigate the origins of the Wuhan Coronavirus, including the theory that it came from the Wuhan Virology Lab in China, either accidentally or intentionally, and that the virus was the result of "gain of function" research to create a bioweapon for the military. The investigation will also look at China's actions in covering up the spread of the virus, protecting China by blocking internal travel, and then purposely spreading the virus to 180 other countries by encouraging air travel between Wuhan and those countries.

This order has caused a seismic shock in Beijing, as well as in Washington's mainstream media.

Simply calling for an investigation isn't exactly an act of war, but we've seen how Australia's call for an investigation in March of last year led to hysterical calls for revenge and retribution, including boycotts of Australian goods, escalating up to the present time when Chinese media is talking about bombing Australian soil.

The CCP is far more reluctant to threaten the US militarily than to threaten Australia. Nonetheless, they must be considering possible forms of revenge in the next few weeks.

For now, the CCP response is limited to the usual hysterical lying and deceptions. Here's the statement from China's foreign ministry spokesman:

"However, some in the US, turning a blind eye to facts, science, the questionable study of origins and botched response at home, kept clamoring for additional investigation in China. This shows that they don't care about facts or truth and have zero interest in a serious science-based study of origins. Their one aim is to use the pandemic to pursue stigmatization and political manipulation to shift the blame. They are being disrespectful to science, irresponsible to people's lives, and counter-productive to concerted global efforts to fight the virus. With 33 million confirmed cases and 600,000 deaths from COVID-19, both the highest in the world, the US, instead of examining its own behavior, attempted to scapegoat China. What are they up to? Can they sleep at night with a troubled conscience?
What secrets are hidden in the suspicion-shrouded Fort Detrick and the over 200 US bio-labs all over the world? In July 2019, there were reports on the unexplained outbreaks of respiratory disease in northern Virginia and on the subsequent EVALI outbreaks in Wisconsin. What's hidden there? When will the US release detailed data and information on relevant cases? It owes an explanation to the world."

There are many biolabs in many countries around the world, including one at Fort Detrick biodefense center, where an infectious disease research program was shut down in 2019 over problems with disposal of dangerous materials. However, there was no threat to public health, no injuries to employees, and no attempt to protect the United States while purposely infecting 180 countries around the world, so its in no way comparable to the Wuhan Virology Lab.

The seismic shock to Washington's mainstream media is that this is the biggest story of the century, and yet the mainstream media adamantly refused to investigate and report on it, but has cooperated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to label it as "fake news" or a "conspiracy theory" that was dreamed up by president Donald Trump for political reasons.

Left wing media pundits have been falling all over themselves trying to explain why Donald Trump was right and they were all wrong about the biggest story of the century. Joy Behar of the TV show The View, who is a total idiot, said:

"Trump was blaming the Chinese from the beginning. He was using them as scapegoats. If it happens to be true it was from Wuhan, then that was just a lucky break on his part because he took a guess, in my opinion."

This was echoed by other mainstream media pundits, explaining that the reason that they missed the story of the century was that they didn't want to admit that Trump was right.

However, I believe that the real reason is obvious and far more sinister. The mainstream media and many politicians are totally compromised by the Chinese. News organizations that report news that "disrespects" China can be expelled from China, and even have their reporters jailed. Sports figures have been forced to make humiliating public apologies, kowtowing to China, for merely uttering the word "Uighur" or the phrase "the nation of Taiwan." California representative Eric Swalwell was totally compromised by an affair with a hot Chinese spy, and Joe Biden and his son Hunter are totally compromised by their financial deals with China. But that's just the tip of the iceberg. The CCP have given grants, provided money, provided girls, and provided workers to every university, every public, private and governmental organization, to infiltrate them. This has been a nationwide scandal in Australia and New Zealand.

That China operates this way has been well-documented in many countries, with the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) being the primary bribery and extortion vehicle in Asia, Africa and Europe. This is China's playbook, and it gives them the leverage to use extortion against any reporter, sports figure or politician that might otherwise "disrespect" China or disagree with Chinese Communist policies.

So that's the reason why the mainstream media have been refusing to investigate and report the greatest story so far this century. They would rather find a way to blame Trump, even though it makes them look like idiots, rather than admit to being extorted, which they were. It's bad enough that the mainstream media are an arm of the Democrat Party, but it's much worse that the mainstream media are an arm of the Chinese Communist Party. (Paragraph modified, 1-June)

Biden was clearly reluctant to order any investigation for the same reasons, and in fact in January he closed an investigation in the State Dept. that had been opened by Trump and Mike Pompeo. So what changed?

It's just that circumstantial evidence has been growing and growing more powerful over time. This has included whistleblowers and scientists who had worked in the Wuhan Virology Lab.

There were several triggering events during the month of May:

On May 14, an article in Science Magazine, signed by dozen of scientists, said that "consideration of evidence supporting a laboratory accident was insufficient," and said that "A proper investigation should be transparent, objective, data-driven, inclusive of broad expertise, subject to independent oversight, and responsibly managed to minimize the impact of conflicts of interest."

Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Biden's chief medical adviser, has always maintained he believes the virus was passed from animals to humans, but flip-flopped this month. Fauci was also accused of lying to Congress over "gain-of-function" research, as described below.

On May 5, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists published an article analyzing the work of Shi Zheng-li, known as "Bat Lady," who had led research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology to employ gain-of-function research to make bat viruses transmissable to humans.

On May 23, there were new reports that three researchers from China�s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, suggesting the virus began spreading as early as October 2019. The Chinese deny the report, but the Chinese Communists lie about everything, so nobody believes them anyway. The Chinese Communists are too stupid to understand the lesson from Aesop's Fables that if you're a liar, then no one believes you even when you might be telling the truth."

On Tuesday of last week, the Chinese Communists announced that they would no longer cooperate with any further WHO additional investigations.

Biden had previously called for the previous WHO investigation to be completed, as had been promised, but after the CCP announcement on Tuesday that they wouldn't cooperate, Biden was compelled politically to agree to an investigation.

Weaponizing biotech and 'gain of function' research

In August 2019, shortly before the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus, Defense One magazine published a detailed analysis of decades of China's plans for creating biological weapons for use by the military. So it's possible, though unproven, that Covid-19 was developed by the Chinese military as a bioweapon.

The nightmare scenario for the world is that Chinese scientists might similarly engineer a virus that attacks all humans, excluding all those with Chinese DNA.

Not surprisingly, gain-of-function research has become highly controversial. As described by the recent article in Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) provides grants funding projects at the Wuhan Virology Lab. When questioned about these grants in congressional committees, Dr. Anthony Fauci denied vehemently that these grants ever funded gain-of-research funding at the Wuhan Lab.

However, publicly available documents show that the grants went to a prime contractor, Peter Daszak, president of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York, and that Daszak subcontracted to Bat Lady, Shi Zheng-li, the gain-of-function researcher at Wuhan Virology Lab that we previously described. Fauci insisted that there was no gain-of-function research because the grant agreement specified that there would be no gain-of-funding research. Under questioning, Fauci admitted that there was no way to tell if the Chinese were lying.

The Chinese Communists are supported by many useful idiots in the United States, but apparently Fauci is the stupidest useful idiot of them all.

China becomes increasingly unstable and desperate

I've described China's Communist government as being desperate and unstable in the past, and that's been true, but it's been getting much worse. It's a worsening trend that the CCP is desperately striking out in all directions, with a delusional geopolitical plan, 21 border disputes, deteriorating BRI strategy, and facing people in hundreds of countries that are pissed off that China protected themselves while purposely inflicting the Wuhan Coronavirus on them, though are afraid to take any action because of China's bribery and extortion playbook.

Americans can't grasp how China's government is becoming increasingly unstable because the US Constitutional government is possibly the most stable in world history, and we can't imagine it any other way. Every serious decision we take is subject to checks and balances by three branches of government, and is usually first debated in various committees, agencies, and the courts.

Contrast that with China, where Xi Jinping has made himself a dictator for life, which means that he could make a serious decision and there would be no one there to stop him. That's what happened with Mao Zedong's disastrous Great Leap Forward in 1958, which resulted in tens of millions of unnecessary deaths, and destroyed China's economy for decades, so much that it still hasn't recovered. Nothing like that could ever happen in America.

Why did the Imperial Japanese choose December 7, 1941, to bomb Pearl Harbor? They chose that date because they thought that they were running out of time and they panicked. The US had placed an embargo on the trade of all militarily useful items with Japan, and faced with serious shortages, they believed that they had to move quickly, or they would lose the opportunity.

We know that the Chinese are going to attack Taiwan. We know that because they've said so repeatedly, and they've been open about making military preparations for an attack. And now we've learned that their preparations are reaching the stage of possibly bombing Australia, because they believe that Australia's military would join with America's military in defending Taiwan.

China's "Wolf Warrior" strategy of xenophobia, nationalism and belligerance has been growing. I've tried to show a trend, how there have been a series of such incidents, and how each incident has been worse than the last one. Over the last 20 years, I've studied thousands of wars, and this is how wars start.

The Chinese military or Xi Jinping may decide, for rational, irrational or delusional reasons, that they've run out of time and that they have to move quickly, or they would lose the opportunity. No one, not even the Chinese themselves, can predict when they will panic and take that step. All we can do is watch as the Chinese Communist government becomes increasingly unstable and desperate.

Sidebar: Attacks on Asian-Pacific people in the United States

This is a separate subject, but this is a good place to include it.

The mainstream media have been pointing to an increase in hate crimes on Asian Americans as proof that Republicans are white supremacists, and that they've been stirred up by president Trump's frequent reference to the "China Virus."

It takes a reporter from the NY Times or CNN to say something as totally idiotic as that. These attacks have been going on since the 1800s, and incidentally they've been even worse in Australia. So they long predate Trump.

However I came across a report, posted in January by the National Institutes of Health, which used data from the Department of Justice to "examine the nature and characteristics of hate crimes against Asian Americans." The report compared hate crimes against Asian Americans, African Americans, and Hispanics.

You have to go far into the report to find the results (search for "Table 3" or "Findings of this study, however, also provide support to the minority-specific model"), but the findings are clear:

Hate crimes against Asians are overwhelmingly done by blacks.
"Hate crimes against Asian Americans are more likely than hate crimes against either African Americans or Hispanics to be committed by non-White offenders."

Blacks may be motivated by their resentment of the success of Asians.
"This finding may be attributed to animosity toward the �model minority� from other minority groups. As aforementioned, the �model minority� stereotype assuming Asian Americans� success in economics, education, and other opportunities generates potential competition or threats by members of other racial groups, which in turn may lead to resentment to be further acted upon through hate crimes."

Blacks may be motivated by fears that they'll lose their special privileges and financial welfare and other benefits because Asians will get the same benefits during downturns.
"Offenders of other minorities of color targeting Asian Americans might fit the category of �reactionists." ... Instead of acting impulsively, the �reactionists� are motivated by protecting their resources from competitors.... This finding might also lend indirect support to the perspective of racial competition motivating hate crimes, which argues that when members of a racial group perceive that their access and privileges to material resources are threatened by other racial groups during economic downturns, racial conflict and hate crimes may occur."

The article by conservative Michelle Malkin referenced below provides multiple examples of hate crimes against Asians by blacks, probably all Democrats.

Reading through the news stories of the Atlanta shooting in March of Asians, you can almost see the frustration of the writers that they can't find an angle to blame Republicans. By this time it's almost certain that the Atlanta shooter was a Democrat, probably a supporter of Black Lives Matter.

A personal note: All the signs are there that the Atlanta shooter was obsessed with Asian women and went berserk. I find this quite believable, since I've known two guys in the past who were obsessed with Asian women -- to date them not to kill them. There's something about Asian women that causes some men (not me) to obsess about them.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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26-May-21 World View -- The aftermath of the Israel - Gaza war

What did the Israelis accomplish? Mowing the lawn

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

The Gaza-Israel war by the numbers
What did the Gaza Palestinians accomplish? International attention
What did the Israelis accomplish? Mowing the lawn
The Biden Administration plans
The future of the Mideast

The Gaza-Israel war by the numbers

Over $300,000 in gold shaped as nails and hidden in wooden pallets. Hamas tried to smuggle the gold into the West Bank to fund terror activity. (Jerusalem Post)

Over $300,000 in gold shaped as nails and hidden in wooden pallets. Hamas tried to smuggle the gold into the West Bank to fund terror activity. (Jerusalem Post)

The worst possible outcome of the recent war -- that it would spiral into a full-scale regional war -- did not happen.

The best possible outcome of the recent war -- that it would settle the Israel-Palestinian dispute once and for all -- did not happen and could not possibly happen.

The 11 day conflict ended with a ceasefire on Friday, May 21, at 2 am. Nobody believes that there won't be another war soon.

Hamas fired 4,300 rockets from Gaza into Israel during the conflict, killing two children and six adults in Israel.

Israel fired thousands of missiles into Gaza during the conflict, killing 66 children and 248 adults.

Gaza was devastated by the war. More than 100,000 people lost their homes. Water and sewer systems were destroyed, so there's no water or sanitation. There is little electricity, and many hospitals were destroyed.

What did the Gaza Palestinians accomplish? International attention

If you listen to Palestinians interviewed on tv, then you hear them say that the deaths and destruction in Gaza were worth it because those deaths have generated international outrage at Israel. There have been international anti-Israel riots and demonstrations in cities around the world. There have been calls for boycotts of Israeli goods.

In a way, this is a longing for a return to the 2000s decade, when the Palestinian issue was front page news around the world almost every day. Starting around ten years ago, Palestinian spokesmen began complaining that they had been completely forgotten by the international community because of other international issues, such as the wars in Ukraine and Syria. One of the motivations for starting the 2014 summer war with Israel is thought by some to be an attempt to get back on the front pages. And now, the Palestinians themselves seem to be saying the same thing.

Some Arab writers are saying the same thing in different ways.

German-Egyptian Intellectual Dr. Hamed Abdel-Samad said the following in an interview:

"Hamas has turned the Palestinians into beggars. Where did all the money go? I would like Fatah and Hamas to explain to the Palestinians where all this money went? [Imagine] what could have been done with it.
Why wasn't it invested in good education, instead of making children TV shows that teach them martyrdom and suicide? Why do all the leaders of Fatah have villas, palaces, and a lot of money? They stole from their people and did not invest in their freedom, in their educations, and in their self confidence. They left their people only with the choice between martyrdom or begging for money."

Saudi journalists are even more harshly critical of the actions of the Gaza Palestinians, directly connecting the actions of Hamas to the agenda of the Iranians, who are supplying Hamas with the rockets that they've been launching at Israel.

As the war began, Saudi journalist Muhammad Aal Al-Sheikh tweeted:

"I suspect that the move of those Palestinian factions that are agents of the Persians was carried out on orders from Iran, so as to exert pressure in [Iran's] favor in the Vienna [nuclear] talks. The implications [of the escalation] will likely be devastating for the helpless citizens of Gaza."

Another Saudi journalist, Sa'ud Al-Fawzan said that the war could have been avoided entirely, but it's something that that the leaders of Palestine and Israel wanted:

"I will never show tolerance for the killing of children in [either] Tel Aviv or Gaza. Those responsible for their death are both [Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu and [Hamas leader in Gaza Isma'il] Haniya. Were it not for Netanyahu and Haniya, the Palestinians and the Israelis would have lived together just as our forefathers coexisted peacefully with the Jews for many centuries."

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this interpretation is comforting, but delusional. There is enormous mutual hostility, xenophobia and hatred between the Palestinians and the Israelis, and do Netanyahu and Haniya were doing what the people they were governing wanted them to do.

And this is further proved, by the way, by the communal violence between Palestinians and Israelis that broke out and is still ongoing.

What did the Israelis accomplish? Mowing the lawn

First, not all Israelis are happy with the ceasefire. The cities of Ashkelon and Sderot, in southern Israel, have been hit particularly hard to by Gaza rockets over the years, and have suffered numerous casualties.

According to Sderot's mayor Alon Davidi:

"This proves that despite the full support and perseverance and heroism that the residents of the south have shown for the past 20 years, it appears that Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu and the Israeli government are not interested in defeating Hamas and prefer temporary quiet for residents of central Israel at the expense of residents of the Gaza periphery and the south, who will continue to suffer from terrorism."

Of course it's totally delusional that completely defeating Hamas is even possible, but this is a widely held desire by many Israelis, especially in the south.

When Israeli officials are interviewed about what they accomplished, they describe the war much more succintly and in military terms.

They say that Israel had to defend itself from the incoming rockets, and that they had to retaliate with massive missile strikes to destroy Hamas's military infrastructure, including military offices, weapons stores, and a huge labyrinth of underground tunnels. The objective is to prevent a new war from occurring for as long a time as possible.

Israeli military commanders do not have any expectation of defeating Hamas permanently. They use the metaphor "mowing the lawn" to capture the idea that after destroying Hamas's arsenal and tunnels, they will be restored again by Iran -- the grass will grow back and have to be mowed again.

The Biden Administration plans

It was Egypt that negotiated the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. President Joe Biden says that ceasefire was possible because of his intense behind the scenes mediation.

One of the accomplishments claimed by the Palestinians, along with the rise in worldwide outrage at Israel, is that the far left in America's Democrat Party, led by AOC, is demanding that Biden withdraw his support from Israel. In particular, Biden is being pressured from the left to cancel a $735 million weapons deal, most of which would be used to resupply the defensive missiles in the Iron Dome anti-missile system that protected much of Israel from the thousands of Gaza rockets.

Not resupplying the Iron Dome would have disastrous consequences for Israel, and would permit thousands of Gaza rockets to reach their intended destinations, killing civilians in their homes.

AOC in the past has said that she is thrilled by how Biden has taken one far left socialist position after another, but now for the first time, Biden is being forced to take a position opposed to AOC. On Friday, Biden says that the Democrat party "still supports Israel," and said:

"There is no shift in my commitment to the security of Israel. Period. No shift. The shift is we still need a two-state solution. It is the only answer."

I've been ridiculing the "two-state solution" through the presidencies of Bush, Obama, Trump and now Biden. The first major Generational Dynamics analysis that I posted was Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace? (1-May-2003), in which I explained why there would not be peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, because they would be re-fighting the bloody 1948 war that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. Trump's two-state solution plan was announced just a little over a year ago. ( "29-Jan-20 World View -- Trump announces fantasy 'Peace to Prosperity' Mideast peace plan")

Since 2006, there have been five wars involving Israel and Palestinians: the war between Israelis and Hezbollah, fought largely on Lebanon's soil in 2006; the war between Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah in Gaza in 2008, that led to Hamas control of Gaza; Operation Cast Lead, the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza early in 2009; the two wars between Israel and Hamas in Gaza in November, 2012 and July-August 2014.

These wars follow a typical, predictable pattern of a series of clashes separated by periods of peace, with each clash more violent than the preceding one. As the old saying goes, "Peace is that brief, glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading." This pattern cannot go on forever, and eventually will lead to a full-scale generational crisis war.

So now Biden is adopting the same delusional two-state solution plan as Bush, Obama and Trump. The main features of Biden's plan are like every other policy announced by Biden -- just do the opposite of Trump did.

Trump's strategy, which included isolating Iran, was to strongly support Israel and cut funding for Palestinian militias, to prevent another war. Biden's strategy, which includes negotiations with Iran to restore the JCPOA nuclear deal, is to "rebuild ties" with the Palestinians. Biden will reopen the the consulate with the Palestinians in Jerusalem -- Trump had closed it and made it part of the new embassy in Jerusalem. Biden will ask Congress for $75 million for economic assistance for the Palestinans, and also $5.5 million for emergency aid for Gaza. Biden will also restore $32 million in new aid for UNRWA, for the exponentially growing number of Palestinian "refugees."

The money being provided is intended for use in rebuilding Gaza's buildings and infrastructure after being devastated by war. The objection, of course, is that those millions of dollars will be used by Hamas to purchase new stocks of weapons from Iran in preparation for the next war with Israel, instead of to rebuild Gaza.

Along with this monetary largess comes another part of the plan that seems totally delusional. Biden's plan is to route the money though the West Bank Palestinian Authority, and let Fatah, Hamas's enemy, take charge of using Biden's money to rebuild Gaza. Yeah, that will work fine.

As for the Democrat Party, there's a poisonous anti-Semitism growing, which is resulting in violent attacks on Jews in this country. Black Lives Matter is promoting the same hate-filled anti-Semitism. Democrat leaders like Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi have said nothing about the growing violence against Jews.

The future of the Mideast

Regular readers will be familiar with the following paragraph, since I've written something like it dozens of times:

Generational Dynamics predicts that there is an approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, pitting the "axis" of China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries against the "allies," the US, India, Russia and Iran. Part of it will be a major new war between Jews and Arabs, re-fighting the bloody the war of 1948-49 that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. The war between Jews and Arabs will be part of a major regional war, pitting Sunnis versus Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and various ethnic groups against each other.

The latest Gaza war is actually different from previous Gaza wars in some significant ways.

First, Hamas had more rockets and more powerful rockets than in the past, supplied by Iran. Hamas points with pride to the fact that its rockets can now reach apartment buildings in Tel Aviv for the first time.

Second, Israel's missile strikes on Gaza were much more powerful than in the past. The destruction of apartment blocks and infrastructure was much more extensive than in 2014.

Third, the communal violence between Arabs and Israelis in the West Bank and within Israel itself was much greater and more violent than in the past. In particular, for the first time, Arabs living as citizens in Israel took the fight to their Israeli neighbors. This is extremely ominous, and the communal violence is still ongoing.

No politician, except the most delusional, believes that the recent Gaza war was the last one. In a sense, the continuing communal violence suggests that the recent Gaza war hasn't really ended yet. But we can expect a new Gaza war in the not too distant future, and at some point it will escalate into a full regional Mideast war.

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16-May-21 World View -- Will there be a third Palestinian Intifada?

Can Joe Biden bring peace to the Mideast?

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

History of Palestinian Intifadas
Yassir Arafat vs Ariel Sharon
The decline of Mahmoud Abbas
Can Mahmoud Abbas prevent a Third Intifada from occurring?
Can Joe Biden bring peace to the Mideast?

History of Palestinian Intifadas

Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday -- can he prevent a Third Intifada (AFP)

Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday -- can he prevent a Third Intifada (AFP)

Previously, I've described a new an unexpected development in the current war between Israel and the Palestinians. The new development, which has apparently caught everyone by surprise, is the rise of extremely bitter communal / sectarian violence between Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. (See "14-May-21 World View -- Communal violence within Israel threatens much wider war")

The purpose of this article is to explain in further detail the significance of this violence, and the role of the "58-Year Rule" of generational theory.

Today's violence is occurring on both the Jewish and Arab sides, but it's being characterized by some as a "Third Intifada," a general street uprising of Palestinian people against the Israeli government and people.

There have been two previous Intifadas. The first began in December 1987 in Gaza and spread to the West Bank. It consisted of massive peaceful protests, demonstrations, strikes, boycotts, and riots. It began to die off fairly quickly, and officially ended in September 1993 with the signing of the Oslo Accords agreement, which was supposed to provide peace between Israelis and Palestinians, but never did anything of the sort. In the late 1990s, Hamas was formed and carried out a series of suicide attacks against Israeli targets, while Israelis continued to build settlements in the West Bank, with both sides violating the Oslo Accords.

The Oslo Accords broke down in 2000, resulting in the Second Intifada, which began in September 2000 and was an armed rebellion by Palestinian militias, including Hamas and Fatah, against Israeli security forces, and against Israeli civilians using suicide bombings. The violence only began to subside in 2005, after the deaths of about 3,000 Palestinians and 1,000 Israelis.

Yassir Arafat vs Ariel Sharon

During the Second Intifida, the leaders of the Palestinians and Israelis were, respectively, Yassir Arafat and Ariel Sharon. On May 1, 2003, I posted my first major Generational Dynamics analysis, predicting that President George Bush's "Mideast Roadmap to Peace" peace plan would fail, because the Jews and the Palestinians would be re-fighting the bloody 1948 war that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. (Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace? (1-May-2003))

In that article, I wrote the following:

"There's an incredible irony going on in the Mideast today, in that the leaders of two opposing sides are, respectively, Ariel Sharon and Yassir Arafat.
These two men hate each other, but they're the ones cooperating with each other (consciously or not) to prevent a major Mideast conflagration. Both of them remember the wars of the 1940s, and neither of them wants to see anything like that happen again. And it won't happen again, as long as both of these men are in charge."

Although I didn't write the following, I suspected that Sharon and Arafat were actually cooperating in back channels to prevent the violence from turning into a full-fledged civil war.

Why would they do that? They would do that because they had both survived the ethnic civil war in 1948-49. In my article earlier this week, I gave an example of what happened during Rwanda's ethnic civil war: Populations had intermarried and were living on the same streets, where their children had played together. But that did not stop someone from picking up a machete, going next door, killing the father and children, raping the wife, killing her, and then cutting them all up into mangled pieces. These examples are the rule, not the exception, for ethnic civil wars. Crisis wars are like forces of nature; you can no more stop a crisis war than you can stop a tsunami.

That example is from the Rwanda war, but you can be absolutely certain that similar things happened during the 1948-49 ethnic civil war between Arabs and Jews. Both Arafat and Sharon had lived during that war. They may have personally participated in or ordered these kinds of atrocities. Nobody goes through experiences like that without being completely traumatized. Preventing a repeat of those experiences becomes an overwhelming goal, much more important than fighting another war, even a "justified" war.

It goes much deeper than that. Not only Arafat and Sharon, but also millions of Palestinians and Israelis had lived through the 1948-49 war and were similarly traumatized. That's why, during the Second Intifada, there was relatively little contact between civilian Jews and Arabs, and most of the violence was more or less organized, through militias and security police.

When Yassir Arafat died in November 2004, I wrote the following:

"Yes, he was a brutal, vicious terrorist. Yes he was a liar and maybe even a crook. Yes, he approved suicide bombings that killed Jewish children.
But for a man in his position, approving suicide bombings was the lesser of two evils. The greater evil was unleashing a new genocidal war, one that would kill many more Jewish and Arab children than suicide bombings do."

Mahmoud Abbas, born in 1935, took Arafat's place. He was also a survivor of the 1948-49 war, and did not radically change Arafat's policies. Today, Abbas is facing the possibility of leading the Palestinians through a Third Intifada.

The decline of Mahmoud Abbas

I have often seen Al-Jazeera's political analyst Marwan Bishara discuss Mideast topics. It's always been clear that he hates Israel but, notably, it's also been clear that he hates Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah even more than he hates Israel. He considers Abbas to be a historic traitor to the Palestinians, because he negotiates with the Israelis to keep the peace, and the West Bank security forces cooperate with the Israeli security forces for the same reason.

So I listened to Bishara rant for a long time on Saturday. He wonders why the Israelis are killing innocent Palestinians. He wants the US, the UK and the EU all to condemn Israel for its practices, and to force Israel to accept a ceasefire with Hamas.

It's not surprising that Bishara sharply disagrees with Abbas. Abbas was born in 1935 and lived through the 1948-49 war. Bishara was born in 1969, and knows nothing about the war except what Palestinian activists have told him. So he welcomes a Third Intifada, because the Palestinians might finally achieve their dreams of freedom -- whatever that means.

Abbas opposes a Third Intifada. He believes that the Second Intifada was a disaster for Palestinians. His unstated reason is that it is absolutely certain that Abbas remembers the traumatizing atrocities of the 1948-49 war. He is old enough to remember them, and he's also old enough to recognize that it's happening again. Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to go on television and tell the nation: "Nothing justifies the lynching of Arabs by Jews and nothing justifies the lynching of Jews by Arabs." For him to make that announcement reveals that horrible things are happening today and, indeed, news reports confirm that.

Can Mahmoud Abbas prevent a Third Intifada from occurring?

Mahmoud Abbas is now 85 years old. I reported years ago that polls shows young Palestinians were almost unanimous in disliking Abbas. They consider him a failure for any number of reasons, the most obvious one being that, 27 years after the Oslo Accords, almost nothing has changed for the Palestinians. Young Palestinians dislike Hamas leaders almost as much.

In my article last week, I described how the 58-Year Rule applies. The generations people who lived through the 1948-49 war were all traumatized by the horrors and atrocities. We've found that these generations all retire and die around the same time, 58 years after the end of such a war, which would have been 2006-2007. That's why the First and Second Intifadas fizzled. There were too many people around who were traumatized by the last war, and would do anything to keep it from happening again.

But that's not true today. Abbas is still around, but almost everyone else from that generation of survivors is gone. That's the difference between Mahmoud Abbas and Marwan Bishara. Bishara has no personal knowledge of the war's atrocities, so he couldn't care less if there's another ethnic civil war. He and many other young people welcome it, because they have fantasies that they'll be free and that Israel will be pushed into the sea.

So, can Mahmoud Abbas prevent a Third Intifada from occurring? Can an 85 year old extremely unpopular leader stop a force of nature? If I had to bet (and fortunately I don't), I would bet that he can't. Or if he can, he can stop it only temporarily.

Can Joe Biden bring peace to the Mideast?

On Saturday, there was a panel of journalists on the BBC discussing the Israel-Palestine situation. The hostility to Israel among these journalists is enormous, and not surprising. And it's worth noting that there are anti-Israel demonstrations going on in cities around the world.

One person said, "I'm going to say something very controversial. [long pause] If Donald Trump were president, this would not have happened."

Instead of the usual screaming, this comment was met with silence, which I interpreted as tacit agreement.

According to these journalists, Biden was hoping to avoid having to deal with the Mideast, since he wanted to focus on getting a new nuclear agreement with Iran, and ending the sanctions. This would now be very controversial, since Iran is funding Hamas. But the journalists are blaming Biden for the Mideast war, saying that he has been ignoring the Palestinian problem in favor of the Iran policy.

So the narrative is growing that the Mideast war is Israel's fault, and it's also Biden's fault because Biden is not holding back Israel, and forcing Israel to agree to a ceasefire.

In Washington, Democrats like AOC are demanding that Biden end all funding to Israel, and force Israel to accept a ceasefire under terms dictated by Hamas. Republicans are angry that Biden has been taking a wrecking ball to all aspects of America's domestic and foreign policy, and is giving money to the Palestinians, which they are using to buy weapons from Iran, which Biden is also supporting.

So this is shaping up to be a major political issue in America. Meanwhile, the Israel-Palestine war is continuing to escalate, and will continue to do so no matter what Biden does.

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14-May-21 World View -- Communal violence within Israel threatens much wider war

Understanding the mainstream media

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Israel-Gaza war continues to escalate
Communal violence within Israel threatens much wider war
Generational Dynamics analysis -- the 58-Year Rule
Understanding the mainstream media

Israel-Gaza war continues to escalate

Israeli riot policeman tries to block a Jewish right-wing man as communal violence erupted in Lod on Wednesday (AP)

Israeli riot policeman tries to block a Jewish right-wing man as communal violence erupted in Lod on Wednesday (AP)

Communal or sectarian violence within Israel threatens a much larger war. I'll return to that subject below.

The following are the recent developments in the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza:

In the last two days, Hamas has launched over 1,500 rockets into Israel, targeting large population areas like Tel Aviv. The rocket attacks have killed six Israelis, and injured hundreds others.

Israel has retaliated with airstrikes into Gaza. Israel has targeted large apartment buildings, which puts civilians at risk, because Hamas purposely stores military hardware and military offices side by side with civilians in these buildings. Some 96 Gaza civilians have been killed, and hundreds have been injured or displaced.

Hamas's rockets are supplied by Iran. Hamas has built up an inventory of these weapons over the years. Hamas has recently acquired a new long-range rocket with a range of 200-250 km, which puts most of Israel within range.

Hamas would like to force Israel to shut down its airspace. Hamas has launched rockets in the direction of Ben Gurion airport, forcing Israel to divert flights to Ramon airport in far southern Israel. But now Hamas is launching its new long-range rocket towards Ramon airport, but it landed in the open desert.

Israel has called up 9,000 reservists and is massing troops and tanks on the border with Gaza in preparation for a possible ground invasion. Israel has been launching artillery attacks across the border into Gaza. A late announcement is that there are some ground troops in Gaza.

It's estimated that there are 20-30 thousand armed Hamas and security personnel inside Gaza, so any Israeli ground invasion would mean major bloodshed for the military on both sides, and for the thousands of civilians caught in the crossfire in the densely populated Gaza Strip.

My view has been that the current war would fizzle out within a few months, like the 2014 war. The only thing that could prevent that is if some third country, like Egypt or Turkey, actively entered the war on the side of Hamas.

Communal violence within Israel threatens much wider war

However, there's a new development that changes that calculation. The new development, which has apparently caught everyone by surprise, is the rise of extremely bitter communal / sectarian violence between Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. To be clear, we're talking about Israeli citizens who have for years been living side by side within Israeli cities and towns. About 20% of Israel's total population are Arabs.

There have been shootings, lynchings, rock-throwing, and stabbings. The epicenter of the ethnic violence is Lod, a city with large Jewish and Arab populations. However, the violence has been spreading to cities across the country.

In one case, a lynching was shown on tv in real time. In the city of Bat Yam, a live tv broadcast showed a Jewish mob dragging a man, whom they believed to be Palestinian, out of his car before severely beating him. Needless to say, the video of this live broadcast has gone viral.

"Death to Arabs" is frequently chanted in rallies throughout the country, including Haifa and Acre in the north, as well as Lod, Jaffa, and Tiberias.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on both Jews and Arabs to cease attacks on each other:

"Nothing justifies the lynching of Arabs by Jews and nothing justifies the lynching of Jews by Arabs."

Maybe nothing justifies these lynchings, but it's clear that these lynchings are going to increase in number.

Generational Dynamics analysis -- the 58-Year Rule

As one commentator said, there has been a "social compact" in Israel for decades, permitting Arabs and Jews to live together side by side in peace, but now that social compact is coming apart at the seams.

The 58-Year Rule is a significant finding of modern generational theory. According to the Generational Dynamics 58-Year Hypothesis, which by now has been well proven, a new ethnic civil war will not begin less than 58 years from the end of the previous ethnic civil war. That's because 58 years is precisely the time when the generations of survivors of the preceding war all die or retire, all at once, and the younger post-war generations come to power. It has now been 73 years since the end of the last ethnic civil war, the war between Jews and Arabs that occurred with the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, and so Israel is fully ripe for a new ethnic civil war, and that seems to be what's happening.

Two recent examples of ethnic civil wars are the Rwanda war of 1994 and the Bosnian war of 1995. In Rwanda and Bosnia, populations had intermarried and were living on the same streets, where their children had played together. But that did not stop someone from picking up a machete, going next door, killing the father and children, raping the wife, killing her, and then cutting them all up into mangled pieces. These examples are the rule, not the exception, for ethnic civil wars.

So as long as the war between Israel and Gaza is at the top level government levels, then the top-down war is likely to fizzle out, as I said. But when the war is organic and bottom-up, then it's likely to spread into a much wider war, crossing into neighboring countries.

So for those of you who can take a breather from Washington politics and want to watch what's going on in the world, this is the place to watch. If the communal violence dies down, then a larger war will be avoided, for the time being. But if the communal violence grows and spreads, it will probably engulf the entire Mideast.

As regular readers know (since I've written it many times), Generational Dynamics predicts that there is an approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, pitting the "axis" of China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries against the "allies," the US, India, Russia and Iran. Part of it will be a major new war between Jews and Arabs, re-fighting the bloody the war of 1948-49 that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. The war between Jews and Arabs will be part of a major regional war, pitting Sunnis versus Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and various ethnic groups against each other.

Understanding the mainstream media

This is a completely separate subject. The following text is something that I posted in the Generational Dynamics forum that may be of interest to a larger audience.

The problem is that media sources have become dishonest and censorious, and so the question is: Who is to be believed?

But after writing thousands of articles over almost 20 years, I've developed a pretty good intuition about who in the media is telling the truth and who is bullshitting.

I should probably put together a whole big article on the subject, but here are some sample conclusions:

CNN, MSNBC, AP, Tehran Times, Russia Today, China Daily are all similar in that they're "state media," and just parrot the government line uncritically.

Fox News generally lives up to its "fair and balanced" claim, since they present both sides of issues pretty fairly.

For international news, the BBC is pretty good, but when it reports on American news, which it does all the time, it's the same as CNN and MSNBC. BBC receives a great deal of funding from NPR, and so it is required to follow the same Democrat party talking points.

Al-Jazeera is also pretty good with international news. But you'll never see a negative story about Qatar. Also, they hate Israel, and they hate the Palestinian Authority even more, but they love Hamas. But for Asian news they're pretty good. Oh, and they hate America, and they REALLY hate Trump.

AFP is pretty good for Mideast, Asian and African news. VOA and RFERL are pretty reliable.

Reuters is an interesting case, because I've found them to be almost always completely fair and balanced. I believe that the reason is that Thomson Reuters is an Canadian company, so they have a wholly different view of the world.

When I'm writing an international story, I have to use each news source in a credible way. For example, I'll consider China Daily or Global Times to be an accurate statement of China's political position, and I would consider them more credible on this subject than, say, Reuters or AP or the BBC. On the other hand, the BBC is much more credible about China's actions.

In an international story, like the Israel-Palestine story of today, I don't want to take sides, so I try to find accounts from each side, ideally to quote them in parallel. This is not always easy to do.

And of course I'm always guided by previous Generational Dynamics conclusions. For example, I've known for decades that there will never be a "two-state solution" in the Mideast, so I know automatically that any policitian who talks about it is full of crap.

So maybe at some point I'll expand this into a more comprehensive article.

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11-May-21 World View -- Violence escalates between Israelis and Palestinians in Jerusalem and Gaza

Israeli police storm Al-Aqsa Mosque after violent Palestinian protests

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Hamas fires dozens of rockets at Jerusalem in response to clashes
Israeli police storm Al-Aqsa Mosque after violent Palestinian protests

Hamas fires dozens of rockets at Jerusalem in response to clashes

Violence in Jerusalem on May 6 (Reuters)

Violence in Jerusalem on May 6 (Reuters)

The war between Hamas militants in Gaza and Israeli's military was renewed on Monday, when militants fired dozes of rockets into Israel, and Israel's military responded with missile strikes, killing 20 people in Gaza, including nine children, according to Gaza officials.

This was the worst such violence that has occurred in year, since the 2014 summer war. Hamas militants have fired rockets into southern Israel at intervals for years, but this was a major escalation because the rockets targeted Jerusalem. Explosions could be heard in Jerusalem, and one of the rockets damaged a home on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Israel struck many of the rockets down, using their "Iron Dome" anti-missile system, and others exploded harmlessly in open areas.

Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the rocket attacks had "crossed a red line":

"Israel will respond very forcefully. We will not tolerate attacks on our territory, our capital, our citizens and our soldiers. Whoever strikes us will pay a heavy price."

Hamas launched the rocket attacks after a 6 pm deadline passed for an ultimatum that demanded that Israeli police withdraw from the Al-Aqsa mosque in East Jerusalem. Hamas also demanded the release of all detained Palestinians, and the removal of Jewish settlers from an East Jerusalem neighbourhood.

Hamas said that Israel was waging a "religious war against Palestinian worshipers" in Jerusalem.

"What is happening in the Al-Aqsa Mosque at the time of storming and assaulting worshipers is proof of the brutality of the Zionist occupation.
[Israel is responsible for its] incursion into the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The occupation will pay a heavy price."

So both sides are promising "a heavy price."

Terminology:

Neutral: West Bank, Jerusalem, East Jerusalem
Pro-Palestinian: Occupied West Bank, Occupied East Jerusalem, Al-Aqsa Mosque Compound
Pro-Israeli: Judea and Samaria, Temple Mount Compound.

Israeli police storm Al-Aqsa Mosque after violent Palestinian protests

Map of holy sites in Jerusalem's Old City (BBC)

Map of holy sites in Jerusalem's Old City (BBC)

Hamas militias set the 6 pm deadline and launched the rockets as a reaction to a situation of escalating violence is occurring for weeks in Jerusalem. Typically, these situations worsen for a while, then begin to settle down and fizzle. But we know that one day one of these situations will escalate into a full war, but we don't know which one. So far, this situation is triggering a larger war, to include Hamas.

The epicenter of violence in the last few weeks is the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, which is Islam's third-holiest site, behind Mecca and Medina. It is also a major holy site for Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount. So it's not surprising that it's a major flash point for Palestinian worshippers and Israeli nationalists.

On Monday, Palestinians hurled rocks, other heavy objects and firecrackers at Israeli policemen. Israeli police stormed the mosque, firing stun grenades and rubber bullets inside the mosque. Hundreds of Palestinians were wounded, and dozens were hospitalized.

This kind of violence has been going on daily since the start of Ramadan on April 13. This is the worst violence in years between Israeli police and Palestinians in East Jerusalem. In April, Israeli police blocked off access to a part of the Old City, giving Covid restrictions as the reason. Then a TikTok video went viral apparently showing an Israeli being abused by an Arab. That's when right-wing extremist Jewish settlers held a large demonstration, chanting "Death to Arabs." Palestinians heard about this, and a crowd responded by throwing firecrackers and setting garbage bins on fire. (See 24-Apr-2021 World View: Violence grows between Palestinians and far-right Jews in East Jerusalem)

Clashes between Palestinians and settlers have occurred almost daily since then. The violence has spiked in recent days as Jewish settlers are asking the Israeli courts to evict Palestinians from their homes, so that the Israeli settlers can take their place. The settlers claim that the land occupied by the Palestinian homes belonged to their Jewish ancestors prior to the 1948 creation of Israel.

These are the last days of Ramadan but, more significantly, Monday is Israel's "Jerusalem Day," which celebrates Israel's capture of East Jerusalem during the 1967 Middle East war.

Israel's government took two steps to try to defuse the violence. First, a court hearing scheduled for Monday was postponed a month. The court hearing would have finalized the decision to evict Palestinians from homes. These threatened evictions would have severely escalated the clashes between Palestinians and settlers.

The other step was to cancel a scheduled march by Israeli right-wing nationalists and settlers, in celebration of Jerusalem Day. The parade would have marched through the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem's Old City, which the Palestinians said would be highly provocative. These two steps reduced some of the violence, although they've apparently infuriated the Israeli nationalists. Nationalist Israelis demonstrated against the moves.

Generational Dynamics predicts that the Israelis and Palestinians will be re-fighting the 1948 war that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. However, this new situation so far shows signs that it's more likely to fizzle, rather than expand into a larger regional war. The US State Department is pressuring Israel to back off, and the United Nations, Egypt and Qatar are mediating between Israel and Hamas to halt the fighting.

However, the violence is expected to continue for at least several weeks and months. The court hearing to evict Palestinians from their homes has not been canceled, but has been postponed for a month, so we can't expect the clashes between Palestinians and Israelis around the Al-Aqsa Mosque to end for at least that period of time. That will lead to more demands by the Hamas militants for at least that period of time. Perhaps the worst that will happen will be like the 2014 summer war between Hamas and Israel that lasted 67 days.

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3-May-21 World View -- US withdrawal from Afghanistan threatens Central Asia stability

Violence on Tajikistan - Kyrgyzstan border worst in 20 years

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Violence on Tajikistan - Kyrgyzstan border worst in 20 years
Taliban and Afghan forces clash as US begins withdrawal
US withdrawal from Afghanistan threatens Central Asia stability

Violence on Tajikistan - Kyrgyzstan border worst in 20 years

Ironically, some crockery survives an enormous blast that reduced homes to rubble near the Tajikistan - Kyrgyzstan border (BBC)

Ironically, some crockery survives an enormous blast that reduced homes to rubble near the Tajikistan - Kyrgyzstan border (BBC)

For years since the end of the bloody Tajikistan civil war (1992-97), there have been border disputes between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, but they've all been isolated incidents. But in the last few weeks, the Tajik army has been mobilizing along a long section of the border, for the first time. The border is 971 kilometers long, of which 471 km are disputed.

At least 31 people have been killed, and over 10,000 people have been evacuated from their homes due to the worst violence in decades between Kyrgyz and Tajik army forces. Entire villages on both sides have been burned down. On Sunday, the two governments agreed to a ceasefire, but it's not clear that the people on the ground agree.

Both Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan belong to Russia's Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and Russia has military bases in both countries, so Russia would like to see the conflict settled peacefully.

The borders between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan were set up in the 1920s by Josef Stalin, making them part of the Soviet Union. Stalin had no concern for ethnic, demographic, and tribal considerations when he set up those boundaries. He was only interested in commericial benefits. And the boundaries didn't matter, since both countries were part of the Soviet Union. But when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, suddenly the boundaries mattered.

The boundaries were never clearly defined, and there have been calls over the years to officially mark the boundaries. Of course, this would bring any border disagreements into sharp focus, so this project hasn't been pursued. But recently, the government of Kyrgyzstan announced that it would like to complete border demarcations between the countries, and to build a reservoir along the river that supplies water to both countries. These announcements caused the Tajiks to panic, and led to the current border clashes.

Taliban and Afghan forces clash as US begins withdrawal

The US and Nato began withdrawal of all forces from Afghanistan on May 1, with the withdrawal to be completed on September 11, on the 20th anniversary of the Sept 11, 2001, attacks. The Taliban had promised to coexist peacefully with the Afghan government provided that the US withdrawal was fully completed by May 1, as agreed with the Donald Trump administration early last year. But the Taliban now say that the US has violated the agreement, so they're free to attack anyone they want. Joe Biden has said that the the September 11 completion date for the withdrawal is absolute, not conditions based, so the Taliban know that they can just go ahead and attack.

On Friday, 30 people were killed when a car bomb exploded near a guest house where high school students were staying, in preparation for university entrance exams. Dozens of people were hurt. Witnesses described roofs collapsing and victims being trapped under the debris.

In the last two days alone, there have been dozens of new casualties, from clashes between Afghan forces and the Taliban. Once the Americans leave, there will be nothing preventing the clashes from escalating.

Reports indicate that the people of Kabul are feeling increasingly anxious, particularly about girls' education, which the Taliban have promised to abolish. Friday's car bombing may have been designed to target girls' education.

US withdrawal from Afghanistan threatens Central Asia stability

The withdrawal of US and Nato troops from Afghanistan threatens more than just the stability of Afghanistan. It threatens new kinds of instability in the entire Central Asia region. The countries in the region are concerned that the American withdrawal from Afghanistan will create the same regional instability that the American withdrawal from Iraq did in 2010.

The heads of the countries in Russia's Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) have been meeting to discuss this precise concern. In fact, villagers in Tajikistan, along the Afghanistan border, are being told to be prepared "to take up arms," in the words of a provincial governor:

"In coordination with the police and intelligence departments, we've registered all hunters who live in the border areas. They will have to take up arms to defend our country. In fact, all of us will have to take up weapons if the situation dictates."

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is not surprising at all. Both Afghanistan (1991-96) and Tajikistan (1992-97) had extremely bloody ethnic civil wars during the 1990s.

In Afghanistan, the war was between the Pashtuns in the south versus the Northern Alliance in the north, consisting of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks. These opposing groups have fresh memories of the atrocities, torture, rape, beatings, dismemberments, mutilations, and so forth that the other side performed on their friends, wives and other family members, so they will be looking for revenge.

It's been over 20 years since those civil wars ended, so the region is in a generational Awakening era, with new nationalistic generations having grown up since then, and having little fear of a new civil war. It's way too early for a major new war, but as typically happens, there will be periods of bloodshed separated by periods of ceasefire, with each bloodshed period worse than the previous one.

Furthermore, new terrorist groups with allegiance to al-Qaeda or ISIS have been springing up in Afghanistan, but have been kept under control with the help of American forces. These groups will be encouraged to grow again, with the departure of the Americans.

In 2009, I told readers to make a mental note of the Fergana Valley (or Ferghana Valley), in central Asia, because it was going to become increasingly important in world affairs. The Fergana Valley sits at the intersection of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, and is a hotbed of terrorist activity by al-Qaeda. ( "Islamist Uzbeks lead terrorists in Pakistan and Afghanistan (2-Nov-2009)")

The American withdrawal from Afghanistan will encourage these clashes. That may be why there have been reports that the Biden administration has been talking to the government of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan to reposition the US forces leaving Afghanistan in abandoned American military bases in those two countries. American forces had occupied those bases between 2001 and 2014, before the host countries demanded that the Americans leave.

Little is known publicly about these negotiations, but it would be ironic if the withdrawal of American forces from the "forever war" in Afghanistan led to American forces becoming involved a "forever war" in Central Asia and the Fergana Valley.

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19-Apr-21 World View -- Britain sends warships to Black Sea amid Russia's military buildup around Ukraine

Britain to send warships to Black Sea after US backs down

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Britain sends warships to Black Sea amid Russia's military buildup around Ukraine
Russia builds up its naval forces in Black Sea
Britain to send warships to Black Sea after US backs down
Russia continues military buildup on Ukraine's border
Major diplomatic row between Russia and Czech Republic

Britain sends warships to Black Sea amid Russia's military buildup around Ukraine

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov.

Ukraine. In 2014, Russia invaded and occupied Donbas, and invaded and annexed Crimea. In 2018, Russia completed a bridge over the Kerch Strait, controlling access to the Sea of Azov.

Britain is reported to be sending two warships to the Black Sea, as Russia continues its military buildup on the Ukraine border, and a naval buildup in the Black Sea. Britain's announcement came when the US backed out of plans to send ships to the Black Sea after being warned by Russia to stay out.

Russia appears to be taking the next step in a plan that began with its invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2014, following a military buildup on the border of Ukraine similar to the military buildup going on at the current time. The invasion took place after Vladimir Putin promised not to invade Ukraine.

During the course of that invasion, Russians in eastern Ukraine in July 2014 shot down a passenger plane, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, with a Russian Buk 9M38 missile. The Russians claimed that the US shot down the plane to embarrass Putin. Russia lied about not invading Crimea, and then invaded Crimea. Putin lied about not annexing Crimea, and then annexed Crimea.

In May 2015, Russia began constructing an 11.8 mile bridge across the Kerch Strait (see map above), said to be the longest bridge in Europe.

Russia used the bridge to strangle commerce into Ukraine's seaports of Mariupol and Berdyansk, resulting in substantial economic damage to Ukraine. In November 2018, Russia completed the bridge, and opened live fire for no reason on three Ukrainian vessels, wounding six sailors, boarding and seizing the vessels. The sailors were transferred indefinitely to a jail in Moscow.

The point of reviewing this history is to set the framework for Russia's latest actions, and to show that pretty much everything Russia claims is garbage. The typical Russian playbook is to commit some atrocity and then blame the United States or Nato, such as when the Russians shot down the MH17 passenger plane.

In the current scene, Russian analysts are claiming that the military buildup is because the United States wants Ukraine to join Nato, and because Ukraine is planning to invade Russia. Over the years, I've dealt with dozens of Russian trolls excusing Russia atrocities with some of the most ridiculous excuses, and this is typical.

The problem is that we have absolutely no idea what the Russians are planning.

The super-optimistic Pollyannaish view is that Putin is just trying to send a message to the west, and has no plans for military engagement.

A more cynical view is that Russia has no military plans, but intends to use the invasion threat to blackmail Ukraine, Nato and the West to gain some diplomatic advantage.

At the other end of the spectrum is the view that the Russians plan a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, possibly extending as far as Moldova and its pro-Russian breakaway Transnistria, which lies along Ukraine's southwest border.

The intermediate view is that the Russians are planning to attack and occupy the seaports at Mariupol and Berdyansk, and then continue to move west in order to create a land bridge between Russia and occupied Crimea, and take control of the entire Sea of Azov.

Whatever military action Russia is planning will probably take place in early or mid-May, after the snows have melted and the fields have dried and are able to hold tanks. We'll have to wait until then to see which of these options Russia will pursue.

Russia builds up its naval forces in Black Sea

Coinciding with the huge build-up of over 100,000 Russian troops near the border with Ukraine, Russia is bolstering its naval fleet in the Black Sea.

Two Russian warships from Russia's Baltic fleet, accompanied by 15 smaller vessels, transited from the Mediterranean Sea through the Bosphorus to the Black Sea on Saturday. The Bosphorus is the waterway, controlled by Turkey, connecting the Mediterranean Sea with the Black Sea.

This comes after Russia announced that Russia is sending 15 naval vessels from its Caspian Sea Flotilla to the Black Sea. These vessels must travel up the Volga River, through a canal built in 1952 with 13 locks, to the Don River, and then to the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea.

So Russia's naval buildup is large and expensive, just like its ground buildup.

Britain to send warships to Black Sea after US backs down

Map of Russian deployment around Ukraine (RFE/RL)

Map of Russian deployment around Ukraine (RFE/RL)

There are a number of news stories from multiple international sources describing this situation, and they seem to boil down to the following:

The US was planning to send two warships into the Black Sea, for a long-scheduled routine mission. However, Russia warned the United States on Tuesday (4/13) against sending the warships, "for their own good." Russia's Deputy Foreign Ministry Sergei Ryabkov was quoted by Russian news agencies as follows:

"There is absolutely nothing for American ships to be doing near our shores. We warn the United States that it will be better for them to stay far away from Crimea and our Black Sea coast. It will be for their own good."

Also on Tuesday, president Joe Biden phoned Russia's president Vladimir Putin, after which the US backed down on the plans to send warships to the Black Sea. US officials described the reason was to avoid needlessly escalating the situation, and a desire not to provoke Moscow during a delicate time.

However on Sunday, British media is reporting that a flotilla of ships from the Royal Navy's carrier task group in the Mediterranean, including a Type 45 destroyer armed with anti-aircraft missiles and an anti-submarine Type 23 frigate, will travel to the Black Sea in May. The deployment is aimed at showing solidarity with Ukraine and Britain's NATO allies.

I heard one analyst make the following speculation about what happened: Perhaps Biden fears a coordinated attack next month on Ukraine by Russia simultaneously with a Chinese attack on Taiwan, and so Biden did not want American warships to be trapped in the Black Sea.

Russia continues military buildup on Ukraine's border

If major hostilities break out again in the Donbas (eastern Ukraine), then the situation will have changed a lot since the last war in 2014, since both Ukraine's and Russia's militaries are better prepared.

Ukraine has significantly boosted defense spending since 2014, has U.S.-supplied Javelin anti-tank missiles in its arsenal, and has troop numbers of nearly 250,000 compared to 168,000 in 2013.

In recent weeks, Russia has unexpectedly boosted its troop presence near the conflict zone in Ukraine. Analysis of open-source material has identified tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, long-range artillery, rocket launchers, and Iskander short-range ballistic missile systems among the materiel that has been moved to the area since mid-March. U.S. and NATO officials have called it the largest military buildup in the region since Russia�s surprise occupation of Crimea and the start of fighting in the Donbas, which has killed more than 13,000 combatants and civilians since April 2014.

So what are Russia's plans? We probably won't know until early to mid-May.

Major diplomatic row between Russia and Czech Republic

This is a (probably) unrelated story, but it's being described as a major diplomatic development between Russia and Europe.

The Czech Republic expelled 18 Russian diplomats on Saturday. Czech local intelligence agents claim the diplomats are Russian intelligence operatives. They are suspected of involvement in an explosion at an arms depot in 2014. On Sunday, Russia retaliated by announcing that 20 diplomats from the Czech Republic will be expelled. At the time of the explosion, it was assumed to be an accident, but through detective work, Czech officials now say that it was Russian sabotage.

Czech Police have identified two suspects in connection with the blast - Alexander Mishkin and Anatoly Chepigov - who are also accused of using the chemical nerve agent weapon Novichok to murder Sergei Skripal, a former double Russian agent, and his daughter Yulia. The murder took place in the UK in Salisbury in 2018.

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15-Apr-21 World View -- High farce and tragedy continue in Afghanistan, as Biden announces Sept 11 troop withdrawal

CNN: Biden guided by 'magical thinking' in Afghanistan

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

High farce and tragedy continue in Afghanistan, as Biden announces Sept 11 troop withdrawal
CNN: Biden guided by 'magical thinking' in Afghanistan
Generational Dynamics analysis of the war in Afghanistan

High farce and tragedy continue in Afghanistan, as Biden announces Sept 11 troop withdrawal

Girls in Afghanistan will no longer be in school if the US withdraws and the Taliban takes over (NY Times)

Girls in Afghanistan will no longer be in school if the US withdraws and the Taliban takes over (NY Times)

President Joe Biden announced on Wednesday that all American troops would be withdrawn by September 11 of this year, the 20th anniversary of the 9/11/2001 attacks, and that Nato troops would be withdrawn at the same time. This would be farcical if it weren't so tragic.

How many times have we been here? The President announces a new policy -- "surge" into Afghanistan, a "victory" in Afghanistan, or a "peace with honor" in Afghanistan. I write an article explaining why all of those are impossible, based on a Generational Dynamics analysis summarized later in this article. The new policy fails, exactly as I predicted. But nobody ever learns.

So last year, Donald Trump made a farcical agreement with the Taliban that if they changed their behavior, then the US would withdraw its troops by May 1 of this year. Trump's reason was that Americans are tired of "endless wars." (A bit of irony: Biden's announcement was described by the fawning mainstream media as "historic," but Trump's similar announcement was not.)

So now Joe Biden is president, and he made a farcical announcement that the troops will be removed by September 11 of this year -- the 20th anniversary of the 9/11/2001 attack. I always accuse the Biden administration of having no clue what's going on in the world, but this takes the cake. We can expect the Taliban to engineer a major terrorist attack on September 11 to celebrate their victory over the Americans, having achieved their objective of forcing the Americans to withdraw.

In his speech, Biden said:

"I believed that our presence in Afghanistan should be focused on the reason we went in the first place: to ensure Afghanistan would not be used as a base from which to attack our homeland again. We did that. We accomplished that objective.
I said, among � with others, we�d follow Osama bin Laden to the gates of hell if need be. That�s exactly what we did, and we got him. It took us close to 10 years to put President Obama�s commitment to � into form. And that�s exactly what happened; Osama bin Laden was gone.
That was 10 years ago. Think about that. We delivered justice to bin Laden a decade ago, and we�ve stayed in Afghanistan for a decade since. Since then, our reasons for remaining in Afghanistan are becoming increasingly unclear, even as the terrorist threat that we went to fight evolved."

So Biden's argument is that America went into Afghanistan to defeat al-Qaeda, but now that al-Qaeda has been defeated, there's no need for American troops to remain.

There was one difference between the terms of the Trump and Biden announcements. Trump's May 1 deadline was "condition based," meaning that if the Taliban didn't behave, then Trump might extend the deadline. This was explained by Biden's press spokesman, Jen Psaki:

"[Question: And could his deadline extend, or could he change his mind if you do see the situation in Afghanistan just decline?]
Psaki: Well, I will say that the president made this decision after close consultations and a close discussion and taking into account all the difficult factors I should say around that decision. So no, he remains committed to the timeline that he intends to set out in his speech. ...
[Question: I don�t think I�ve heard in the answers so far, what the Taliban is supposed to think about this. I mean, if I was them, I think I�d want to take the summer off and wait until September 11th. And why go ahead and negotiate an agreement that would limit them if the U.S. is going to leave anyway?]
Jen Psaki: Well, first I would say that we have an expectation that the Taliban is going to abide by their commitments and that they are not going to allow Afghanistan to become a pariah state. That�s our view. That�s also in their interest, in our view. ...
And his view is that, when you talk about a conditions-based withdrawal, it punts it down the road, �We will never leave. What conditions would we be required to leave? By how long? What does that mean? What�s the additional cost?� These are all the factors in his mind."

First off, the "expectation that the Taliban is going to abide by their commitments" is totally delusional.

This answer illustrates the conundrum that Biden and Psaki did not unravel.

On the one hand, if the withdrawal date is unconditional, then the Taliban will have every reason to continue terrorist acts. In fact, the Taliban have announced that they won't attend an Afghanistan peace conference being hosted by Turkey. Why should they?

On the other hand, if the withdrawal date is conditional then, as Psaki says, the date will just be kicked down the road again.

So the question is this: Will Biden go ahead with the withdrawal as announced, and hand the Taliban a victory? Or will he be forced to reconsider the withdrawal decision?

CNN: Biden guided by 'magical thinking' in Afghanistan

A number of analysts have ridiculed Biden's withdrawal announcement and the delusions behind it. One of them is Peter Bergen, the National Security Analysts for CNN, the network that fawns over Biden so much they've turned into a sewer. So Peter Bergen's analysis cannot readily be rejected as the opinion of a "white supremacist," or whatever CNN calls anyone who disagrees with them.

According to Bergen:

"President Biden's decision to announce a date for pulling all US troops out of Afghanistan by the 20th anniversary of 9/11 sets the stage for a predictable disaster. ...
There has to be some magical thinking going on for the Biden White House to expect that there will be a different outcome in Afghanistan [than in President Obama's precipitous withdrawal from Iraq].
Yes, al Qaeda is a mere shadow of what it was on 9/11. That's because for the past two decades, the US and its allies have prevented Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for al Qaeda and allied groups.
It's a policy that has worked.
Now, that sound policy is being abandoned. Once the US leaves Afghanistan, America's NATO allies, who have 7,000 soldiers on the ground, will leave as well, since they rely on an American security umbrella. President Biden confirmed this in his speech to the nation Wednesday afternoon.
The pullout of US and NATO troops will likely enable the Taliban to take over much of the country."

Bergen explains that the Taliban have remained in close contact with al-Qaeda, and they've guaranteed that they "would honor their historical ties" with al-Qaeda. Furthermore, ISIS retains a foothold in Afghanistan.

As Bergen pointed out, the US and Nato have prevented Afghanistan from becoming a safe haven for al-Qaeda and allied groups. Once the allied forces pull out, Afghanistan will once again become a safe haven for both al-Qaeda and ISIS, just as Osama bin Laden used Afghanistan as a safe haven to launch the original 9/11/2001 attacks.

It's not just Peter Bergen who is alarmed at the withdrawal decision. The New York Times, which always fawningly slobbers over Biden, is worried for the girls of Afghanistan. According to the Times:

"�I am so worried about my future. It seems so murky. If the Taliban take over, I lose my identity,� said Wahida Sadeqi, 17, an 11th grader at Pardis High School in Kabul. �It is about my existence.� ...
For two decades, American leaders have pledged peace, prosperity, democracy, the end of terrorism and rights for women. Few of those promises have materialized in vast areas of Afghanistan, but now even in the cities where real progress occurred, there is fear that everything will be lost when the Americans leave. ...
Over two decades, the American mission evolved from hunting terrorists to helping the government build the institutions of a functioning government, dismantle the Taliban and empower women. But the U.S. and Afghan militaries were never able to effectively destroy the Taliban, allowing the insurgents to stage a comeback. ...
Women would be most at risk under Taliban rule. When the group controlled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, it banned women from taking most jobs or receiving educations and practically made them prisoners in their own homes."

Biden administration officials might be thinking to paraphrase Lyndon Johnson's statement from 53 years ago, referring to Walter Cronkite: "If we've lost the NY Times, then we've lost America."

The interesting thing about the NY Times article is that it seems to reject the delusional Biden administration claim that the Afghan democracy will continue. The article simply assumes that the Taliban will take over, and will impose the same dictatorial government they had in 2001, when they sponsored Osama bin Laden's attack on America.

Analysts who favor continuing to leave a small number (3,500) of American troops in Afghanistan point out that these can prevent a resurgence of al-Qaeda and ISIS, and can also provide a listening post and forward military base to counter Chinese military activity in Central Asia. On the other hand, once America closes its bases in landlocked Afghanistan, they can never be reopened.

Generational Dynamics analysis of the war in Afghanistan

I began writing about the impossibility of winning in Afghanistan shortly after President Obama announced his plan to "surge" troops into Afghanistan.

President Bush had used a successful "surge" counter-insurgency strategy in Iraq in 2007, with the result that al-Qaeda was driven out of Iraq, and the objectives were met. But al-Qaeda in Iraq were mostly not Iraqis. They were jihadists that al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had imported from Jordan and Saudi Arabia. The Iraqis themselves, even the Sunnis, mostly hated al-Qaeda, as I described in a lengthy analysis, "Iraqi Sunnis are turning against al-Qaeda in Iraq".

But the Taliban could not be defeated in a similar way in Afghanistan, because the Taliban are radicalized ethnic Pashtuns, and most of the population of Afghanistan are Pashtuns.

In an article earlier this year, I was able to extend this original analysis, based on research that I had done for my book, "Vietnam, Buddhism and the Vietnam War." In that book, I compared the counter-insurgency strategies used by British in the Boer War (1899-1902) and the Malay Emergency (1948-55), and how they contrasted to similar counter-insurgency strategies used by the Americans in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. (See "18-Jan-21 World View -- Chaos grows in Afghanistan as American troops leave in hope of delusional peace plan")

But the extended analysis is based on the same reasoning: In Iraq, the civilians and jihadists looked different and spoke differently. In Afghanistan, the civilians and jihadists are the same Pashtun people.

Let's face it, most politicians and journalists are ignorant and dumb. They have no knowledge of Afghanistan's last generational crisis war, an extremely bloody, horrific civil war, in 1991-96, that defines Afghan society today. The war was a civil war, fought between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the Northern Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban are radicalized Pashtuns, and when they need to import foreign fighters, then can import their cousins from the Pashtun tribes in Pakistan.

Indeed, it's much worse than that. The ethnic groups in Afghanistan are COMPLETELY NON-UNITED and loathe each other. Pashtuns still have scores to settle with the Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks that formed the Northern Alliance, especially the Shias. These opposing groups have fresh memories of the atrocities, torture, rape, beatings, dismemberments, mutilations, and so forth that the other side performed on their friends, wives and other family members, and they have no desire to be friends or to work together. They'd rather kill each other.

So what is Biden going to do? If he goes ahead with the withdrawal, then it's 100% certain that Afghanistan will collapse into chaos, and it's likely that the Taliban will take control of the government, and everything that America's sacrifices brought to Afghanistan -- democracy, women's rights, relative peace -- will be lost within a few months.

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13-Apr-21 World View -- Investing in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Smart Contracts

Sabotage and fraud in DeFi and Smart Contracts

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Investing in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Smart Contracts
Automated processing on IBM mainframes in the 1960s
Intentional sabotage in automated processing
Sabotage and fraud in DeFi and Smart Contracts
Due diligence in DeFi and Smart Contract investments

Investing in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Smart Contracts

How Smart Contracts Work (Deccan Herald)

How Smart Contracts Work (Deccan Herald)

I've been asked about investing in the crypto-currency (Bitcoin) related technologies, Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Smart Contracts, which use the same internet-based blockchain technology as Bitcoin.

For over a decade, crypto currencies have been the highly stylish, fashionable rock star finance technology, but lately they've been losing their glamor and lustre as compared to a newer technology, "decentralized finance" (DeFi) and "smart contracts."

It was just a few years ago that people were saying that the world was just a stone's throw away from having a universal currency (Bitcoin) that was independent of any nation. Last week, I read one analyst saying, "We are a stone�s throw away from the global financial industry running on a common software infrastructure." Well, that stone would have to land something like 20-30 or more years in the future, and if humans haven't figured out how to do it by then, then perhaps our computer overlords will do it for us.

What's happening now is that there's an explosion of financial applications and services, normally provided by banks, brokers, and other financial institution, that are now being provided on blockchain platforms as "smart contracts." There are really an unlimited number of possible apps and services -- insurance, lending, borrowing, asset management, gaming, day trading, savings, payments, billing, and so forth. Smart contracts are "self-executing," meaning that once a particular smart contract is set up, any action that would normally be taken by a human intermediary in a bank or financial institution would now be executed automatically by the smart contract.

Another way of looking at it is to compare a smart contract to workflow software that has been around since the 90s. The software is set up with a set of workflow rules, and when the appropriate conditions specified by the rules are satisfied, then the workflow software sends out e-mail messages to the appropriate people, telling them to take the appropriate action.

DeFi applications are more powerful because typically they have control of crypto assets, so when the right conditions are met, the app does not send out an e-mail saying "buy a new car." Instead, it automatically issues the paperwork to buy a new car.

There are several ways to invest in DeFi technology. You can set up a financial relationship with someone else using a smart contract. Or you could invest in companies that develop these apps or offer services using this technology.

The following web site provides a pretty extensive list of companies offering such apps and services at the current time: https://defipulse.com/defi-list/

Automated processing on IBM mainframes in the 1960s

Although Decentralized Finance and Smart Contracts are a brand-new, shiny technology, there are problems and dangers that can be learned from history. Let's look at some historical examples.

Back in the 1960s, accounting systems were developed for IBM mainframe systems, and they were only a stone's throw from never needing human accountants again, according to experts.

The transaction processing systems used magnetic tapes. A typical processing run required three tapes -- an input tape of existing account records, an input tape of new transaction records, and an output tape of updated account records. The two input tapes are pre-sorted by account number so that they can be processed simultaneously in order of account. It's therefore possibe to update the accounts with only one pass through the transaction tape, writing the updated accounts to the output tape, which would be the existing accounts input tape for the next day's run.

So let's take a look at some of the issues. The most obvious one is that the mainframe might be down, so that the transaction processing run could not take place. Another issue is that mag tapes are somewhat fragile, and data could be lost.

Another possible problem is that the transaction processing software could have a bug, since all software has bugs. So if the bug affects several thousand accounts, then it's possible that a single run could result in several thousand errors caused by the bug, and they wouldn't be caught until much later.

That's when people started saying things like, "To err is human. To really screw things up takes a computer."

Intentional sabotage in automated processing

Another problem was intentional sabotage. The mag tape transaction processing that I described was subject to a very interesting form of sabotage.

Some transactions involve division of two numbers, and result in an amount with a fraction of a penny. The correct algorithm would round to the nearest penny, and the resulting amount would be used in the transaction. But one developer did something different. His software contained secret code that deducted the fractional penny from the amount, and credited it to his own account. Tens of thousands of fractions of a penny adds up to real money. He made a lot of money that way, but the consequences of what he had done were not discovered until much later.

The thing that makes this kind of sabotage possible is that managers don't understand what the programmers are doing. There was a similar problem with the financial crisis of the 2000s. The Gen-X financial engineers got their Masters Degrees in the 1990s, and applied those skills to create fraudulent synthetic securities based on subprime mortgages. Their managers in the financial institutions had no idea how they worked, except that they made lots of money, and the result was the financial crisis. In the late 2000s I was working on a government system where the lead programmer was sabotaging the code (my code, in particular). I complained repeatedly to my boss, but he refused to believe me. Eventually, the lead programmer screwed around with someone else's code, someone really important, and my manager apologized to me. This shows that the consequences of sabotage are not usually discovered until much later.

Another example was the Obamacare website Healthcare.gov. President Obama launched Obamacare on the afternoon of Oct 1, 2013, and he had no idea that the web site wasn't even working. When he announced the launch, he had no idea a disaster had unfolded several hours earlier. As I wrote in my 2015 article, massive fraud had occurred among all the consulting firms, and they propagated lies all the way up the chain. The entire White House had no idea of the disaster until it was too late. (See: "Healthcare.gov -- The greatest software development disaster in history")

So there was massive fraud in the development of Obamacare, which no one cares about since caring about Obamacare fraud is politically censored. Similarly, with tens of millions of mail-in ballots sent out last year there was massive fraud in the 2020 election that no one cares about, since caring about fraud in the 2020 election is politically censored.

The reason for mentioning all this is that the DeFi technology will be a huge target for sabotage and fraud, and the people benefiting from the fraud may want it censored. This concern is being politically censored because the major beneficiaries -- Silicon Valley, the Chinese, the Democrats, hedge funds -- don't want it discussed.

Sabotage and fraud in DeFi and Smart Contracts

Blockchain technology has this magical, mystical reputation as being incorruptible -- open source, "tamper-proof data," transparency, permissionless access, etc. Obamacare had the same magical, mystical reputation, and the amount of fraud was massive. The mainstream media didn't want to see it, because it was censored. The housing bubble of the early-mid 2000s was obvious (I was writing about it, Alan Greenspan was talking about it), but mainstream media didn't want to see it until 2009, when millions of people had lost their homes or went bankrupt. The mainstream media don't want to see the massive voter fraud in the 2020 election.

So there's no doubt that as DeFi grows, there will be lots of bugs and plenty of fraud, sabotage and corruption. This will be done at technical levels, and managers won't even know that it's going on until there are severe consequences and it's too late. In particular, it's absolutely certain that China's military is already developing tools to hack into DeFi applications, to control them.

There's another issue that's analogous to the 1960s IBM mainframe being unavailable, and this applies to all blockchain technologies: There may be a crisis (flood, hurricane, Chinese sabotage, malware, war), and the internet could become unavailable, or large numbers of servers along the blockchain could be destroyed.

Due diligence in DeFi and Smart Contract investments

So you can invest in DeFi at any of several levels. You can invest in companies developing core low-level technologies, or in companies developing mid-level API platforms, or in companies developing the top level apps that people and corporations actually use in their business. Or, you could invest by using one of the apps for its business relationships. The investment at any of these levels would be subject to the same concerns that I've raised.

So how do you do due diligence on such an investment? I believe that the biggest advantage of DeFi is also its biggest disadvantage and biggest risk -- the "self-executing" feature of "smart contracts."

Here's the investopedia definition of Smart Contracts:

A smart contract is a self-executing contract with the terms of the agreement between buyer and seller being directly written into lines of code. The code and the agreements contained therein exist across a distributed, decentralized blockchain network. The code controls the execution, and transactions are trackable and irreversible.
Smart contracts permit trusted transactions and agreements to be carried out among disparate, anonymous parties without the need for a central authority, legal system, or external enforcement mechanism.

In other words, a "smart contract" is just a software program. It will also certainly contain bugs -- because all software programs contain bugs -- and it will be subjected to sabotage, malware and hacking. And since the whole point of smart contracts is that they're "self-executing," without human involvement, and since management won't understand what's going on anyway, the bugs and sabotage won't be detected until a disaster has occurred.

Perhaps a good solution is to require "human oversight" of any smart contract. That is, if a self-executing smart contract tells you "kill your mother or pay a large fine" (and this isn't as far-fetched as it might seem, given my experience with software developers in the last 20 years), then there has to be a way for a human being on each side of the smart contract to review the self-executing action, and override it under the right circumstances.

This means that every party to a "smart contract" should have, as a backup, a printout or a pdf of a written contract that can be referenced if the internet goes down, or if there's a failure in or sabotage of the smart contract.

Unfortunately, this will only work at a small scale. DeFi applications are going to become larger and more complex, with a single app consisting of hundreds or thousands of interlocking smart contracts, and these will really be a disaster waiting to happen. But they're coming anyway. Watch for the buzzword: DAO (distributed autonomous organization), an entire business which is just a collection of smart contracts.

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11-Apr-21 World View -- Myanmar ethnic groups in Shan State launch coordinated attack on Burmese military

Peaceful protests continue in cities across Myanmar, heading for catastrophe

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar ethnic groups in Shan State launch coordinated attack on Burmese military
Repeating the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Muslim Rohingyas
War with the Karen ethnic group on the Myanmar / Thailand border
Peaceful protests continue in cities across Myanmar, heading for catastrophe

Myanmar ethnic groups in Shan State launch coordinated attack on Burmese military

Burmese soldiers in Shan State after an attack by ethnic groups in 2019 (AFP)

Burmese soldiers in Shan State after an attack by ethnic groups in 2019 (AFP)

An alliance of ethnic armies in Myanmar / Burma on Saturday attacked a military police station in Shan State, killing at least 10 policemen. The attackers were from an alliance that includes the Arakan Army, the Ta�ang National Liberation Army, and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army. Normally, these ethnic groups oppose each other, and occasionally fight each other, but this is the first time that they've allied, in the face of the army coup, which makes this very significant.

As we've been expecting, the Myanmar / Burma military crackdown on peaceful civilian protesters, following the coup that replaced the democratically elected government with a dictatorial military junta, is rapidly turning into a full scale civil war, involving multiple ethnic groups.

This situation is growing into a repeat of Burma's last generational crisis war, an extremely bloody civil war (1948-1958) following independence, and involving multiple ethnic groups, along with intervention by the Chinese.

This attack on the police station outpost in Shan State seems to me to have special significance, in view of the genocide and ethnic cleansing of the ethnic Rohingyas in previous years.

Repeating the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Muslim Rohingyas

However, the most horrific Buddhist violence against the Rohingyas began after August 25, 2017, when Rohingya insurgents carried out a series of coordinated attacks against 30 Burma police outposts and an army base. Using knives, some guns and homemade explosives they killed at least a dozen Burmese security force members.

The army responded with a sweep of violence against Rohingyas, causing thousands of them to flee their villages and head for the Bangladesh border, where they hoped to cross and reach a refugee camp. The Burmese army shot them as they were fleeing, including women and children, killing dozens. The attack on the police posts was the beginning of mass genocide and ethnic cleansing.

This is a standard pattern used by genocidal autocrats. I've described how this works in detail in "12-Jan-21 World View -- America and the standard Genocide Playbook". Autocratic regimes use an isolated terrorist incident as an excuse to conduct a massive overreaction against an entire group. In America, the Democrats are using the January 6 incident to declare that all 74 million Trump supporters are racists, white supremacists and terrorists, and are using that as an excuse for massive censorship and extrajucicial arrests.

So in Myanmar, we now have a situation similar to the one on August 25, 2017, when Rohingyas attacked police outposts. Saturday's attack by ethnic groups -- the Arakan Army, the Ta�ang National Liberation Army, and the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army -- could well bring about a repeat of what happened to the Rohingyas. We should know within the next few days.

The unifying of different ethnic groups is being described as highly significant by analysts. Over the decades, since the last crisis war, the Burmese military has been able to deal with the different ethnic groups separately, and after the February 1 coup, the military negotiated with each one to keep them out of the fighting. But now it's clear that has failed, and we can expect all out war with the ethnic groups.

These groups are on the border with China, and there are many people of Chinese ancestry living in Shan State. So this may be the trigger that leads to intervention by the Chinese, although the Chinese will not intervene unless events force them to.

War with the Karen ethnic group on the Myanmar / Thailand border

As a separate issue, Burmese regime fighter jets have been dropping bombs on ethnic Karens in territory controlled by the Karen National Union (KNU), as we reported last week. The Karens are the largest ethnic group in Burma. The bombing began on March 27 and has continued almost every day. It was triggered by an attack by the KNU on a military barracks outpost, killing 20.

Some 10,000 Karens have fled across the border into Thailand to escape the violence. This is not new. In the 1990s, a war between the preceding Burmese military junta and the Karens led to some 100,000 refugees in camps along the border between the two countries. This has caused a political problem for the Thai government, which is also led by a military junta that overthrew a democratically elected government in 2014. (See the following: "23-May-14 World View -- Thailand's army seizes power in major victory for 'yellow shirt' elites")

Thailand's last generational crisis war (the Cambodian Killing Fields war) climaxed in 1979, so Thailand is in a generational Unraveling era, with little chance of a new ethnic civil war at this time. (Burma, of course, is well into a generational Crisis era.) Therefore, Thailand's coup did not lead to civil war, but Burma's coup is doing so.

So the thousands of refugees pouring into Thailand present a problem for the Thai military junta, who basically are aligned with the Burmese military junta. So even though Thai prime minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha has assured that "human rights will be respected," the result is that many of the Karen civilians fleeing violence by crossing the border into Thailand are being pushed back into Myanmar by the Thai police.

There are also refugees pouring into India and China.

Peaceful protests continue in cities across Myanmar, heading for catastrophe

There were peaceful protests in multiple cities across Myanmar on Saturday, with large marches in Yangon and Mandalay.

This despite the fact that on Friday, 80 peaceful protesters were killed by the army in random gunfire in the city of Bago, near Yangon. The army had thought that escalating violence would cause the protests to fizzle out, as they did in 2007, during Burma's generational Unraveling era. But they're not going to fizzle out now, in a generational Crisis era.

News reports from Myanmar these days are just filled with more details about the army slaughtering innocent unarmed civiians. Analysts say that the solution is for the UN Security Council to pass a resolution, which is hilariously laughable. Others say that the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) should hold a meeting, which is also laughable. I heard one analyst say that the United States has to intervene militarily to stop the carnage. That guy must have been hopped up on some of the drugs currently pouring into the USA through the open southern border.

Both Russia and China are supplying weapons to the Burmese junta, and neither country would be willing to take any step to end the carnage.

So the bottom line is this: I cannot think of a scenario, nor have I read or heard of a scenario, that will stop the violence in Myanmar / Burma from escalating into a full-scale multi-ethnic civil war in the next few days, weeks and months. Like a Greek tragedy, the characters in this play are heading unstoppably into a catastrophe of their own making. After that, the only question is whether it will spread to other countries, and whether it will be the trigger that leads to a new world war.

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9-Apr-21 World View -- The Troubles: Violence in Northern Ireland revives as consequence of Brexit

Brief generational history of violence in the Isle of Ireland

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

The Troubles: Violence in Northern Ireland revives as consequence of Brexit
Brief generational history of violence in the Isle of Ireland
The beginning of 'The Troubles'

The Troubles: Violence in Northern Ireland revives as consequence of Brexit

Hijacked cars burn at the Peace Wall as rioting broke out in West Belfast, Northern Ireland on Wednesday (AP)

Hijacked cars burn at the Peace Wall as rioting broke out in West Belfast, Northern Ireland on Wednesday (AP)

The last week in Belfast, Northern Ireland, has seen the worst ethnic street violence in decades. There is a concrete "Peace Wall" in Belfast, separating the two warring neighborhoods. People have been lobbing bricks and Molotov cocktails across the Peace Wall in both directions. The violence worsened when the gate in the Peace Wall was smashed open. At least 55 police officers have been injured over several nights of rioting.

The violence has been triggered by the consequences of the Brexit deal that took the United Kingdom (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland) out of the European Union. There were many difficult issues that had to be resolved, but the most intractable was the fact that Northern Ireland is part of the UK, while the Republic of Ireland (Southern Ireland) is part of the EU. This is the only place (if you don't count Gibraltar) where there is a land border separating the UK and the EU after Brexit.

So the biggest deal in the Brexit negotiations was that Ireland and Northern Ireland must have a "frictionless border," so that people and goods could pass freely back and forth without customs and border checks. So a Spanish company that wants to ship goods to England without paying British tariffs could simply trans-ship them through Northern Ireland -- that is, ship them to Ireland, send them across the "frictionless border" to Northern Ireland, and then ship them across the Irish Sea to England. Similarly, an English firm could ship goods to Spain by trans-shipping in the opposite direction, and avoid paying EU tariffs.

Well, that could never work. No politician is going to voluntarily give up tariffs. So the solution is that there has to be a "customs border in the Irish Sea." So goods shipped back and forth between England and Northern Ireland now have to go through customs and result in tariff charges.

During the Brexit negotiations, politicians said that if there were a customs check between Northern Ireland and Ireland, then this would infuriate the "Catholic republicans," and would trigger a revival of "The Troubles," the three decades violence in Northern Ireland. So they did it the other way, and put in a customs check in the Irish Sea, and this has infuriated the "Protestant loyalists," and this is triggering a revival of The Troubles anyway.

Brief generational history of violence in the Isle of Ireland

Northern Ireland's indigenous Gaelic Irish people (usually Catholic, republican, nationalist, "green") have been at war with the descendants of invading English and Scottish people (usually Protestant, loyalist, unionist, "orange") off and on since the 1400s. The Republicans want Northern Ireland to merge with the Republic of (Southern) Ireland, while the Loyalists want to remain loyal to the British crown and have Northern Ireland remain in the UK.

There have been clashes between the two groups since the 1400s, but the most important pattern of wars was set by the Nine Years War (1594-1603), where the Irish Gaelics attempted to overthrow English rule. The result was the Plantation of Ulster, which Gaelics today refer to as genocide and "ethnic cleansing," because the British drove the Gaelics from their land, took it over as landlords, and used the Gaelics as servants.

The next crisis war for Northern Ireland was the Williamite-Jacobite war, climaxing in a victory of the British with the Battle of the Boyne on July 12, 1690. This was the date of the victory of Protestant William of Orange over the Catholic King James II, and it followed England's Glorious Revolution of 1688, where the Dutch Prince William "invaded" England and overthrew King James without firing a shot. Sectarian violence in Northern Ireland tends to increase as July 12 approaches, as it's commemorated by groups like the Protestant Orange Institution.

The border across Ireland first appeared in 1921 as a result of the British-Irish treaty that partitioned the island and ended the Irish War of Independence, with the new borderline running across farms and villages.

The beginning of 'The Troubles'

"The Troubles" began in 1969, when hostilities broke out in Northern Ireland, and the border was reinforced with British Army watchtowers and bomb-proof and mortar-proof inspection facilities. All of those reinforcements were removed as a result of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, with a new power-sharing accord that was supposed to break down some of the barriers between south and north, including the physical barrier at the border.

The "Good Friday Agreement" has achieved almost mythic status among politicians, and its terms were frequently cited during the Brexit negotiations as inviolable, lest The Troubles begin again. The result was the "frictionless border" between Ireland and Northern Ireland, but instead there's a customs border between Northern Ireland and England, and The Troubles seems to be starting again anyway.

There's a lot of finger-pointing now as to the cause of the new violence, with many people blaming Boris Johnson for his "betrayal" of the Northern Ireland loyalists. But from the point of view of Generational Dynamics, the revival of The Troubles is not surprising, inasmuch as a full generation has passed since the Good Friday agreement, and young kids are not going to care about a piece of paper or an ancient agreement that was signed before many of them were even born.

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2-Apr-21 World View -- Russia massing forces on Ukraine border, apparently planning imminent invasion

Russia fires back at reports of a potential invasion of Ukraine

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Russia massing forces on Ukraine border, apparently planning imminent invasion
Russia fires back at reports of a potential invasion of Ukraine

Russia massing forces on Ukraine border, apparently planning imminent invasion

A trainload of tanks in southwestern Russia headed in the direction of the border with Ukraine earlier this week

A trainload of tanks in southwestern Russia headed in the direction of the border with Ukraine earlier this week

The US armed forces European Command has raised its threat watch assessement to its highest level -- "potential imminent crisis" -- because of growing reports of trains loaded with large amounts of Russian military hardware, including aircraft, tanks and other heavy armored vehicles, as well as heavy artillery and ground troops, headed toward the border with Ukraine.

In 2014, Russia troops invaded Ukraine in support of Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. The purpose was to break off the entire eastern portion of Ukraine and annex it to the Russian Federation.

That didn't happen, but Russia also invaded Ukraine's Crimea peninsula and annexed it and made it part of the Russian federation. It's been assumed that Russia has wanted to complete the job of annexing eastern Ukraine, and there are concerns the Russians plan to do exactly that right now.

Russia may have decided to strike now because of the new Biden administration in Washington. Last Thursday press conference by Biden was undoubtedly analyzed closely by the Kremlin, and it was clear that Biden has no idea what's going on. In addition, the world can see that the Biden administration has completely lost control of its southern border. The Kremlin analysts may have decided that it would take a long time for the Biden administration to do anything, if the Biden administration did anything, and that therefore they can invade Ukraine with impunity. (See "28-Mar-21 World View -- North Korea's ballistic missiles stoke the Denuclearization Delusion".)

Russia fires back at reports of a potential invasion of Ukraine

Russia's mealy-mouthed spokesman Dmitry Peskov issued a statement saying that there's nothing to see here:

"Russian Federation is moving its troops within its territory, at its own discretion. Nobody should be concerned about it. It poses no threat to anyone."

At this point, it's worthwhile to make a list of previous Russian lies related to the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine:

Russia always denied that there were Russian army troops in Ukraine, and when it was proven there were, the Russians claimed that they were just "volunteers." That also turned out to be disinformation, as 80% of Russia's army is a volunteer army. America has an all-volunteer army. So saying that Russian troops in Ukraine are "volunteers" is like saying that America's troops in Afghanistan are "volunteers."

Russia lied about invading east Ukraine when it had Russian troops in east Ukraine.

In July 2014, the Russians in eastern Ukraine shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 passenger plane with a Russian Buk 9M38 missile that was transported by a Volvo truck from Russia, as was confirmed in 2015 by a Dutch report following a lengthy investigation. Russia made one moronic claim after another, everything from the claim that MH17 fell out of the sky by itself to a claim that the US shot down MH17 to embarrass Putin.

Russia lied about invading Crimea, and then invaded Crimea.

Putin said Russia had no intention of annexing Crimea, but then annexed Crimea a few days later and gave medals to the military officers who had invaded Crimea. Later, in a televised interview, Putin bragged that he had ordered the invasion and annexation of Crimea weeks before it occurred, and then lied about it.

According to US estimates, Russia has about 32,700 military personnel in Crimea, some 28,000 personnel in "separatist" units in areas of eastern Ukraine known collectively as the Donbass who have been fighting the government in Kiev since 2015.

A member of the Generational Dynamics forum, Navigator, an expert on military history, says:

"You do not move this kind of stuff [tanks and armored vehicles] around unless you mean to use it. Russia wants the traditional Ukraine back. This is up to the line of Odessa/Vinnetsa. They will probably allow Ukraine to remain in what was once the Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia, centered around the city of Lvov. Given Europe's current state, plus a weak US administration, they know they will be able to get away with this.
My bet is that Putin will go all in after Ukraine. After that he will take a breather to get ready for the Baltics. Going after the Baltics will require a NATO response. But my guess is that they will appear so weak due to an almost non-existent response to the Ukrainian campaign that the threat of this will not dissuade him. He could also have intel that the Chinese will be going after Taiwan at the same time he will be prepared to go into the Baltics. This is my guess."

So now more Russian troops ("volunteers?") are headed for the border with Ukraine, and Peskov says, "Nobody should be concerned about it."

However, the Pentagon is concerned about it, as evidenced by the rise in the threat watch assessement to its highest level -- "potential imminent crisis."

According to Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby: "We obviously don�t want to see any more violations of Ukrainian territory. We�ve been very clear about the threats that we see from Russia across domains ... we�re taking them very seriously."

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29-Mar-21 World View -- Myanmar/Burma protests turn into ethnic civil war

Irony and Karmic retribution

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar/Burma protests turn into ethnic civil war
The 'silent strike' threatens a complete economic and healthcare collapse
As the violence increases, clashes with ethnic groups grow
General Min Aung Hlaing thanks Russia for its support
Conflicting strategies of Russia versus China in Myanmar
Irony and Karmic retribution

Myanmar/Burma protests turn into ethnic civil war

Friday meeting between Russia's defense minister Sergei Shoigu and Myanmar's army leader Min Aung Hlaing to discuss Russia's support for the slaughter (Tass)

Friday meeting between Russia's defense minister Sergei Shoigu and Myanmar's army leader Min Aung Hlaing to discuss Russia's support for the slaughter (Tass)

Saturday was the deadliest day yet of violence by the Myanmar/Burma army since the February 1 military coup, and installation of a junta headed by army leader General Min Aung Hlaing. In cities across the country, some 80-100 peaceful protesters were killed on that day alone, with no provocation, as the violence by the army is becoming horrific and unrestrained.

These included children and even babies in their homes. Hundreds of people have been killed, including a seven-year-old girl reportedly shot dead in her home this week. Soldiers have also occupied major public hospitals and attacked healthcare workers, including emergency responders trying to help injured protesters.

According to reports, the security forces have occupied 36 hospitals around the country and, in some cases, patients have been evicted from these hospitals. (This is reminiscent of another war criminal, Syria's Bashar al-Assad, specifically targeting hospitals with missiles to prevent medical care.)

The 'silent strike' threatens a complete economic and healthcare collapse

Because peaceful street protests are being met with increasingly horrific violence by the army, protesters are trying a new tack -- a "silent strike." Starting Wednesday of last week, a growing number of public servants, bankers, and employees in other key industries are deserting their jobs en masse in a civil disobedience movement to demand an end to the violence.

The junta has responded in the only way it knows how -- by going to the homes of the strikers and arresting them. Several hundred public servants and bankers have been arrested, according to reports.

Many doctors and nurses at major public hospitals have joined a nationwide civil disobedience movement, which has severely constricted healthcare delivery. The result is that the public health system has come to a near standstill and the public health system teeters on the brink of collapse.

As the violence increases, clashes with ethnic groups grow

As the violence grows into full-scale civil war, there are now growing ethnic conflicts.

On Sunday morning, army fighter jets launched air strikes against a region along the Thai border populated by the Karen ethnic group, killing eight people. As a result of the air strikes, at least 3,000 people fled across the border into Thailand. There are already more tha 7,500 refugees who have been living in refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border.

The air strikes were in retaliation for attacks on the Burmese army by the Karen National Union (KNU) on Saturday. At least seven members of the military were captured. That was just the latest in a series of skirmishes between the KNU and the army since the February 1 coup, which the KNU opposed.

The Karen have been persecuted throughout Burma's history. In 2004, a ceasefire between the Karen and the Burmese government was brokered, but human rights abuses continue, including forced labor, village burnings, arbitrary taxation, rape, and extrajudicial killings. 140,000 refugees from Burma, mostly Karen, are living in refugee camps in Thailand, some for as many as 20 years.

Another ethnic group, the Kachin, have also been in clashes with government security forces.

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) launched simultaneous attacks on at least four of the junta�s police battalions in a Kachin State township early on Sunday morning. Up to 20 policement were killed, and the KIA seized weaponry from the sites.

According to the Generational Dynamics 58-Year Hypothesis, which by now has been well proven, a new ethnic civil war will not begin less than 58 years from the end of the previous ethnic civil war. That's because 58 years is precisely amount the time when the generations of survivors of the preceding war all die or retire, all at once, and the younger post-war generations come to power. It has now been 63 years since the end of the last ethnic civil war, so Myanmar is fully ripe for a new ethnic civil war, and that seems to be what's happening.

General Min Aung Hlaing thanks Russia for its support

On Saturday, while Burma's army were slaughtering innocent Burmese people peacefully conducting pro-democracy protests against the February 1 coup, Burma's army held a massive parade and weapons exhibition to celebrate Armed Forces Day, which commemorates the army's rebellion in 1945 against Japanese occupation. At the ceremony, the army leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing said that the military would protect the people and strive for democracy.

Many countries in the international community had been expressing horror at the ongoing violence in Myanmar. And yet, despite the horrific ongoing violence, there were eight countries that sent representatives to join Hlaing in the celebrations: Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand.

During his speech, Hlaing singled out one of these eight countries -- Russia. He welcomed the presence of the Russians at the ceremony and said, "Russia is a true friend," having previously referred to Moscow as a "loyal friend."

And indeed, Russia is a friend to war criminal Hlaing. Russia has been a leading supplier of weapons to Burma's army. If you see armored vehicles on the streets of Myanmar in videos, those vehicles were almost certainly supplied by the Russians.

Conflicting strategies of Russia versus China in Myanmar

In Western media, Russia and China are often portrayed as having similar relationships to Myanmar. This largely comes from the fact that Russia and China jointly veto any attempt in the United Nations Security Council to condemn Myanmar for its war crimes and genocidal violence.

However, from Myanmar's point of view, the two countries are quite different. Russia is geographically remote, while China shares a long border. This means that Russia is simply a weapons provider, and really doesn't care how the slaughter in Myanmar evolves. General Hlaing has cultivated defense ties with Moscow over the past decade to avoid dependence on China, which is Myanmar's largest weapons supplier.

But the situation is much more complex for China. China is heavily involved in building Myanmar's infrastructure, including a joint construction project to build the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), which is part of China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The CMEC focuses on 12 areas including basic infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, transport, finance, human resource development and telecommunications.

Thus, it is critical for China that the Myanmar people not blame the Chinese for the ongoing violence. There have already been attacks on Chinese factories by groups claiming that the Chinese are supporting the army violence.

That's why the Russians are able to express open support for the army, while the Chinese are holding back, waiting to see what happens. The Russians couldn't care less how many innocent civilians are slaughtered, and don't care if they're blamed for it in some way. The Chinese don't care either, but they have business interests in Myanmar that outweigh any other considerations.

Irony and Karmic retribution

Buddhists are into Karma, and so it must have occurred to many of them in Myanmar that there a great deal of irony in the country's situation, as well as Karmic retribution.

Since 2011, Burma's army has been committing atrocities on Muslim ethnic Rohingyas living in Rakhine State, and I've written many articles about this. The atrocities included gang rape, violent torture, execution-style killings and the razing of entire villages, in a scorched earth campaign. These atrocities have been cheered by the ordinary Myanmar people, led by Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu, most of whom apparently hate the Rohingyas.

So now, the worm has turned, as the old saying goes. The army had no more use for the useful idiot Aung Sang Suu Kyi, so she's now in jail. The horrors and atrocities that the army perpetrated on the Rohingyas are now being perpetrated on Buddhist civilians. That is truly Karmic justice.

I saw a Burma citizen being interviewed on the BBC about the violence. He was asked about the Rohingyas, and asked how he felt about the genocide and ethnic cleansing that went on. He said that he couldn't speak out for the Rohingyas when the genocide was going on because he would have been punished. But now, he says, the Rohingyas are his beloved "brothers," and he welcomes their return to the country. It makes you want to vomit, doesn't it.

I've been around a long time, and I've learned to believe in Karma. People who do evil things eventually become the victims of their own evil. It's sometimes phrased as "what goes around comes around," meaning that the evil circles back to the evildoer. There's no easy explanation, except that people who are evil do stupid things, and their stupid evil acts catch up with them. I've seen this many, many times in my life, and the Karmic retribution going on in Myanmar today is one of the best examples I've ever seen.

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28-Mar-21 World View -- North Korea's ballistic missiles stoke the Denuclearization Delusion

Myanmar / Burma becomes toxic and explosive

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

North Korea's ballistic missiles stoke the Denuclearization Delusion
Analysis of North Korea's nuclear weapons program
Sanctions and the Denuclearization Delusion
Contrasting negotiating styles: Joe Biden vs Donald Trump
Myanmar / Burma becomes toxic and explosive

North Korea's ballistic missiles stoke the Denuclearization Delusion

Kim Jong-un and Joe Biden

Kim Jong-un and Joe Biden

North Korea launched two ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan on Thursday, in violation of UN resolutions. The missiles landed outside Japan's territorial waters and exclusive economic zone and there have been no reports of harm caused to aircraft or ships. Both Japan and South Korea have lodged formal protests.

The timing was interesting, because Thursday was the day of President Joe Biden's long awaited press conference, where it was promised that he would take questions from reporters. As expected, Biden's handlers carefully selected the questions in advance, from carefully chosen reporters, and the order in which they would be asked, so that all Biden had to do was follow along in a notebook on his podium and read the answers out loud. The reporters and questions were all fawning, such as referring to Biden "as a moral, decent man," and the Fox News reporter was carefully sidelined.

There was one question where Biden seemed totally unprepared, and that was the question about North Korea's ballistic missile launch, which had just occurred several hours before the press conference. Biden looked down at the podium and read a prepared statement supplied by his handlers. Here's what he said:

"Let me say that, number one, U.N. Resolution 1718 was violated by those particular missiles that were tested � number one. We�re consulting with our allies and partners. And there will be responses � if they choose to escalate, we will respond accordingly.
But I�m also prepared for some form of diplomacy, but it has to be conditioned upon the end result of denuclearization. So that�s what we�re doing right now: consulting with our allies."

Denuclearization is a delusional fantasy, as I'll describe below.

This is a reasonable statement, but if you watched the press conference, as I did, Biden didn't appear to understand what he was reading, and had a difficult time reading it. That portion of the press conference appears right at the beginning of the al-Jazeera video referenced below, so you can watch it and judge for yourself. You can blame me as a wild-eyed ideologue for saying that Biden appeared to be, at the least, cognitively challenged or worse, but my perception is not important. What's important is that leaders around the world were watching carefully and analyzing, and they know that Biden is mouthing words, but doesn't know what he's saying. To me, it was painful to watch, and almost cruel for his handlers to stand him up and put him and the country through that.

Before proceeding with the analysis, I want to make it clear that it makes no difference what Biden said. From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, there is a powerful "March of History" going on here. As I've been saying for years, North Korea is on a path to develop nuclear weapons and missiles, and nothing that Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump or Biden could say or do will stop it (short of a pre-emptive missile attack on all of North Korea's facilities, which Trump threatened, but which was never going to happen). Diplomacy is a worthless delusion in the March of History.

Analysis of North Korea's nuclear weapons program

I now want to quote excerpts from the best analysis of the North Korea nuclear program that I've seen in years (not counting some of my own). It appeared in the al-Jazeera show Inside Story, and you can watch the whole thing by following the link in the sources below.

The analysis was done by Tariq Rauf, former head of Verification & Securiity Policy, at the IAEA, which is the United Nations nuclear inspection agency.

He began by giving a summary of North Korea's current capabilities (my transcription):

"North Korea has one of the oldest nuclear programs in the world. It started in 1953 [right at the end of the Korean War].
They now have a complete nuclear fuel cycle -- uranium mining, uranium enrichment, enriching to reactor grade uranium, also to weapons grade uranium, which is over 90%. They also have a plutonium separation capability.
And they've obviously demonstrated that they can make nuclear warheads. They carried out six nuclear tests, and if one looks at the yields of the six nuclear tests, each one of them has been bigger than the previous one. The last test in 2017 was nearly 140 kilotons.
And so North Korea, in its six tests, has demonstrated much more advanced nuclear weapons capability than India or Pakistan did so in 1998. Therefore it is a full program."

He said that their missile program is equally advanced: "They also have a full suite of ballistic and cruise missiles. They have short range or battlefield missiles, they have medium range missiles, and they also have long range missiles."

He added that their nuclear program is pretty much completed, and the only question left is the number of weapons they have in their arsenal. "We believe they have 30, 40 or 50 nuclear weapons, and can apparently make 7 to 12 more per year."

Sanctions and the Denuclearization Delusion

For years, America and the United Nations have been using sanctions to try to convince the North Koreans to denuclearize. This was true under the Clinton, Bush, Obama and Trump administrations, and it's still true in the Biden administration, since Biden has not made any statement about removing the sanctions.

During the al-Jazeera show, Tariq Rauf gave a lengthy discussion of why sanctions have absolutely no chance of succeeding:

"As for sanctions, nobody can point to a single case in history where sanctions have reversed their nuclear, chemical or biological weapons program in a country.
Sanctions did not affect South Africa, Iraq, Iran, didn't stop India or Pakistan, and it's clear that they didn't stop North Korea.
The leadership has shown in Pakistan, Iran, Iraq and also North Korea that if the population has to tighten its belt, that's what they will do.
And North Korea has also seen how Iraq, Libya and Iran have been squeezed because they didn't have nuclear weapons.
Nobody threatens North Korea with an attack, nobody says all options are on the table, so North Korea knows. They also know that India and Pakistan have been accepted as de facto nuclear weapons states."

So Rauf makes it clear that North Korea's nuclear program is here to stay, and sanctions will do nothing.

As I said, there is a March of History, and sanctions will not affect it. By the time the world war ends, every one of North Korea's nuclear weapons will be used somewhere -- on America, on Japan, on South Korea, on China, on Russia, or elsewhere.

Contrasting negotiating styles: Joe Biden vs Donald Trump

Tariq Rauf also gives a comparison between Joe Biden and Donald Trump in handling the North Korea situation:

"Biden has already insulted the Russian president, the Chinese president, has insulted Kim Jong-Un as a Hitler and as a thug. How does he expect them to have a meaningful dialog?
President Biden who is also known for rash decisions, and for insulting foreign leaders, needs also to be restrained. We criticize president Trump quite justifiably, but president Biden is no angel either. He's not going to wave a magic wand and things are going to fall into place."

This gives rise to a comparison of the two negotiating styles, always keeping in mind that the March of History will be same, irrespective of the American president's negotiating style.

As I described many times, I was initially quite contemptuous of Trump's lack of knowledge of the world, until the unexpected happened: He selected as his principal advisor Steve Bannon, who is an expert on both military history and Generational Dynamics, as I had worked with him off and on for several years. Bannon educated Trump on what was happening in China, North Korea and elsewhere, and Trump used that knowledge, combined with this own "Art of the Deal" skills, in his relations with foreign leaders. Thus, he developed a friendly father-son relationship with Kim Jong-un, and repeatedly complimented Xi Jinping as a great leader, although that changed dramatically in March 2020, when the CCP infuriated Trump by announcing that the coronavirus had been planted into Wuhan province by the American army.

At his press conference on Thursday, Joe Biden emphasized that he had a long relationship with China's president Xi Jinping:

"I�ve known Xi Jinping for a long time. Allegedly, by the time I left office as Vice President, I had spent more time with Xi Jinping than any world leader had, because President Obama and the Chinese President Hu decided we should get to know one another since it was inappropriate for the President of the United States to spend time with the vice president of another country. But it was obvious he was going to become the new leader of China.
So, I spent hours upon hours with him alone with an interpreter � my interpreter and his � going into great detail. He is very, very straightforward. Doesn�t have a democratic � with a small �D� � bone in his body. But he�s a smart, smart guy. He�s one of the guys, like Putin, who thinks that autocracy is the wave of the future and democracy can�t function in an ever � an ever-complex world.
So, when I was elected and he called to congratulate me, I think to the surprise of the China experts who were � his people were on call as well as mine, listening � we had a two-hour conversation. For two hours. .... And earlier this month � and apparently it got the Chinese�s attention; that�s not why I did it � I met with our allies and how we�re going to hold China accountable in the region: Australia, India, Japan, and the United States � the so-called Quad. Because we have to have democracies working together.
Before too long, I�m going to have � I�m going to invite an alliance of democracies to come here to discuss the future. And so we�re going to make it clear that in order to deal with these things, we are going to hold China accountable to follow the rules � to follow the rules � whether it relates to the South China Sea or the North China Sea, or their agreement made on Taiwan, or a whole range of other things. ....
And the third thing, and the thing that I admire about dealing with Xi is he understands � he makes no pretense about not understanding what I�m saying any more than I do him � I pointed out to him: No leader can be sustained in his position or her position unless they represent the values of the country. And I said as � �And, Mr. President, as I�ve told you before, Americans value the notion of freedom. America values human rights. We don�t always live up to our expectations, but it�s a values system. We are founded on that principle. And as long as you and your country continues to so blatantly violate human rights, we�re going to continue, in an unrelenting way, to call to the attention of the world and make it clear � make it clear what�s happening.�
And he understood that. I made it clear that no American President � at least one did � but no American President ever back down from speaking out of what�s happening to the Uighurs, what�s happening in Hong Kong, what�s happening in-country.
That�s who we are. The moment a President walks away from that, as the last one did, is the moment we begin to lose our legitimacy around the world. It�s who we are."

Biden was making the point that he has a relationship with Xi Jinping, though apparently a fairly hostile one -- but that's better than no relationship. However, he has no similar relationship with Russia's Vladimir Putin, whom he recently called a "killer," nor with Kim Jong-un, whom he has called a thug, a dictator and a tyrant.

We have to mention that the Trump administration spoke out forcefully about human rights in China, and about the Uighurs. Biden's claim otherwise may be a lie, or more likely he doesn't know, since his handlers didn't bother to tell him. However, world leaders who watched Biden stumble through his press conference are well aware that he lied. (See "20-Jan-21 World View -- Pompeo bashes China over genocide, virus, Taiwan on last days of Trump administration")

So it's not surprising that North Korea's media made a particularly harsh response to Biden's statement:

"We cannot but build invincible physical power for reliably defending the security of our state under the present situation in which south Korea and the U.S. constantly pose military threats to the Korean peninsula while persistently conducting dangerous war exercises and introducing advanced weapons.
We express our deep apprehension over the U.S. chief executive faulting the regular testfire, exercise of our state's right to self-defence, as the violation of UN "resolutions" and openly revealing his deep-seated hostility toward the DPRK.
Such remarks from the U.S. president are an undisguised encroachment on our state's right to self-defence and provocation to it.
It is a gangster-like logic that it is allowable for the U.S. to ship the strategic nuclear assets into the Korean peninsula and launch ICBMs any time it wants but not allowable for the DPRK, its belligerent party, to conduct even a test of a tactical weapon.
We clearly remember that after the appearance of the new administration in Washington there have been exploitation of every opportunity to make words and acts provoking the sovereignty and dignity of our state in which we were branded as the most serious "security threat".
The bellicose stance of the new U.S. administration awakens us to the way to be followed by us and convinces us of the justice of the work to be done by us once again."

It's worth remembering that North Korea is a vassal of Communist China. Kim Jong-un occasionally throws a temper tantrum and does something the CCP doesn't like, but basically Kim does as he's told. I consider it likely that the CCP gave Kim the OK for Thursday's ballistic missile launches.

In my opinion, North Korea will not launch any military attacks without China's permission, and that means it will be done in coordination with China's invasion of Taiwan or Japan or an attack on the United States, at some point in the future.

So that's the state of the relations between America and North Korea today.

Myanmar / Burma becomes toxic and explosive

I want to add a brief word about a different subject.

The situation in Myanmar (Burma) is becoming toxic to the point of being close to explosive. Some 50-80 peaceful protesters were killed on Saturday alone, with no provocation. These included children and even babies in their homes. The violence by the army is becoming horrific and unrestrained. Furthermore, other ethnic groups, including the Kachin and the Shan, are threatening to intervene unless the violence stops.

Burma's last generational crisis war was an extremely bloody multi-ethnic civil war following independence (1948-1958). It's been 63 years since the end of that civil war, and so Burma is due for a new one, and that appears to be happening.

This is going to trigger large refugee flows into Thailand, India and China, so those countries may be brought into the war. Russia, incidentally, is supporting Burma's army, and so probably expects to gain from a Burma civil war.

Sources:

Related Articles:

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23-Mar-21 World View -- Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War

How Vietnam became an economic powerhouse after the Vietnam War

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War
Description
Generational Theory Book Series
Table of Contents - World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War

Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War

Announcing a new book on Vietnam and Buddhism by John J. Xenakis

Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War

Subtitle: How Vietnam became an economic powerhouse after the Vietnam War

Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War, by John J. Xenakis

Book Announcement: World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War, by John J. Xenakis

$13.99 -- Buy the paperback on Amazon

Click here for description and Complete Table of Contents

If you buy it, please write a 5-star amazon review. Thanks.

Description

Most people know nothing about Vietnam except that their grandfathers fought in something called "the Vietnam War." And yet, as guardian of the maritime routes from Europe to India, Malaya and China, Vietnam has for millennia been a dominant player in world trade.

And now, with China illegally annexing the South China Sea, which controls $1.3 trillion in trade, Vietnam's historic role as guardian of the South China Sea could bring the two countries to full war, for the first time in thirty years.

This book describes Vietnam's history since ancient times, through rule by China, through independence, through multiple dynasties, through colonization by France, and through the Indochina wars since World War II, before becoming an economic powerhouse. Those seriously interested in living in or doing business in Vietnam should understand that historically it's not a country in the European sense, but is composed of "Vietnam Villages" that define its culture and business dealings, and should understand the interaction between Buddhism, Confucianism, and Christianity in the villages and guilds.

The book has extensive coverage of the history and theology of Buddhism, and how it spread from India to Vietnam and China, in one of the most sigificant events in the history of religion. The book explains how this was possible because of the specific interactions of Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism, and how Chinese and Vietnamese leaders played one religion off of one another as needed to control the population. In today's Vietnam, these tensions still exist, especially between North and South.

The author's previous book on the history of Iran has extensive coverage of the history and theology of Islam and Christianity, while his book on China does the same for Confucianism and Daoism. Putting the three books together provides a comprehensive understanding of the world's religions.

The book also has extensive coverage of what "really happened" in the Vietnam war. Most people, even those who fought in the war, or who had family and friends who fought in the war, nonetheless have no idea what the Vietnam War was about. Even Vietnamese people under age 50 don't know what it was about. This book will tell you what actually happened -- not what the politicians and ideologues say happened, but what actually did happen, and why it happened.

Generational Theory Book Series

I set up the GenerationalDynamics.com web site in 2003 as an experiment, as I stated at the time. I would analyze current and historical events through generational theory and Generational Dynamics. I would make forecasts and predictions, and the articles would remain on my web site for review at any time.

Now, almost 20 years later, there are over 6,000 articles on my web site, containing thousands of analyses and predictions on hundreds of countries, all of which are either true or trending true. None has been shown to be wrong. There is no web site in the world with a better successful forecasting and analysis record than mine, and there is no politician, analyst or journalist with a better forecasting and analysis record than mine.

There are now four books in the Generational Theory Book Series.

Vietnam-Buddhism Book

"World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War: How Vietnam became an economic powerhouse after the Vietnam War" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 4), March 2021 Paperback: 325 pages, over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732738645/

China-Japan Book

"World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019 Paperback: 331 pages, over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

Iran Book

"World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy -- Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle East" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 1), September 2018 Paperback: 153 pages, over 100 source references, $7.00 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Supremacy-Obsession-Generational/dp/1732738610/

Anniversary Edition Book

"Generational Dynamics Anniversary Edition - Forecasting America's Destiny", (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 3), January 2020, Paperback: 359 pages, $14.99, https://www.amazon.com/Generational-Dynamics-Anniversary-Forecasting-Americas/dp/1732738629/

Table of Contents - World View: Vietnam, Buddhism, and the Vietnam War

Part I. Vietnam, Buddhism and the Vietnam War -- Vietnam today Chapter 1. Importance of Vietnam Chapter 2. Overview of Contents Chapter 3. Objectives of this book Chapter 4. Description of Buddhist theology Chapter 5. Getting a 'feel' for Vietnam 5.1. Vietnam country names Chapter 6. Brief summary of generational eras

Part II. Vietnam's Doi Moi economic reforms (1986-present) Chapter 7. Vietnam's legal and economic history 7.1. Nations, kingdoms, empires, leaders, kings, emperors, dynasties 7.2. Economic influences in historical Vietnam 7.3. Vietnam's economy after French colonization (1858) 7.4. Social etiquette Chapter 8. The collapse of Communism, Socialism, Marxism in Asia 8.1. China -- Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward 8.2. Russia -- Perestroika and Glasnost 8.3. South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong -- the 'Asian Tigers' 8.4. The Doi Moi economic reforms Chapter 9. Details of Doi Moi reforms 9.1. Reforming centrally-planned to market oriented economy 9.2. Land reform 9.3. Abolishing the dual-pricing system 9.4. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) 9.5. Financial crisis in 2009-12 Chapter 10. Vietnam's economic crisis during Wuhan Coronavirus pandemic (2020) 10.1. Vietnam focuses on foreign investment and trade 10.2. Government heightened focus on high tech and artificial intelligence 10.3. Human Rights

Part III. Overview of Asian religions and theology Chapter 11. Evolution of great religions 11.1. Evolutionary framework of great religions 11.2. Documentation -- written law of the great religions 11.3. Written law in Hinduism and Buddhism 11.4. Etiquette in engaging with Buddhists Chapter 12. Overview of Buddhist theology 12.1. Achieving Nirvana 12.2. Theravada Buddhism ('Path of the Elders') 12.3. Mahayana Buddhism ('The Great Vehicle') 12.4. Hinayana Buddhism ('Modest Vehicle') Chapter 13. The school of meditation: Ch'an / Zen Buddhism 13.1. Rise of Ch'an/Zen Buddhism in China 13.2. Philosophy of Daoism 13.3. Ch'an / Zen Buddhism and sudden enlightenment 13.4. Zen Buddhism in the West Chapter 14. Other schools of Buddhism 14.1. The evolution and simplification of Buddhism 14.2. Pure Land Buddhism 14.3. Tantric (Vajrayana, Tibetan) Buddhism 14.4. Bodhisattvas in Mahayana Buddhism 14.5. The Maitreya in Buddhism

Part IV. How Hinduism and Buddhism spread from India to southern Vietnam Chapter 15. Aryan invasion, and rise of Hinduism in India 15.1. Life of The Buddha (563-483 BC) 15.2. The Middle Way and Enlightenment 15.3. Hinduism and Buddhism 15.4. Popularity of Buddhism Chapter 16. Legacy of Emperor Ashoka (304-232 BC, Ruled 273-232 BC) 16.1. Ashoka commits genocide and ethnic cleansing 16.2. Ashoka repents and converts to Buddhism 16.3. Spread of Buddhism north and south -- overview 16.4. Ashoka's influence on Buddhism Chapter 17. Spread of Theravada Buddhism to southeast Asia and southern Vietnam 17.1. Spread of Buddhism to Ceylon (Sri Lanka) 17.2. Spread of Buddhism to Burma (Myanmar) and Siam (Thailand) 17.3. Spread of Buddhism to Malay Peninsula and Indonesia 17.4. Spread of Buddhism to Cambodia and southern Vietnam (Mekong Delta)

Part V. How Buddhism spread through China to northern Vietnam Chapter 18. Spread of Mahayana Buddhism along the Great Silk Road Chapter 19. Collapse of China's glorious Han Dynasty (206 BC � 220 AD) 19.1. Significance of China's Han Dynasty (206 BC � 220 AD) 19.2. Decline of the Han Dynasty in the 100s 19.3. Collapse of the Han Dynasty -- Yellow Turban Rebellion - 184 AD Chapter 20. Changes to Daoism and Buddhism during and after Han Dynasty 20.1. Daoism during and after the declining Han Dynasty 20.2. Buddhism during and after the declining Han Dynasty 20.3. Differences between Chinese and Indian languages and culture 20.4. Role of Daoism in linking Indian and Chinese cultures Chapter 21. Sacking by the Huns (311) -- China splits into North and South Chapter 22. Spread of Buddhism south of the Yangtze River 22.1. Buddhism vs Confucianism and Daoism Chapter 23. Spread of Buddhism north of the Yangtze River 23.1. Northern rulers' adoption of Buddhism 23.2. Northern rulers' misgivings about Buddhism 23.3. Emancipation of Buddhist ideas from Daoism in the North Chapter 24. Spread of Buddhism in Sui and Tang dynasties (589-906) 24.1. Divergence of North and South during period of disunion 24.2. Regulation of religions during Sui-Tang dynasties 24.3. Great Buddhist movements during Sui-Tang dynasties 24.4. The school of meditation: Ch'an or Zen Buddhism 24.5. The catastrophic An Lu-shan Rebellion (755-763) 24.6. Union of Uighurs and Tibetans (765) 24.7. The Great Suppression of Buddhism (842-845) 24.8. Revival of Confucianism Chapter 25. Zen Buddhism in Japan 25.1. The Zen Koan: What is the sound of one hand clapping? Chapter 26. Buddhism in Vietnam 26.1. Adulteration / Syncretism of Buddhism in Vietnam 26.2. Vietnam Communist Party hostility to religion

Part VI. South Vietnam's ancient history Chapter 27. Background: Archaeological ages and Geography 27.1. Archaeological ages 27.2. Stone age 27.3. Bronze age 27.4. Iron age 27.5. Vietnam's fusion of races, languages and cultures 27.6. Vietnam's Geography Chapter 28. South Vietnam's ancient civilizations -- Sa Huynh, Dong Son 28.1. Sa Huynh culture (10000 BC - 200 AD) 28.2. Dong Son (Dong Son) culture 28.3. Growth of Dong Son culture 28.4. China-Vietnam disputes over Dong Son cultures

Part VII. The millennium of Chinese rule (111 BC to 938 AD) -- Viets, Funan, Champa, Khmers Chapter 29. North Vietnam: Confucian Viet culture, following conquest by China 29.1. Chinese invasion and conquest (111 BC) 29.2. Confucianism in Vietnam and role of women 29.3. Trung Sisters Rebellion (40-43 AD) and reconquest by China 29.4. The Sinicization of North Vietnam 29.5. Ly Bi overthrows Chinese rule, creates Van Xuan empire (544-603) 29.6. Chinese rule by China's Tang dynasty (618-906) Chapter 30. Chinese rule ends with spectacular Battle of Bach Dang River (938) 30.1. Ngo Quyen defeats Chinese in the spectacular Battle of Bach Dang River (938) 30.2. Dinh Bo Linh's tributary mission to China (968) Chapter 31. Far Southern Vietnam: Rise of Hinduized Funan culture, centered in Cambodia 31.1. Funan Culture and Oc-Eo port city Chapter 32. Central Vietnam: Rise of Champa culture 32.1. Champa culture 32.2. Cham people today

Part VIII. Nine centuries of Vietnam independence -- 938 - 1862 Chapter 33. Reference list of Vietnamese dynasties after independence Chapter 34. Vietnam villages 34.1. Vietnam's guilds and villages 34.2. Village organization Chapter 35. Brief history of Laos Chapter 36. Early Le Dynasty (980-1005) 36.1. Generational summary 36.2. Defeating another Chinese invasion Chapter 37. The First Great Dynasty: The Later Ly Dynasty (1009�1225) 37.1. Generational summary 37.2. Development of agriculture in Red River Delta -- and southward move 37.3. Development of written law 37.4. Growth of Buddhism in Nam Viet 37.5. Buddhism in central and south Vietnam 37.6. Champa Kingdom conquest by Angkor Khmers (Cambodia) (1203-20) 37.7. Cultural differences: Nam Viet vs Champa Chapter 38. The Second Great Dynasty -- The Tran Dynasty (1225-1400) 38.1. Generational summary 38.2. Mobilizing eunuchs and slaves - preparing for war 38.3. Sacking of Champa capital Vijaya (1252) 38.4. First Mongol War (1257) 38.5. The Tran vs the Mongols [1284-1287] 38.6. Tran Dynasty defeats the Mongols (1284, 1287) 38.7. Mongols face Vietnamese war elephants (1284) 38.8. Tran soldiers defeat Mongols in Battle of Bach Dang (1287) 38.9. Tran war with Champa (1312) 38.10. Buddhism vs Confucianism during the Tran dynasty 38.11. Growth of Confucianism to modern times Chapter 39. Ho Dynasty (1400-1407) -- Vietnam's most hated dynasty 39.1. Ho general usurps the throne 39.2. China invades Vietnam in brutal period of governance 39.3. Ho Dynasty echoes through Vietnam's history 39.4. War with the Chinese (1417-1427) Chapter 40. Later Le Dynasty Part 1: destruction of Champa Kingdom (1428-1527) 40.1. Generational summary 40.2. Destruction of Champa Kingdom (1471) 40.3. Southern expansion (nam-tien) and land settlement (don dien) 40.4. Aftermath of the destruction of Champa kingdom 40.5. Decline of the Le Dynasty (1497-1527) Chapter 41. Later Le Dynasty Part 2: The warring warlords (1527-1787) 41.1. Generational summary 41.2. The Mac family and Nguyen family split Vietnam in two (1527-45) 41.3. Trinh family joins the struggle (1545-1592) 41.4. Arrival of the Europeans - 1600s 41.5. The inevitable war between Nguyen and Trinh begins (1620-1672) Chapter 42. The cataclysmic Tay-Son Rebellion (1771-1790, defeated 1802) 42.1. Background to Tay-Son Rebellion 42.2. The Ho (Nguyen) brothers begin the Tay-Son rebellion 42.3. Marxist Socialism before Marx -- Tay-Son rebellion 42.4. Tay-Son rebels align themselves with Chinese pirates 42.5. Socialism in the 21st century -- Memories of the Tay-Son rebellion Chapter 43. Nguyen Phuc Anh (Gia Long) launches a harsh new Nguyen Dynasty 43.1. List of kings of the Nguyen Dynasty 43.2. Generational summary 43.3. Nguyen Phuc Anh defeats the Tay-Son rebels (1776-1802) 43.4. Vietnam finally adopts the name Viet Nam 43.5. The Nguyen Dynasty (1802-1945) 43.6. Nguyen Dynasty and persecution of Christians

Part IX. The Treaty of Saigon and French colonization (1862-1954) Chapter 44. Treaty of Saigon, June 1862 44.1. France completes conquest of French Indochina (1887) Chapter 45. Conflicts during French colonization 45.1. Vietnam Villages during French colonization 45.2. Vietnam government after the Treaty of Saigon (1862-1954) 45.3. Truong Dinh -- anti-French guerrilla movement (1858-64) 45.4. Anti-Catholic violence 45.5. Vietnamese modernization movements opposing French colonialism Chapter 46. Rise of Vietnam nationalism up to World War II 46.1. Phan Boi Chau and the Rise of Nationalism (1904) 46.2. Did Ho Chi Minh betray Phan Boi Chau? 46.3. Rise of Ho Chi Minh and fight for independence from the French 46.4. European migration to French Indochina until 1945

Part X. Understanding the context of America's 'Vietnam War' Chapter 47. Summary of America's Vietnam War Chapter 48. Major findings about America's Vietnam War 48.1. Disastrous decisions by President Kennedy 48.2. The question of insanity 48.3. The question of sophistry 48.4. Facts and events vs Context 48.5. Was the Vietnam War worth the cost? Chapter 49. Major world events as context of Vietnam War 49.1. March of Communism 49.2. North Vietnam's toxic relationships with China and Soviet Russia 49.3. Vietcong insurgency in South Vietnam 49.4. Laos coup and the 'Ho Chi Minh Trail' Chapter 50. Insanity and Greek Tragedy 50.1. Understanding Greek Tragedy 50.2. Insanity 50.3. Aeschylus and Prometheus 50.4. The relevance of Greek Tragedy 50.5. The Vietnam War and Greek Tragedy 50.6. Setting the scene in 1959-60 -- the seeds of future defeat 50.7. The main characters Chapter 51. Generational issues 51.1. The Vietnam War and American generations 51.2. Public moods in Vietnam, France and America after WW II 51.3. Hannah Arendt -- 'the calm that settles after all hopes have died' 51.4. Communism on the march -- and the 'Iron Curtain' 51.5. The Truman Doctrine makes America Policeman of the World (1947) 51.6. Truman receives NSC-68 report calling for Soviet Communist 'containment' (April 14, 1950) 51.7. Communist North Korea invades South Korea (June 25, 1950) 51.8. President Eisenhower explains the Domino Theory (1954) 51.9. President Kennedy's 'ask not' inauguration speech (1961) Chapter 52. From trauma in World War II to a Generation Gap in the 1960s 52.1. The traumatic World War II 52.2. Lessons learned: New laws and institutions after WW II 52.3. Definition of the 'Generation Gap' 52.4. The Summer of Love (1967) 52.5. America's generational Awakening era -- 1960s-1970s 52.6. Generation Gap resolution -- Awakening Climax Chapter 53. Examples of generational Recovery and Awakening Eras 53.1. America after World War II (1945) 53.2. Iran after Great Islamic Revolution (1979) 53.3. Zimbabwe after war of independence (1980) 53.4. China after the Communist Revolution (1949) 53.5. American Civil War (1865) 53.6. America's Revolutionary War (1782) 53.7. Japan after the Meiji Restoration (1868) 53.8. Japan after World War II (1945) 53.9. The generational 'Democide Pattern' Chapter 54. The political debate over America's 'Vietnam War' 54.1. The left-wing antiwar view of the Vietnam war 54.2. The Vietnamese view of the Vietnam war 54.3. America allies with Ho Chi Minh in World War II Chapter 55. Overview of the Vietnam War

Part XI. French Indochina War (First Indochina War, Nov 1946 to Aug 1954) Chapter 56. Beginnings of the war Chapter 57. Vietminh strategy Chapter 58. Battle of Dien Bien Phu

Part XII. Interwar period -- 1954-1959 -- Republic of Vietnam Chapter 59. Disagreements between China and Vietnam over who gets the credit Chapter 60. History of persecution of Catholics Chapter 61. North-South migration after First Indochina war Chapter 62. Land reform program Chapter 63. Beginnings of American military involvement Chapter 64. Le Duan replaces Ho Chi Minh as de facto North Vietnam leader 64.1. Legacy of Le Duan (1908-1986) 64.2. Rise of Le Duan Chapter 65. North Vietnam ratifies Resolution 16, authorizing war with the South (May 1959)

Part XIII. Second Indochina War 1959-1975 (America's "Vietnam War") Chapter 66. Conflicts between Washington and Saigon 66.1. Core issues - John Kennedy and William Averell Harriman 66.2. Kennedy's youth and inexperience 66.3. Two peoples, quite apart in culture, thrown together against a common enemy 66.4. Ngo Dinh Diem and South Vietnam's imperfect democracy 66.5. America's conflicting values and policies 66.6. America's conflicting policies in Vietnam under Eisenhower 66.7. Kennedy's disastrous international agreement on Laos 66.8. The Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba (April, 1961) Chapter 67. Conflicting counterinsurgency (COIN) strategies 67.1. Summary of conflicting counterinsurgency (COIN) strategies 67.2. Counterinsurgency (COIN) military doctrine 67.3. Clear-hold-build counterinsurgency framework Chapter 68. Antecedents of Vietnam's Strategic Hamlet program 68.1. Description of the resettlement strategy for COIN operations 68.2. Boer War (1899-1902) resettlement operations for counterinsurgency 68.3. The Malayan Emergency (1948-55) counterinsurgency (COIN) program Chapter 69. Vietnam's Strategic Hamlet counterinsurgency (COIN) program 69.1. Mixed success of strategic hamlet program Chapter 70. Military coup and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem 70.1. Eruption of Buddhist-Catholic conflict (summer 1963) 70.2. Rise of antiwar activism and assassination of Diem (1963) 70.3. Summary: Kennedy's two acts of sabotage of the Vietnam War effort 70.4. Sabotage of the Strategic Hamlet program by Hanoi Chapter 71. Why did the Strategic Hamlets program fail? 71.1. Ethnic and linguistic purity in Malaya and Vietnam 71.2. Ethnic and linguistic purity in Boer War 71.3. Counterinsurgency operations in Iraq War and Afghanistan War 71.4. Ethnic and linguistic purity issue in Afghanistan Chapter 72. Lyndon Johnson's war (1964-1967) 72.1. Battle of Ia Drang (November 14-18, 1965) 72.2. Chaos in Saigon -- Buddhists vs Catholics 72.3. Was the war already lost in 1964? 72.4. Lyndon Johnson's 'limited war' escalation 72.5. Tet Offensive, January 1968 72.6. The My Lai Massacre (March 16, 1968) 72.7. Korean soldiers in Vietnam war Chapter 73. Nguyen Van Thieu and the Second Republic of Vietnam (1967-1975) 73.1. Creation of the Second Republic (1967) 73.2. American policy mistakes in Vietnam 73.3. Problems facing Richard Nixon 73.4. Nixon's 'Vietnamization' policy 73.5. The Cambodia incursion 73.6. The Paris Peace Agreement - October 1972 73.7. The collapse of South Vietnam 73.8. Le Duan's victory speech (May 15, 1975)

Part XIV. Vietnam - Cambodia - China war (Third Indochina War, 1975-1989) Chapter 74. Overview of the so-called 'Vietnam War' Chapter 75. Richard Nixon's 'decent interval' policy Chapter 76. North Vietnamese post-war massacres and boat people (1975-85) Chapter 77. Pol Pot and the Cambodian 'Killing Fields' by the Khmer Rouge 77.1. Rise of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia 77.2. Pol Pot's Killing Fields -- one of the worst genocides of the 20th century 77.3. War between Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge (supported by the Chinese Communists) 77.4. Cambodia invades Vietnam (1977) 77.5. Hanoi attacks the Chinese population in Vietnam (1978) 77.6. Collapse of Vietnam's economy (1978) 77.7. History of China and Russia wars and border conflicts 77.8. Vietnam invades Cambodia 77.9. China invades Vietnam (1979-89) 77.10. Le Duan dies and Vietnam opens its markets - Doi Moi (1986)

Part XV. References lists Chapter 78. Reference list of names for Vietnam Chapter 79. Reference list of Vietnam's dynasties Chapter 80. Reference list of 54 Vietnamese Ethnic Groups 80.1. Eight categories of Vietnamese ethnic groups 80.2. Alphabetical list of Vietnam's 54 ethnic groups Chapter 81. Reference list of China's dynasties

Part XVI. Histories of Vietnam's neighbors Chapter 82. History of Philippines 82.1. China's history with the Philippines 82.2. Ancient history of the Philippines 82.3. Philippines Spanish colonial period (1521-1898) 82.4. Philippines under American control (1898-1946) and Japanese occupation (1941-45) 82.5. Modern generational history of the Philippines republic Chapter 83. Brief generational history of Cambodia Chapter 84. Brief generational history of Thailand Chapter 85. Brief generational history of Myanmar (Burma)

Part XVII. The End Chapter 86. About John J. Xenakis 86.1. Acknowledgments

Part XVIII. Footnotes / References

(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (23-Mar-2021) Permanent Link
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16-Mar-21 World View -- After ten years, Qatar seeks to become Syria war mediator

Syrian war timeline

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

After ten years, Qatar seeks to become Syria war mediator
Ten years of war have turned an affluent Syria into a country in ruins
The remaining battleground in Idlib province
Qatar's strategy in offering to mediate the Syrian war
Syrian war timeline

After ten years, Qatar seeks to become Syria war mediator

Map of Syria showing areas of control, as of February 2021 (BBC)

Map of Syria showing areas of control, as of February 2021 (BBC)

On Thursday of last week, a three-way conference was held in Doha, Qatar's capital, to lay the groundwork for a political solution to war in Syria that began in 2011. Qatar has suffered some foreign policy defeats in recent years, and is looking for a new role to play, and apparently sees this as a way of gaining increased influence in the Mideast.

The conference was attended by ministers form Qatar, Russia and Turkey. They were Qatar's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu.

According to Cavusoglu: "Today we launched a new trilateral consultation process. Our goal is to discuss how we can contribute to efforts towards a lasting political solution in Syria."

This is laughable. The United Nations has appointed several envoys -- Kofi Annon, Lakhdar Brahimi, Staffan de Mistura -- to mediate a political solution, and in the end they all resigned in disgust after being made useful idiots by Bashar al-Assad. In neach case they provided cover for al-Assad to continue his war crimes and genocide targeting innocent Arab Sunnis, and also provided cover for al-Assad's supporters in Russia and Iran, allowing them to make sanctimonious statements while they support al-Assad's bloody slaughter. The UN has recently appointed a new envoy, Geir Pedersen, who sounds to me like all the others, and speaks the same nonsense.

All of these envoys say the same thing: "A military solution is impossible. There has to be a political solution." The problem is that Syria, Russia, Iran and Hezbollah have joined together, and have brought about a military holocaust in Syria. Bashar al-Assad believes that he is close to a total victory, and will never agree to any political solution.

So now Qatar wants to take on the role of mediator. Qatar is a little different from the envoys because it openly supports tne anti-Assad Arab political opposition, while the UN envoys are supposedly neutral. But Qatari officials apparently believe that they can use their existing relationship with Russia to bring something about.

Russia's Vladimir Putin, of course, doesn't care how many Sunni Arabs Bashar al-Assad beats, tortures, rapes or kills. Russia is supporting al-Assad because it wants to retain control of its two military bases in Syria, the Tartus naval base and the Hmeimim airbase. When al-Assad begged Putin for military help in 2015, Putin agreed to help, and received control of the two military bases in return.

Ten years of war have turned an affluent Syria into a country in ruins

Ten years ago, Syria used to be a beautiful, affluent middle-class country. Today, the entire country looks like a war zone, with buildings destroyed everywhere, particularly schools, hospitals and markets.

Of the 22 million people that lived in Syria before the war, about half a million have been killed, and more than 12 million people have been forced to flee their homes, either becoming refugees or displaced people in their own country.

Today, Syria is an economic basket case, with massive poverty among people who still live there, and among Syrians who live in refugee camps in Lebanon and Turkey.

The Syrian currency, the Lira, has crashed. $10 used to give you 500 Syrian Lira. Now $10 is 40,000 Syrian Lira. Money-changers need carts to carry their currency, in a scene reminiscent of the wheelbarrows of money in Germany in the hyperinflation of the early 1920s.

Post-war discontent with corruption, spiralling food prices, a collapsed currency, worsening power cuts and gasoline shortages have aggravated hardships for the remaining citizens.

The remaining battleground in Idlib province

The war in Syria has become more or less static in the last year. There are about 2.5 million Sunni Arabs in Idlib province, which is in northwest Syria along the border with Turkey, and I had expected that Syria's dictator Bashar al-Assad, backed by Russia, would by this time have found a way to exterminate many of the 2.5 million people, who are mostly women and children. But Turkey has sent its own troops and tanks into Idlib, and al-Assad's extermination process has been slowed.

Al-Assad himself has been shown by defectors to be someone who gets obvious pleasure from gouging out people's eyes or pulling out their fingernails, or other forms of torture. (See "8-Feb-17 World View -- Investigation reveals depraved new atrocities by Syria's Bashar al-Assad")

Most of the civilians in Idlib are women and children refugees from other provinces, including Aleppo, Ghouta, Daraa and Quneitra. In each of the other provinces, al-Assad sent missiles into school dormitories to kill children, or dropped barrel bombs laden with metal, chlorine, ammonia, phosphorous and chemical weapons on civilian neighborhoods, or using Sarin gas to kill large groups of people. Al-Assad's barrel bombs, missiles and chemical weapons have specifically targeted schools, markets and hospitals, in order to kill as many women and children as possible, Since chlorine gas is heavier than air, it seeps down into the basements and forces the choking women and children out into the open, where they can be targeted by missiles and gunfire. As if that wasn't enough, al-Assad was supported by Russian warplanes.

In each case, international pressure forced al-Assad to allow hundreds of thousands of civilians, mostly women and children, to escape to Idlib province. The result is that about half the population in Idlib is refugees from other provinces.

Bashar al-Assad repeatedly vowed to attack Idlib next, with Russian support, and to exterminate all the Sunni Arab civilians. This threat actually presented a huge threat to Turkey and even to Europe, as those attacks would drive millions of refugees across the border into Turkey, and possibly into Europe from there.

To block this, Turkey sent its own troops into Idlib, so that an attack on Idlib would be an attack on Turkey. This has prevented the expected extermination of Sunni Arabs in Idlib. But it has also raised pressure on Turkey to end its "occupation" of Syrian territory.

Qatar's strategy in offering to mediate the Syrian war

From the outbreak of the Syrian conflict, Qatar, provided huge financial, political and media support for opposition groups, especially armed ones. However, this aid stopped in 2015 when Russia intervened.

Qatar has for years had sharp differences with the other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). In March 2014, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain recalled their ambassadors from Qatar after a stormy meeting. One issue was Qatar's friendly relationship with Iran, as well as Qatari support for two organizations that Saudi Arabia and UAE consider to be terrorist organizations -- the Muslim Brotherhood and the Union of Muslim Scholars.

They papered over their differences in 2014, but the differences exploded in June 2016, when Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) also broke relations and imposed a sea, air and land blockade on Qatar. Qatar is a very wealthy country and was able to weather this blockade, but it lost influence in the Mideast.

There has been some softening of the blockade in recent months. That change, combined with the presence of a new administration in the United States, has led Qatar to change direction and reactivate its diplomatic posture.

Having ended its aid to Syrian opposition groups in 2015, Qatar is now returning to mediation in the Syria war, taking advantage of what it hopes are its existing good relations with Russia and Iran.

Syrian war timeline

The following timeline lists the major events in the ten-year Syrian war?

March 2011 -- The first big protests against Assad�s rule that began in Deraa in southern Syria spread across the country. Security forces respond with arrests and shootings.
August 2011 -- Al-Assad began his policy of ethnic cleansing and genocide by attacking and cleansing the al-Ramel Palestinian refugee camp in Latakia, forcing 10,000 people to flee for their lives. Later, that region was repopulated by Iranian and Hezbollah Shias. This was the launch of genocidal attacks on many Syrian cities. The attack on the Palestinian camp was signficant because it internationalized the war, and eventually caused thousands of young Sunni males in 80 countries to travel to Syria to fight al-Assad, eventually forming ISIS.
April 30, 2012 -- Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallad gave a televised speech committing Hezbollah's soldiers to enter Syria and fight on the side of al-Assad's army.
May 2012 -- Syrian security forces stormed Aleppo University, breaking down doors and using machine guns and rifles against students. Al-Assad launched air raids on many cities and towns, killing thousands. This began a policy of targeting schools, hospitals, markets and residential neighborhoods, particularly targeting women and children.
December 2012 -- US officials confirm that Syria has the precursor chemicals for deadly Sarin gas, and loaded the gas into bombs. Iraq's president Saddam Hussein's forces killed 5,000 Kurds with a single Sarin gas attack on Halabja in 1988. Barack Obama declared that use of chemical weapons would be a "red line" that would provoke a military response from the US.
March 19, 2013 -- A Sarin gas attack killed 26.
June 2013 -- Syria launched a Sarin gas attack on a densely populated rebel-held Eastern Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus killing hundreds of civilians, without triggering a U.S. military response.
August 21, 2013 -- A Sarin gas attack on the densely populated Eastern Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus. Washington declares it to be use of chemical weapons violating its red line, without triggering a U.S. military response.
January 2014 -- A jihadist group, later to be called ISIS, seized territory across Syria and Iraq, and declared a caliphate.
April 13, 2014 -- First reported use of chlorine gas by al-Assad in barrel bombs targeting women and children in markets and residential neighborhoods.
September 2014 -- US begins air strikes in support of the Kurds against ISIS
May 2015 -- After suffering several major military defeats, and with his army near total collapse, al-Assad announces that he's losing the war.
June 2015 -- Iran announces plans to deploy tens of thousands of troops to Syria in support of al-Assad.
September 2015 -- Russia joins the war on al-Assad's side, deploying warplanes and giving military aid that, with the help of Iran, swiftly turns the course of conflict against the rebels.
December 2016 -- After massive slaughter of residents of Aleppo by Syrian and Russian forces, al-Assad scores a "historic victory" in Aleppo.
February 2018 -- Syria, Russia, Iran conduct full-on mass extermination of civilians in Eastern Ghouta
April 2018 -- Donald Trump administration, allied with France and Britain, launch a missile attack on Syria in retaliation for crossing "red line" on use of chemical weapons. However, al-Assad continued to use chemical weapons anyway, with impunity.
May 2018 -- Civilians in Eastern Ghouta and Douma are allowed to flee to Idlib province
June 2018 -- Al-Assads begins massive slaughter in Daraa and Quneitra provinces.
July 2018 -- Civilians in Daraa and Quneitra provinces are allowed to flee to Idlib province.
August 2018 -- Al-Assad promised to slaughter all the 2.5 million people at that time.
October 2019 -- Trump administration announced withdrawal of American troops. Turkey announced plan to invade Turkey to protect civilians in Idlib, and to keep Kurds under control in northeastern Syria.
February 2020 -- Turkey sent tanks across border into Syria to confront al-Assad regime in Idlib

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6-Mar-21 World View -- Violence escalates dangerously in Myanmar / Burma

Consequences of a new Burma civil war

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Violence escalates dangerously in Myanmar / Burma
International community calls for sanctions to end the violence
Ethnic Burmans vs the other ethnic groups
Generational analysis of crisis in Myanmar / Burma
Consequences of a new Burma civil war

Violence escalates dangerously in Myanmar / Burma

Protesters set up a street blockade in Mandalay, Myanmar (AP)

Protesters set up a street blockade in Mandalay, Myanmar (AP)

Last Sunday (February 28) was a major turning point in the violence in Myanmar / Burma, when the army security forces began using lethal force and adopted a shoot-to-kill policy, killing peaceful protesters for the first time. The protests were the largest that Myanmar has seen since 2007. They began when the iconic leader Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested on Jan 28, along with her government ministers. (See "2-Feb-21 World View -- Myanmar (Burma) military coup as army arrests Aung San Suu Kyi government officials")

Up till last Sunday, the army had been using non-lethal tactics, including tear gas and rubber bullets. But on Sunday they began using live ammunition, and the level of violence has been increasing every day since then. Dozens of protesters have been killed so far, and thousands have been arrested, including 29 journalists.

Several analysts have said that the army is purposely increasing the level of violence each day in order to break the back of the protests. This tactic worked in 2007. Hundreds of activists and citizens were shot dead or burned alive in government crematoriums. Thousands of Buddhist monks, who led the protests to begin with, were gathered up and detained. Some were found floating face down in rivers. The protests finally fizzled when the violence became lethal enough.

However, there's a big difference in public mood between now and 2007. Unlike then, the country today is in a generational Crisis era, and so, unlike then, the mood of both the army and the protesters is not to compromise. This means that it's unlikely the violence will fizzle, and more likely that it will continue to escalate. The next step for the army would be machine guns and assault rifles.

The fact that young, innocent people are being killed is infuriating the protesters. There have been complaints of cruelty, even sadism, by the security forces. There have been brutal attacks on innocent medics, and all hospitals are closed in many cities.

The increase in lethal violence so far has not deterred the protesters who remain defiant and, if anything, have been growing in numbers. The protesters are wearing whatever protective equipment they can find, like makeshift shields. Some are using satellite dishes as shields, or are wearing helmets. They've tasted freedom in the last few years, and they cannot tolerate a new dictatorship by military junta.

Protesters are heavily using their mobile phones to publicize the violence. Although it's dangerous to do so, they're filming the violence and then loading the video onto twitter or live streaming it onto facebook.

Probably the military junta has been most hurt by civil disobedience and the national strikes by the banks, and even in the civil service, by workers in health, education, labor, and immigration.

The army has used videos on Tiktok to threaten the protesters. A typical video shows a soldier pointing a big gun at the camera and saying that protesters will be shot dead. Tiktok claims that it has removed most of those videos.

International community calls for sanctions to end the violence

The UN Security Council met on Friday and, not surprisingly, accomplished nothing. Any condemnation of the violence in Myanmar will be vetoed by China and Russia, rather than risk having violence in their own countries be condemned.

The US and UK are planning their own sanctions. There are planned sanctions targeting the assets of the members of the military council and imposing travel restrictions, as well as an arms embargo.

There is no chance that these sanctions will stop the military junta.

Ethnic Burmans vs the other ethnic groups

Both BBC and al-Jazeera have been interviewing people in Myanmar, and they're describing a different situation than is portrayed by the so-called "international community," as represented by the UN and NGOs.

The international community has provided verbal condemnation that the violence is unacceptable and must stop immediately, that peaceful protests much be permitted, and that Aung San Suu Kyi must be released from jail and returned as leader of the government. And if the violence doesn't stop, the international community is threatening even worse verbal condemnations, and possibly even to hold more meetings.

However, some reports have pointed out that although the Burmese mobs support that solution, the ethnic minorities in Myanmar are opposed to it. This opposition point of view was discussed at length by Khin Zaw Win, a Burmese anti-government activist and journalist who was imprisoned by the army from 1994-2005 for "seditious writings," and who was interviewed on the BBC.

According to Khin, the ethnic minorities are opposed to Aung San Suu Kyi because she was part of the government that discriminated against minorities. Furthermore, she damaged herself deeply by becoming a useful idiot and siding with the army when the army was conducting genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Muslim Rohingyas in Rakhine State, even going so far as traveling to the Hague in December 2019 to defend the Burmese army against charges of war crimes. It is an irony that the army that she defended turned around and threw her under the bus, arresting her and her entire government when she was no longer useful to the army.

The Burmese majority and the ethnic minorities have been temporarily united by the military coup and the resulting violence against peaceful street protesters. However, they do not share a common objective. What the ethnic minorities want is a new constitution, with greater political autonomy and greater rights for ethnic minorities. And nobody believes that solution is even remotely possible.

Generational analysis of crisis in Myanmar / Burma

Burma's last two generational crisis wars (1886-91 and 1948-58) were extremely bloody and violent civil wars involving multiple ethnic groups. (See "Burma: Growing demonstrations by the '88 Generation' raise fears of new slaughter")

The October 2007 demonstrations occurred 49 years after the climax of the last crisis war, during a generational Unraveling era. At that time, there were many people in the army who had lived through the 1958 slaughter, and stopped short of trying to repeat it. Similarly, the young people who protested in 2007 had parents who had lived through the 1958 slaughter, and who held back their children from going too far in risking their lives.

But since 2016, Burma has been in a generational Crisis era. The people who had lived through the 1958 slaughter are gone or retired, and have lost their influence. The younger generation of protesters have no memory of the 1958 slaughter, and do not fear what's coming.

The current generation of people in the army also have no memory of the 1958 slaughter. What they remember is the 2007 protests, and they remember that those protests fizzled when the army began escalating the violence.

The current protesters also remember the 2007 protests, and they remember how the protesters at that time simply surrendered when they didn't have to.

This is how a generational Crisis era is different from a generational Unraveling era. Today, the army has no inhibitions against escalating its violence, and the protesters have no inhibitions against continuing to protest, even if some of them get killed. That makes it unlikely that the current situation will simply fizzle.

The situation is further complicated by the ethnic minorities. The 1948-1958 crisis war was a civil war involving all the ethnic groups, especially the Burmese, the Kachin and the Shan. The latter three groups are currently aligned in their opposition to the army, but what we are seeing are the first signs of a massive new ethnic civil war.

Consequences of a new Burma civil war

According to the Generational Dynamics analysis, the current clashes are fairly likely to escalate into a full scale civil war, although that is not a certainty. However, the current situation is so febrile that even if some temporary truce is worked out -- and this would have to include freeing Aung San Suu Kyi and her government -- then the violence will resume again before long.

Arguably, the civil war already began in 2012, when the army began its genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Muslim Rohingyas. The army referred to the Rohingyas as "enemies of the state," but now the ordinary Burmese people have also become "enemies of the state."

If the violence escalates into a full-scale civil war, it could affect the entire region. There are now almost a million Rohingyas living in filthy refugee camps just across the border in Bangladesh, and they're looking for revenge. If there is a general breakdown in law and order in Myanmar, then those Rohingya refugees may well cross back into Myanmar and join the fighting. This could also bring Bangladesh itself into the fighting.

The separatist Kachin Independence Army (KIA) has joined together with the Shan ethnic group and other ethnic groups in northern Burma, along the border with China, to form a "northern alliance" against Burma's army. These groups have had occasional clashes with China's army along the border inside China, and those clashes would probably escalate if there is a civil war in Burma. In fact, China was heavily involved in the crisis war that climaxed in 1958, and history will certainly repeat itself, with China heavily involved in a new civil war in Burma.

As long-time readers are aware, Generational Dynamics predicts a new world war between the US and China, but does not predict the scenario that will lead to that war. We've speculated that it may begin with a Chinese invasion of Taiwan or Japan, or it may begin with a war between India and Pakistan, or it may begin in the Mideast and spread from there.

But here we see another possibility. If a massive civil war occurs in Burma, and it spreads to involve China and Bangladesh, then it may spread further to other countries in Central Asia, bringing in India and Russia.

And so, Dear Reader, keep your eye on Myanmar / Burma. Even if you're totally addicted to watching the political sewer in Washington, try to avert you eyes every once in a while, if only for a few moments, to see something that may affect the lives of you and your family more than the latest lockdown.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (6-Mar-2021) Permanent Link
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19-Feb-21 World View -- Afghanistan prepares for war, as Nato postpones military withdrawal decision

Book on history of Vietnam nearing publication

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Afghanistan prepares for war, as Nato postpones military withdrawal decision
Nato postpones decision to withdraw forces from Afghanistan
Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail
Book on history of Vietnam nearing publication

Afghanistan prepares for war, as Nato postpones military withdrawal decision

Feb 29 2020 signing ceremony for US-Taliban peace agreement (Tolo News)

Feb 29 2020 signing ceremony for US-Taliban peace agreement (Tolo News)

On Thursday, Nato defense ministers met in Brussels and decided to postpone the planned withdrawal of Nato troops, previously scheduled for May 1. The Taliban have threatened that unless the troops are withdrawn, then there will be a major escalation in the Taliban's spring fighting season, and indeed the violence is already increasing.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban are poised to return to power in Afghanistan, either through negotiations or through a renewed civil war, after they had been removed from power by the United States in 2001, after the 9/11 attacks.

In 2009 I wrote, based on a Generational Dynamics analysis summarized below, that peace was impossible in Afghanistan, no matter how many troops the US and Nato sent there, which means that the Taliban would return to power if American troops withdrew. That prediction is being proven true once again, and we now appear close to a historic d�nouement.

In February 2020, the Donald Trump administration reached a delusional agreement with the Taliban to bring a new era of peace to Afghanistan. America and Nato would remove all its troops by May of this year and, in return, the Taliban would stop funding al-Qaeda and would sever all its ties to al-Qaeda. The Taliban didn't promise to stop violence altogether, but did promise to "tone down" the violence.

As part of the agreement, peace talks took place between America and the Taliban in Doha, Qatar. These peace talks were also completely delusional. The Afghan government weren't in the talks. And NATO, which also has troops in Afghanistan, weren't in the talks. In fact, the entire "peace process" has always been delusional.

Trump removed all but 2,500 troops from Afghanistan, and had every intention of removing all troops by May 1, but Joe Biden has promised to review that decision. But what happens now is now a Brussels decision rather than a Washington decision.

Nato postpones decision to withdraw forces from Afghanistan

Nato still has 10,000 troops in Afghanistan, and they were scheduled to leave by May 1 as well. It's clear that's not happening, simply from the fact that they haven't yet "started packing."

BBC's Lyse Doucet interviewed Nato's Jens Stoltenberg on Thursday. Parts of what he said were hopeful but delusional, but in other parts he conceded that the hopeful parts were not going to happen.

The Taliban are claiming that they've met their commitments to reduce violence and end ties with international terrorists. However, violence has been increasing, not decreasing. Furthermore, a UN panel headed by Edmund Fitton-Brown has found that "There is still clearly a close relationship between Al Qaeda and the Taliban. We believe that the top leadership of Al Qaeda is still under Taliban protection."

The Taliban are promising a major escalation of violence unless the US and Nato troops withdraw by May 1. Since it's clear that the troops will not withdraw by May 1, it's clear that a major escalation in fighting will begin in the new spring fighting season.

Here is what Stoltenberg said in the interview (my transcription):

"So we really believe that this not the time to make a final decision, because we'd like to give every chance to the peace process, the peace talks, to succeed.
Those talks are fragile and difficult, there is no easy option in Afghanistan, but there is still a possibility to reach a lasting political agreement, and all parties should engage in those talks, and the Taliban must reduce violence and must negotiate in good faith, and they must stop cooperating with the international terrorists.
And by doing that, they will also provide the platform to find a political solution.
[Question: So you may be in Afghanistan for many years to come?]
Absolutely, as I said, there are no easy options in Afghanistan, and we face many difficult dilemmas. If we decide to stay beyond May 1, then we risk more violence against our troops, and of course we risk continued long-term involvement in a very difficult operation in Afghanistan. But if we leave, we risk that Afghanistan once again becomes a safe haven for international terrorists, planning attacks against our own countries as we saw on 9/11 and also losing all the gains we made on human rights, especially for women over last years.
So this is difficult. That's the reason at this stage why we believe this is not the right time to make a final decision on whether we leave or stay, but continue to support the efforts to re-energize the peace talks.
[Question: The Taliban say they have kept their commitments. Do you believe you have solid evidence that they have not cut there ties with al-Qaeda, that there is still a risk that Afghanistan could once again be a safe haven to launch attacks against Europe and the United States?]
What we have seen is an increase in violence, not a decrease in violence. We have seen that the peace talks are almost stopped, there is hardly any progress at all.
And the Taliban has to do more and they have to live up to their commitments especially related to counterterrorism, break ties with terrorist groups."

According to Doucet, this is so far the worst Taliban fighting season ever, and it will get worse when the snow melts. In fact there's been so little snow this winter, the doctors in the National Police Hospital said that they had never seen so many casualties from so many provinces at this time of year.

So the delusional parts of Stoltenberg's interview are when he says, "we'd like to give every chance to the peace process, the peace talks, to succeed." That's delusional because there is zero probability that the peace talks will succeed, since the Taliban are committed to them not succeeding, and are using the peace talks as a ploy to get the Nato forces to withdraw, so that the Taliban can overrun Kabul and resume the control they had before they were ejected by American forces after 9/11/2001.

According to a European diplomat: "This war is not winnable, but Nato cannot allow itself to lose it pitifully." That's the choice facing Nato right now.

And so the war will go on and be substantially escalated again when the Taliban's spring fighting season begins in earnest.

Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail

I've written many times that, based on a Generational Dynamics analysis, there is no possibility whatsoever of a successful peace agreement. I started writing about this in 2009, when I predicted that Barack Obama's "surge" into Afghanistan would fail. That prediction has been 100% correct so far.

The following is a summary of the Generational Dynamics analysis:

Afghanistan's last generational crisis war was an extremely bloody, horrific civil war, in 1991-96. The war was a civil war, fought between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the Northern Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban are radicalized Pashtuns, and when they need to import foreign fighters, then can import their cousins from the Pashtun tribes in Pakistan.

So when Jens Stoltenberg says that Nato wants to give the peace process a chance, he knows that statement is delusional, and the only relevant statement is the one by the unnamed European diplomat: "This war is not winnable, but Nato cannot allow itself to lose it pitifully."

Book on history of Vietnam nearing publication

As regular readers know, I have been writing a book on the history of Vietnam, to complement my previous books on the histories of Iran and China. The book is nearing publication, and I now expect it to be published on Amazon in March.

Here are the front and back book covers:

Front and back covers of forthcoming book on history of Vietnam

Front and back covers of forthcoming book on history of Vietnam

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy -- Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle East" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 1), September 2018, Paperback: 153 pages, over 100 source references, $7.00, https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Supremacy-Obsession-Generational/dp/1732738610/

John Xenakis is author of: "Generational Dynamics Anniversary Edition - Forecasting America's Destiny", (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 3), January 2020, Paperback: 359 pages, $14.99, https://www.amazon.com/Generational-Dynamics-Anniversary-Forecasting-Americas/dp/1732738629/

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the Generational Dynamics World View News thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (19-Feb-2021) Permanent Link
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8-Feb-21 World View -- Violence feared in Myanmar/Burma as pro-democracy protests grow

Similarity between Burma and Washington DC

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Violence feared in Myanmar/Burma as pro-democracy protests grow
History of violence and atrocities in Burma
Similarity between Burma and Washington DC
The state of the world.
Infographic: Refugee flows around the world

Violence feared in Myanmar/Burma as pro-democracy protests grow

Thousands of protesters in Yangon on Sunday carrying placards with image of Aung San Suu Kyi (BBC)

Thousands of protesters in Yangon on Sunday carrying placards with image of Aung San Suu Kyi (BBC)

Myanmar / Burma is seeing its largest protests in more than a decade, as tens of thousands of protesters demanded that Aung San Suu Kyi be freed, after she was arrested by the army last weekend during an army coup. (See "2-Feb-21 World View -- Myanmar (Burma) military coup as army arrests Aung San Suu Kyi government officials")

The "problem" that the army has to face is that Suu Kyi has millions of supporters, as her party won legislative elections by a landslide in November.

To combat the peaceful protests, the army shut down the internet. The army shut down internet social media, and then the entire internet, making it difficult for international observers to know what was going on, and to prevent protesters from easily communicating with one another. However, on Saturday, the internet was partially restored, though social media is still blocked.

History of violence and atrocities in Burma

What everyone fears is the next tactic -- violence.

In October 2007, there were large nationwide anti-army pro-democracy demonstrations, led by over 100,000 Buddhist monks. These were demonstrations by the "88 Generation," triggered by an abrupt government decision to double the price of gasoline. ( "Burma: Growing demonstrations by the '88 Generation' raise fears of new slaughter")

Hundreds of activists and citizens were shot dead or burned alive in government crematoriums. Thousands of Buddhist monks, who led the protests to begin with, were gathered up and detained. Some were found floating face down in rivers.

By coincidence, Sylvester Stallone was filming a Rambo film nearby, and witnessed some of the genocide. Stallone said:

"I witnessed the aftermath�survivors with legs cut off and all kinds of land mine injuries, maggot-infested wounds and ears cut off. We saw many elephants with blown off legs. We hear about Vietnam and Cambodia and this was more horrific. This is a hellhole beyond your wildest dreams. All the trails are mined. The only way into Burma is up the river."

The October 2007 demonstrations occurred 19 years after the previous major nationwide demonstrations, starting on August 8, 1988 (8/8/88), creating what was called the "88 Generation," led by Aung San Suu Kyi. Those demonstrations were crushed when the Burmese army fired on students with machine guns, killing thousands. Suu Kyi was arrested and put into detention for years.

Atrocities come easily to Burma's army. Since 2011, the army has been committing atrocities on Muslim ethnic Rohingyas living in Rakhine State, as I described in last week's article. The atrocities included gang rape, violent torture, execution-style killings and the razing of entire villages, in a scorched earth campaign. Aung Sang Suu Kyi became a "useful idiot" for the army by presenting a sympathetic, tired, weary, female face to the world to deflect the horrors and atrocities that are occurring in their country, as I described in my article.

Suu Kyi appeased the army by becoming a useful idiot, just as Neville Chamberlain appeased Hitler and the Nazis. In both cases there were high prices to be paid for being appeasers.

The international community is now waiting to see what will happen next in Burma. Anti-government pro-democracy protests have been growing. How long will the army wait before repeating the violence and atrocities that come as easily to them as smoking a cigarette?

Similarity between Burma and Washington DC

Nancy Pelosi has requested thousands of troops in Washington DC, armed with crew-manned machine guns like the one shown above

Nancy Pelosi has requested thousands of troops in Washington DC, armed with crew-manned machine guns like the one shown above

The problems facing the Democrats in Washington DC are similar to the problems facing the army in Burma.

The Burmese army has to deal with millions of Aung Sang Suu Kyi supporters conducting street protests. They've arrested Suu Kyi so that she can't communicate with her supporters, and they've shut down internet social media so that her supporters can't communicate with one another.

The Democrats have to deal with 74 million Trump supporters who, according to polls I've seen, overwhelmingly support Trump. The wealthy, powerful "Big Tech" companies have colluded with the Democrats to shut down thousands of social media accounts to prevent Trump from communicating with his supporters, and to prevent his supporters from communicating with each other. This kind of mass censorship is previously unheard of in America, and suggests that America is becoming a Stalinist dictatorship.

The Democrats are taking other steps. Joe Biden announced last week that hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens will be permitted to enter the United States freely. The apparent purpose is to send them mail-in ballots in 2022 and instruct them to vote for Democrats.

What about violence? The Burmese army is on the verge of violence as the only way to handle even peaceful demonstrations by the millions of supporters of Suu Kiy.

Would the Democrats use violence to control peaceful demonstrations by the 74 million Trump supporters?

Let's make it a little more specific. Look at the first picture at the beginning of this article with a mob of peaceful demonstrators carrying placards with pictures Aung Sang Suu Kyi. Now imagine that as a crowd of Trump supporters carrying placards with pictures of Trump, with text reading "Trump - The Real President."

Something like that could actually happen. What would the Democrats do? Would Nancy Pelosi totally freak out? On January 20, the acting Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli said that Nancy Pelosi had requested thousands of troops to remain in DC for months, and she wanted them armed with crew-manned machine guns. These are the guns used in countries like Burma to kill dozens of student protesters within seconds. The request was denied, but this request shows the state of mind of Pelosi and the Democrats.

We also note that Biden is ordering the army to "stand down" so that "extremists" can be weeded out. To the Democrats, all 74 million Tea Partiers and Trump supporters are extremists or cultists that need to be "deprogrammed."

The state of the world.

If you're talking about psychology and madness, it's hard to find any aspect of today's world that isn't full of madness.

You have full-scale genocide going on in China, as bad as the world has seen since the 1930s, or worse. China is also annexing or threatening to annex other regions, as the Nazis did in the 1930s.

There are huge refugee flows around the world. The number of displaced persons has surged astronomically since 2010.

America is being governed by "big tech" companies, and America is moving in the direction of a Stalinist dictatorship.

Stock prices are at astronomically high valuations, and global debt is unsustainable in the hundreds of trillions.

I find the madness of today's world personally overwhelming. To say that it's a world that is senseless to me is an understatement. I can understand how King Solomon saw a world of madness and folly and chaos.

Generational Dynamics is less about predictions than it is about trends. And the madness and folly and chaos trends are growing worse every day. These are the trends, and the trends are unstoppable. Every aspect of today's world is worse than yesterday's world. The only good news is that today's world is better than tomorrow's world.

If something can't go on forever, then it won't.

People talk about how to prevent World War III. But Generational Dynamics sees a world that needs World War III. Each day's delay means that World War III will be even worse.

Infographic: Refugee flows around the world

Infographic: Refugee flows around the world surging since 2010 (UNHCR)

Infographic: Refugee flows around the world surging since 2010 (UNHCR)

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2-Feb-21 World View -- Myanmar (Burma) military coup as army arrests Aung San Suu Kyi government officials

China may intervene in Myanmar

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Myanmar (Burma) military coup as army arrests Aung San Suu Kyi government officials
How Aung Sang Suu Kyi became a useful idiot
China may intervene in Myanmar
The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and Shan state

Myanmar (Burma) military coup as army arrests Aung San Suu Kyi government officials

Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi in happier days, before she turned into Hitler

Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi in happier days, before she turned into Hitler

The military in Myanmar (Burma) on Sunday arrested the country's nominal leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, and about 45 other government officials, in a military coup. Army chief Min Aung Hlaing declared a state of emergency, and claims that the state of emergency will last a year, and then there will be new elections.

Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party won a landslide victory two months ago in November's parliamentary elections, with 80% of the seats. The army's political party suffered a huge defeat, and risked losing a great deal of power when the new parliament was seated, which was scheduled for today (Monday).

In 2010, the army released Suu Kyi from detention after 21 years. She had been under detention since the 1988 student protests, in which she participated. During her time in detention, she won a Nobel Peace Prize.

She went into politics and became country leader under the condition that she "share power" with the army. There have been numerous disagreements between the two, but apparently there was always one area of agreement: Aung Sang Suu Kyi and the army and the Buddhist monks, led by monk Ashin Wirathu, committed massive genocide, atrocities and ethnic cleansing on ethnic Rohingya Muslims. Suu Kyi still retains her Nobel Peace Prize anyway.

On Monday, the NLD issued a statement that had been written by Suu Kyi in advance, in anticipation of the coup. In the statement, Suu Kyi called on the country�s 55 million people to oppose a return to �military dictatorship.� The implication is that she is asking her supporters to protest and riot.

How Aung Sang Suu Kyi became a useful idiot

Cox's Bazar refugee camp for Rohingyas in Bangladesh, fleeing from Burma (al-Jazeera)

Cox's Bazar refugee camp for Rohingyas in Bangladesh, fleeing from Burma (al-Jazeera)

Army general Min Aung Hlaing, the leader of the coup, became head of the army in 2011. That was the same year that Burma's security forces began committing atrocities on Muslim ethnic Rohingyas living in Rakhine State. The atrocities were supported by Buddhist monks, led by Buddhist Monk Ashin Wirathu. The United Nations described it as "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing." The atrocities included gang rape, violent torture, execution-style killings and the razing of entire villages, in a scorched earth campaign. Aung Sang Suu Kyi told reporters nothing had happened.

In 2013, a mob of Buddhists attacked a Rohingya village, hacking 20 boys to death, and reduced an entire established community of 12,000 Muslims, including homes, shops and mosques, to ashes and rubble. Aung Sang Suu Kyi told reporters nothing had happened.

A massive period of full-scale genocide and ethnic cleansing began in August 2017. Tens of thousands were killed, and 730,000 refugees were forced across the border into Bangladesh, where they're still living in the crowded, filthy Cox's Bazar refugee camp.

In 2019, the International Court of Justice in the Hague held a trial on Burma's genocide, and Aung Sang Suu Kyi came and defended the army, saying that nothing had happened.

So Aung Sang Suu Kyi is just a useful idiot, becoming a war criminal herself and serving the needs of the Burmese army war criminal, by presenting a sympathetic, tired, weary, female face to the world to deflect the horrors and atrocities that are occurring in their country.

These atrocities have been going on since 2011, but almost nobody cared, or even cares much now, because of Aung Sang Suu Kyi's tired, weary, female face, reciting the words of her puppetmaster Min Aung Hlaing. Most Burmese people are well aware of the genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Rohingyas. But they aren't bothered by it. They love it. "Go on!" you might imagine millions of Burmese saying in unison. "Torture the Rohingyas some more! Rape them some more! Slit their throats, so that their impure blood waters the furrows of our farmland!"

The Burmese hatred of the Rohingyas is not rare. That kind of ethnic hatred is common in several countries today and recently. It's the rule. It's the Chinese hatred of Uighurs. It's the Zimbabwe Shona hatred of the Nbdele. It's the Syrian Alawite hatred of Arab Sunnis. It's the Rwandan Hutu hatred of Tutsis. It's the Nazi hatred of Jews. In America today, it's the Democrats' hatred of the 74 million Tea Partiers and Trump supporters, as I described at length in "12-Jan-21 World View -- America and the standard Genocide Playbook".

Aung Sang Suu Kyi sold herself, her self-respect, and her soul out to become a useful idiot for the Burmese army war criminals. As often happens by groups united only by hatred and criminality, the army and Aung Sang Suu Kyi have now become enemies. The army has arrested Aung Sang Suu Kyi and dozens of people in her government, but the army just lost an election in a landslide, and they can't arrest the millions of people who supported her. (This is also a lesson for America.)

Aung Sang Suu Kyi has called on her millions of supporters to oppose the coup with protests. This could easily unravel into full-scale riots. However, the Burmese security forces were extremely violent for years against the Rohingyas, and they won't hesitate to be equally violent against their own people. They can also count on support from the Chinese Communists, who conduct their own violence against Uighurs, Tibetans, Buddhists, Christians, and anyone who disagrees with them.

China may intervene in Myanmar

Myanmar and China share a common border, and they have a great deal in common, especially since both are committing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Muslims, of Rohingyas and Uighurs, respectively. That must give them a lot to talk about, to discuss the best methods for torture and enslavement. Indeed, in a meeting last month with Min Aung Hlaing, China's foreign minister Wang Yi called the two countries �brothers� while praising the military�s �national revitalization.� Myanmar has promised to "continue to support China's position on issues related to Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang." They also support each other in the United Nations, when they're accused of crimes against humanity. It takes one to know one.

China is heavily involved in building Myanmar's infrastructure, including a joint construction project to build the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), which is part of China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The CMEC focuses on 12 areas including basic infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, transport, finance, human resource development and telecommunications.

China is also practicing "vaccine diplomacy," by promising to provide 300,000 doses of coronavirus vaccines to Myanmar.

However, China and Burma have also had strong disagreements over separatist ethnic groups. In August 2009, there was violent fighting between Burma's army and rebels from the Kokang ethnic group. This angered the Chinese because the Kokang are a Han Chinese minority, and got China's army involved briefly.

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and Shan state

The wild card in this situation is the separatist Kachin Independence Army (KIA), which is demanding a separate state for the Kachin ethnic group. They've joined together with the Shan ethnic group and other ethnic groups in northern Burma, along the border with China, to form a "northern alliance" against Burma's army. In northern Shan state, intense fighting has occurred since January 2018 and intensified since December 2020. There are an estimated 7 ethnic armed organizations, 20 militia groups, and 7 Border Guard Forces (BGFs) actively engaged in an armed independence movement against the Myanmar government.

62 years have passed since the climax of the last generational crisis war, so Burma is ripe for cycling around and having a new violent ethnic civil war. China was heavily involved in the 1950s crisis war, and they would be involved in a new Myanmar civil war, possibly destabilizing the entire region.

Pretty much everyone is shocked that the army engineered this coup at this time. Analysts are puzzled by why the army took this step right now, since they pretty much control everything anyway, even with Aung San Suu Kyi as the nominal leader.

So the following is speculation: Perhaps the Burmese army has intelligence that sees signs of new KIA activity, and they want to lock everything down. As I said, this is speculation, but the current situation appears to be potentially very unstable, with an army coup, with threats of protests and riots by Aung Sang Suu Kyi's millions of supporters, and with the possibility of protests by the Kachin and Shan ethnic groups. It's necessary to watch the situation in Myanmar very carefully in the next few weeks.

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20-Jan-21 World View -- Pompeo bashes China over genocide, virus, Taiwan on last days of Trump administration

China calls Pompeo 'Mr Liar' displaying 'final hysteria'

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Pompeo bashes China over genocide, virus, Taiwan on last days of Trump administration
Pompeo calls for investigation of China's Wuhan virology laboratory
Pompeo lifts restrictions on American officials in Taiwan
China calls Pompeo 'Mr Liar' displaying 'final hysteria'
Pressure on the Biden administration

Pompeo bashes China over genocide, virus, Taiwan on last days of Trump administration

Mike Pompeo, Donald Trump's Secretary of State, made extremely harsh accusations against China on Tuesday, announcing new sanctions on China and declared that China's actions constitute "genocide" and "crimes against humanity."

The harsh accusations refer to China's treatment of the Uighurs in East Turkistan (Xinjiang Province). According to Pompeo's statement:

"For the past four years, this Administration has exposed the nature of the Chinese Communist Party and called it what it is: a Marxist-Leninist regime that exerts power over the long-suffering Chinese people through brainwashing and brute force. We have paid particular attention to the CCP�s treatment of the Uyghur people, a Muslim minority group that resides largely in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in Western China. While the CCP has always exhibited a profound hostility to all people of faith, we have watched with growing alarm the Party�s increasingly repressive treatment of the Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minority groups. ...
Party apparatchiks have denied international observers unhindered access to Xinjiang and denounced reliable reports about the worsening situation on the ground, instead spinning fanciful tales of happy Uyghurs participating in educational, counter-terror, women�s empowerment, and poverty alleviation projects. Meanwhile, they are delivering far darker messages to their own people, portraying Uyghurs as �malignant tumors,� comparing their faith to a �communicable plague,� and exhorting the Party faithful to implement a crushing blow, telling them �you can�t uproot all the weeds hidden among the crops in the field one-by-one; you need to spray chemicals to kill them all.� ...
These crimes are ongoing and include: the arbitrary imprisonmentor other severe deprivation of physical liberty of more than one million civilians, forced sterilization, torture of a large number of those arbitrarily detained, forced labor, and the imposition of draconian restrictions on freedom of religion or belief, freedom of expression, and freedom of movement. The Nuremberg Tribunals at the end of World War II prosecuted perpetrators for crimes against humanity, the same crimes being perpetrated in Xinjiang. In addition, after careful examination of the available facts, I have determined that the PRC, under the direction and control of the CCP, has committed genocide against the predominantly Muslim Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minority groups in Xinjiang. I believe this genocide is ongoing, and that we are witnessing the systematic attempt to destroy Uyghurs by the Chinese party-state. The governing authorities of the second most economically, militarily, and politically powerful country on earth have made clear that they are engaged in the forced assimilation and eventual erasure of a vulnerable ethnic and religious minority group, even as they simultaneously assert their country as a global leader and attempt to remold the international system in their image."

I've been writing about these atrocities for years. Many Washington politicians, both Republicans and Democrats, have been calling on the Trump administration since 2017 to make this determination. In a televised interview on Tuesday on Fox News, Pompeo defended the timing of the announcement, on his last day in office: "Look, I�m happy to accept that critique. What took so long is when you do something like this, you have to be right. You have to � and I think this will be a bipartisan analysis that will be shared by a broad swath of American leadership. Indeed, leaders all across the world I think will recognize that the United States got this right."

Pompeo calls for investigation of China's Wuhan virology laboratory

Pompeo has made several statements and accusations recently on China. Last week, Pompeo called for a a transparent and thorough investigation into the origin of COVID-19, the Wuhan Coronavrus, including a thorough investigation of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), to investigate the evidence that the virus was created by Chinese scientists and then escaped from the WIV lab.

Pompeo this week released new information concerning the activities inside China�s government laboratories in 2019. According to Pompeo:

"The COVID-19 pandemic was avoidable. Any responsible country would have invited world health investigators to Wuhan within days of an outbreak. China instead refused offers of help � including from the United States � and punished brave Chinese doctors, scientists, and journalists who tried to alert the world to the dangers of the virus. Beijing continues today to withhold vital information that scientists need to protect the world from this deadly virus, and the next one."

One of those brave Chinese scientists is Li-Meng Yan a virologist who made claims about the creation of the coronavirus and her relationship with the Chinese government, and then had to flee from her life from China. She has taken refuge in United States, at an undisclosed location.

Pompeo lifts restrictions on American officials in Taiwan

Two weeks ago, Pompeo announced that the State Dept. is lifting its internal restrictions on how American officials may interact with their Taiwanese government counterparts. These complicated restrictions had been in place to enforce the delusional "One China policy," where China and the United States both say that there is but one China, but they don't say who the one China is.

The Trump administration has also increased weapons sales to Taiwan, to help them defend against an expected invasion from China. China has been threatening this invasion for years, and it could occur at any time.

China calls Pompeo 'Mr Liar' displaying 'final hysteria'

Prior to Tuesday's announcement, where Pompeo accused China of genocide and crimes against humanity targeting the Uighurs, China's statement media went on a hysterical tirade accusing Pompeo of lying and "final hysteria." China blamed Pompeo's hysteria on realizing that he followed the wrong guy as his boss, Donald Trump.

According to China's Global Times:

"A long-term anti-China hawk in the Trump administration, Pompeo tweeted around 30 anti-China posts during the weekend, including verbal attacks on the Communist Party of China (CPC), Chinese media entities, policies concerning the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Hong Kong, the South China Sea, China's response to the COVID-19 outbreak and so on. ...
"Pompeo is now at the stage of physical and psychological hysteria. Why? Because he is facing such a huge failure in his own political career and rising anxiety in his final days after he realized that he followed the wrong guy as his boss, especially after the Capitol Hill riots," Shen Yi, a professor at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs of Fudan University, told the Global Times on Sunday."

We can hardly wait to see how China will react to the accusations of genocide.

This kind of hysteria from the Chinese Communists just emphasizes how delusional Chinese government officials are. Unfortunately, these hysterical delusions make them extremely dangerous.

Pressure on the Biden administration

These recent announcements are fairly certain to be timed to put pressure on the incoming Biden administration not to lose the ground that America has gained versus China during the administration of Donald Trump, who was the first president in decades to confront China on theft of intellectual property and many other Chinese crimes.

There is real concern that Joe Biden himself, who has spent the last year in his basement, is not capable of leading the administration as anything but a figurehead. These concerns have grown as evidence accumulated that Democrats like Eric Swalwell, Dianne Feinstein, Hunter Biden and Joe Biden are all totally compromised by the Chinese and Chinese money and Chinese honeypots. China has openly used money and sex to influence American politicians, almost always Democrats, to gain intelligence and compromise policy. With Trump making these harsh accusations in the last few days, the objective of the Trump administration is to pressure the Biden administration and prevent it from simply returning to the previous situation before Trump took office.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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18-Jan-21 World View -- Chaos grows in Afghanistan as American troops leave in hope of delusional peace plan

Iran offers Shia fighters to fight the Taliban and ISIS

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Chaos grows in Afghanistan as American troops leave in hope of delusional peace plan
Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail
Iran offers Shia fighters to fight the Taliban and ISIS
Abandoning the peace talks

Chaos grows in Afghanistan as American troops leave in hope of delusional peace plan

A Kabul resident washes the road after gunmen killed two female judges working for the Supreme Court (AFP)

A Kabul resident washes the road after gunmen killed two female judges working for the Supreme Court (AFP)

On Sunday morning, unidentified gunmen, suspected to be from the Taliban, killed two female judges from Afghanistan�s Supreme Court. The two were were driving to their office in a court vehicle, when gunmen riding a motocycle ambushed them and shot them dead.

This was only the latest in a wave of assassinations across the country. In many cases, the targets appear to have been chosen because they're women.

This is happening as delusional peace talks are taking place in Doha, Qatar, between America and the Taliban. Participation of the Afghan government in the peace talks has been limited to nonexistent because the Taliban don't want to talk to the Afghan government. They simply want to use the peace talks as a ruse to get America to withdraw its troops.

In February 2020, Washington agreed with the Taliban to begin withdrawing troops. The Taliban did not have to agree to end its terrorist violence, but it did agree to "tone down" its violence. I guess shooting only two female supreme court judges dead is an example of "toning down" violence.

Donald Trump made a campaign promise of "stopping the endless wars," and so has been ordering the withdrawal of American troops faster than had been anticipated, something that some American military officials opposed. In August of last year, there were 8,000 US troops in Afghanistan, which were cut to 4,500. After losing the election on November 3, Trump fired his Defense Secretary Mark Esper on November 9, apparently because the latter opposed further troop withdrawals, unless the Taliban met its commitments to reduce violence. On Friday of last week, acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller said that further withdrawals have reduced the number to 2,500.

Trump has agreed with the Taliban to withdraw all remaining troops by May 2021. I assume that Trump's intention is to let whatever happens happen after that, even if it means that the Taliban take control of the government, as they had prior to 9/11/2001.

However, that will be devastating for the people of Afghanistan, especially the girls and women. For that reason, president-elect Joe Biden may be forced to postpone any further withdrawals.

Joe Biden has been hiding in his basement for the last year, and has no idea what's going on in Afghanistan. According to some unconfirmed reports, Susan Rice will work behind the scenes to make Biden's foreign policy decisions. Susan Rice is an idiot, but I don't know if she's stated a policy on Afghanistan.

Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail

The following is a summary of the Generational Dynamics analysis:

Based on my work on the book on Vietnam that I'm writing, I was able to extend this analysis in an article last year by comparing the Afghan counterinsurgency efforts to previous counterinsurgency efforts. ( "22-Nov-20 World View -- Afghan 'peace talks' threatened by terrorist rocket attack on Kabul")

Here's a brief summary of the extended analysis:

Malay: Britain had a successful counterinsurgency in Malay in the early 1950s. In that case, the civilians were indigenous Malays, while the insurgents were ethnic Chinese. The counterinsurgency succeeded because it was possible to distinguish a civilian from an insurgent simply by looking at them or talking to them.

Vietnam: The insurgency in Vietnam could not be defeated because it was impossible to distinguish between the civilians (in South Vietnam), who were ordinary Vietnamese, and the insurgents (from North Vietnam), who were also ordinary Vietnamese, and so it was impossible to easily distinguish the civilians from the insurgents. For this reason, the counterinsurgency effort failed.

Iraq: President George Bush's "surge" strategy won the Iraq war because the insurgents were quite distinguishable from Iraqi civilians. The insurgent group "al-Qaeda in Iraq" consisted almost entirely of fighters imported from Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Syria. They were not Iraqis, and the Iraqis hated them. That's why the Iraq war was winnable, and the counterinsurgency succeeded. (See "Iraqi Sunnis are turning against al-Qaeda in Iraq" from April, 2007.)

Afghanistan: The Afghan insurgency cannot be defeated because ordinary civilians are ethnic Pashtuns, and so are the Taliban. So the Afghan counterinsurgency must fail.

Iran offers Shia fighters to fight the Taliban and ISIS

Iran has recently offered to send Shia militias into Afghanistan to fight the Taliban and ISIS in Afghanistan. These Shia militias would presumably be withdrawn from Syria, and consist of thousands of ethnic Hazaras and other Shia fighters previously recruited from Afghanistan to support Bashar al-Assad's genocide in Syria.

This is certainly an interesting proposal. Since Iran and Afghanistan are in generational Awakening/Unraveling eras, this would not lead to an "explosion" as some people are suggesting, but it would lead to local clashes between the Hazaras and the Pashtuns. The Hazaras are already under frequent terror attacks by the Pashtuns, and those would expand.

We'll have to wait and see if this goes anywhere.

Abandoning the peace talks

Since the peace talks under Trump were always completely delusional, they're going to end one way or another without accomplishing their supposed objective.

When the Taliban's spring fighting season begins this year, I would expect to see a surge in terrorist violence, whether American troops have been completely withdrawn or not.

The Biden administration will be under tremendous pressure to cancel the May 2021 withdrawal, and probably will do so.

Here's some advice for the Biden administration from the Atlantic Council:

"The new administration should affirm its support of the ongoing Doha peace negotiations. It should pause further US troop withdrawals until it can conduct an expedited inter-agency policy review. The review should include consultations with NATO, the European Union, and other allies who have faithfully partnered with the United States in Afghanistan. It should include a re-examination of military drawdowns not only as part of a political strategy, but also as they relate to assuring that remaining US forces, diplomats, and other personnel are secure."

This would abandon the existing peace agreement at just about the time of the Taliban's spring fighting season. It is a prescription to continue the status quo indefinitely, and with the increase in Taliban violence, Biden might actually be forced to increase the number of American troops again.

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12-Jan-21 World View -- America and the standard Genocide Playbook

The January 6 attack on the Capitol building by Trump supporters

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

What is the standard Genocide Playbook pattern?
Democrats' attitude to Tea Partiers during Obama administration
The January 6 attack on the Capitol building by Trump supporters
How will this end?

What is the standard Genocide Playbook pattern?

Jan 9 announcement by John Matze, CEO of Parler.com, of a coordinated attack by Twitter, Google and Amazon

Jan 9 announcement by John Matze, CEO of Parler.com, of a coordinated attack by Twitter, Google and Amazon

As regular readers know, everything I write is, as much as possible, from a historical perspective. Plus �a change, plus c'est la m�me chose. As King Solomon said, there's nothing new under the sun.

So before describing how America is in the early stages of the Genocide Playbook, I have to describe what the Genocide Playbook is, and how common it is.

I want to emphasize that this is nothing rare. This is going on in multiple countries today. As regular readers know, I've written thousands of articles describing current and historical events in hundreds of countries, and the Genocide Playbook is a pattern that is not only not rare, but is actually very common, and is the rule.

Here's an outline of how the pattern works:

In the early stages, the government or the �lites target a hated ethnic group with abusive policies, including violence, jailing without evidence, censorship and punishment of criticism of the government, and other forms of discrimination, with the purpose of humiliating and infuriating the target group.

Frequently there is an analogue to the Nazi Kristallnacht, where police stand aside and allow violent mobs to attack homes and businesses of the target group.

Sooner or later there is some kind of violent incident by a few people in the target group. This incident might occur organically, or it might be a setup by the �lites.

The �lites use this incident to justify complete censorship, violence, abuse and control towards the target group and, in the extreme, to commit genocide and ethnic cleansing.

I will repeat several times: This pattern is not rare. It is common. It is the rule.

Let's look at some examples where the Genocide Playbook is in use today in its later stages:

China: For years, the Chinese Communists targeted the Muslim Uighurs in Xinjiang province with abusive policies, including destroying mosques, mandatory Communist atheist education, forced sterilization of Uighur females, and looting Uighur resources. These abuses triggered Uighur rioting in 2009. Since then, the Chinese Communists have declared all Uighurs to be terrorists, and have arrested, tortured, beaten and enslaved millions of Uighurs.
Hong Kong is in the early stages of the Genocide Playbook. The Communists are already targeting pro-democracy activists with violence and jailing without evidence. If some pro-democracy activist now commits an act of violence, whether organic or a setup by the Communists, then the Communists will declare all pro-democracy activists to be terrorists, and will crack down on them violently.
Of all the countries today, China has been the most effective in using censorship in its genocide playbook.

Burma/Myanmar: Starting in 2011, Buddhists, led by Buddhist Monk Ashin Wirathu, joined with Burma's security forces in committing mass atrocities on Muslim ethnic Rohingyas living in Rakhine State, which the United Nations described as "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing." The atrocities included gang rape, violent torture, execution-style killings and the razing of entire villages, in a scorched earth campaign.
In 2013 there was a super-Kristallnacht type attack, when a mob of Buddhists attacked a Rohingya village, hacking 20 boys to death, and reducing an entire established community of 12,000 Muslims, including homes, shops and mosques, to ashes and rubble.
In August 2017, Rohingya insurgents carried out a series of coordinated attacks against 30 Burma police outposts and an army base, killing at least a dozen security force members. This was the event that the Burmese were hoping and waiting for. After that, they carried out a massive program of genocide and ethnic cleansing, forcing hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas across the border into Bangladesh refugee camps, where they remain to this day.

Syria: The Syrian war began in 2011 when Bashar al-Assad ordered his army and air force to attack peacefully protesting civilians, including women and children. Things really turned around in August 2011, when al-Assad launched a massive military assault on a large, peaceful Palestinian refugee camp in Latakia, filled with tens of thousands of women and children Palestinians. He dropped barrel bombs laden with metal, chlorine, ammonia, phosphorous and chemical weapons onto innocent Sunni women and children, he's targeted bombs and missiles on schools and hospitals, and he's used Sarin gas to kill large groups of people. Even so, al-Assad would have lost the war until he received massive military support from Russia to continue his genocide and ethnic cleansing.

I wanted to give examples of genocide taking place today to show that the Genocide Playbook isn't some science fiction concept, but is commonly used in many countries.

Of course it was also used in Nazi Germany, when Hitler used the burning down of the Reichstag to attack all communists, and then used minor terrorist acts by Jews to claim that all Jews were terrorists, leading to the Holocaust.

Democrats' attitude to Tea Partiers during Obama administration

I never thought I'd see the Genocide Playbook pattern being used in America. This is the darkest time for America in my memory.

As I've said many times, the Democrats' vitriolic hatred for Trump has nothing to do with Trump. They used to love Trump when he was a TV star. They only began to hate him when they transferred their vitriolic hatred of Tea Partiers to him.

And the vitriolic hatred of Tea Partiers was enormous during the Obama administration. Obama and Joe Biden both referred to Tea Partiers and Republicans in general as terrorists, racists and teabaggers. The word "teabaggers" is an especially vile epithet, as bad as the n-word. Can you imagine someone saying that all Democrats are the n-word? That would be extremely vile and hateful, and that shows how vile and hateful the Democrats were to Tea Partiers and Republicans.

And why were Obama and Biden calling them racists, terrorists and teabaggers? It's because they opposed Obama policies -- Obama's budget, Obamacare, or gun control for example. No matter what the policy, if Tea Partiers opposed it, it's not because the policies were bad (which they were). It's because the Tea Partiers were racists, terrorists and teabaggers.

The Democrats' hatred went even beyond that, saying that they had some kind of neurological disorder that turned them into violent racists. This is similar to the kinds of things that Hitler said about the Jews.

The following are excerpts from a newsbusters.org article from 2009 that I saved from my archives. As far as I know, this article is no longer online.

"Garofalo: Tea Party Goers Are Racists Who Hate Black President
By Noel Sheppard | April 16, 2009 | 23:56
During last year's election campaign, liberal media members treated Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin with a hatred most Americans had never witnessed from the press.
On Thursday's "Countdown," MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and his guest Janeane Garofalo defamed fellow citizens who attended the prior day's Tea Parties with the same vitriolic contempt.
Garofalo actually called Party-goers "a bunch of teabagging rednecks," adding "this is about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up."
But that's just the beginning, for what Olbermann and Garofalo engaged in Thursday evening is amongst the most vile, hate-filled attacks on average American citizens ever conveyed on national television by so-called journalists.
KEITH OLBERMANN, HOST: Well, the teabagging is all over, except for the cleanup. And that will be my last intentional double entendre on this one at least until the end of this segment. Our number two story tonight, the sad reality behind the corporate sponsored Tea Parties, visual proof that this is not about spending, deficits, or taxes, but about some Americans getting riled up by the people who caused these things, and finally about some Americans who just hate the president of the United States. ...
And then there were the protest messages, seething with hate. [Neil] Cavuto calling that hate bipartisan. "They hate Republicans who waste money, they hate Democrats who waste money." ...
OLBERMANN: Congratulations, Pensacola teabaggers. You got spunked. And despite the hatred on display, a few of you actually violated the penal code. But teabagging is now petered out, taint what it used to be. ... On a more serious note, we're now joined by actor, activist Janeane Garofalo. Good to see you.
JANEANE GAROFALO: Thank you. You know, there's nothing more interesting than seeing a bunch of racists become confused and angry at a speech they're not quite certain what he's saying. It sounds right and then it doesn't make sense. Which, let's be very honest about what this is about. It's not about bashing Democrats, it's not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don't know their history at all. This is about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up. That is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks. And there is no way around that. And you know, you can tell these type of right wingers anything and they'll believe it, except the truth. You tell them the truth and they become -- it's like showing Frankenstein's monster fire. They become confused, and angry and highly volatile. That guy, causing them feelings they don't know, because their limbic brain, we've discussed this before, the limbic brain inside a right-winger or Republican or conservative or your average white power activist, the limbic brain is much larger in their head space than in a reasonable person, and it's pushing against the frontal lobe. So their synapses are misfiring. Is Bernie Goldberg listening? ...
GAROFALO: Because Bernie might not have heard this when I said this the first time. So, Bernie, this is for you. It is a neurological problem we're dealing with. ...
GAROFALO: I don't think you do, for most of them. This is a -- it's almost pathological or elevated to a philosophy or lifestyle. And again, this is about racism. It could be any issue, any port in the storm. These guys hate that a black guy is in the White House. But they immigrant bash, they pretend taxes and tea bags, and like I said, most of them probably couldn't tell you thing one about taxation without representation, the Boston tea party, the British imperialism, whatever the history lesson has to be. But these people, all white for the most part, unless there's some people with Stockholm syndrome there.
OLBERMANN: And, I didn't see them, the fact that they weren't near the cameras which is bad strategy on the part of the people that were staging this at Fox.
GAROFALO: True, and Fox News loves to foment this anti-intellectualism because that's their bread and butter. If you have a cerebral electorate, Fox news goes down the toilet, very, very fast. But it is sick and sad to see Neil Cavuto doing that. They've been doing it for years, that's why Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch started this venture, is to disinform and to coarsen and dumb down a certain segment of the electorate. But what is really, I didn't know there were so many racists left. I didn't know that. I -- you know, because as I've said, the Republican hype and the conservative movement has now crystallized into the white power movement.
OLBERMANN: Is that not a bad, long-term political strategy because even though your point is terrifying that there are that many racists left, the flip side of it is there aren't that many racists left.
GAROFALO: They're the minority, but literally tens of people showed up to this thing across the country.
OLBERMANN: But if you spear your television network or your political party towards a bunch of guys looking who are just looking for a reason to yell at the black president, eventually you will marginalize yourself out of business, won't you?
GAROFALO: Here's what the right-wing has in, there's no shortage of the natural resources of ignorance, apathy, hate, fear. As long as those things are in the collective conscious and unconscious, the Republicans will have some votes. Fox News will have some viewers. But what else have they got? If they didn't do that, who is going to watch -- you know what I mean? They have tackled that elusive clam -- you know, the clam, the 18 to 35 clam -- klan. Klan. With a k demo. But, you know, who else is Fox talking to? I mean, what is it urban older white guys? And the girlfriend, and, you know, the women who suffer from Stockholm syndrome gain. There's a lot of Stockholm syndrome, is what I'm saying ultimately. What else do you want to know?
OLBERMANN: What happens if somebody who's at one of these things hurt somebody?
GAROFALO: That is an unfortunate byproduct since the dawn of time of a volatile group like this of the limbic brain. Violence unfortunately may or may not ensue. It always, it's like a, the Republican Party now depends upon immigrant bashing and hating the black guy in the White House. Will people act on that? It's not new. But, you know, Fox doesn't mind fomenting it. Michelle Bachmann doesn't mine fomenting it. Glenn Beck doesn't mind fomenting it.
OLBERMANN: Lou Dobbs.
GAROFALO: Lou Dobbs. Oh, man he sure doesn't mind. But this is, this their, what have they got if they don't have this? You know what I mean? It's like an identity politics of the worst kind. ...
OLBERMANN: Janeane Garofalo, number five, comedian, actress, political activist, and the expert on the limbic brain, great thanks as always.
GAROFALO: Very much thanks to you."

The reference to "Bernie" is Bernard Goldberg, a hated conservative commentator, whose web site is still online at https://bernardgoldberg.com/. The hatemongers also mention Lou Dobbs and Neil Cavuto, who still have shows on Fox Business Network.

So those 60 million Tea Partiers have become 75 million Trump supporters, and the Democrats have the same vitriolic hatred for them.

Once again, I have to emphasize that this isn't rare. This kind of hatred is common. It's the Chinese hatred of Uighurs. It's the Burmese Buddhist hatred of Rohingyans. It's the Syrian Alawite hatred of Arab Sunnis. It's the Rwandan Hutu hatred of Tutsis. It's the Nazi hatred of Jews.

I wish I understood this kind of hatred. In the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans freed the slaves. The Democrats bitterly opposed ending slavery, and after they lost the Civil War, they formed the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) militia, which the Democrats used for the next century to lynch, torture, rape and execute blacks. If today you're a Democrat who hates Trump supporters, then a century ago you would have been a Democrat in the KKK, cheering the lynching, torture, rape and killing of blacks. I don't know why that kind of thing is in the DNA of the Democrats, or why it's in the DNA of the Chinese or Burmese Buddhists or Nazis or the other groups I mentioned. Like the Genocide Playbook, it's not rare. It is very common. It is the rule.

The January 6 attack on the Capitol building by Trump supporters

At the beginning of this article I described the Genocide Playbook, and these were the last two items: "Sooner or later there is some kind of violent incident by a few people in the target group. This incident might occur organically, or it might be a setup by the �lites. The �lites use this incident to justify complete censorship, violence, abuse and control towards the target group and, in the extreme, commits genocide and ethnic cleansing."

In the current situation, the violent incident was the January 6 attack on the Capitol building by Trump supporters.

This resulted from Donald Trump's disastrous decision to hold a rally with hundreds of thousands of supporters, and then tell them to march to the Capitol building to pressure the politicians to do their jobs and object to the electors in six states. He's been accused of purposely inciting violence, which was clearly the opposite of his intention. He may be accused of stupid blunders and reckless actions, but it was clearly not his intention to incite violence, even if that was the unintended consequence.

The violent Capitol building incident is the culmination of the Genocide Playbook strategy towards Tea Partiers and Trump supporters that the Democrats have been using since the Obama administration. It's what they've been hoping for to crush the Trump supporters once and for all. The Democrats made vile attacks on Tea Partiers during the Obama administration, as we've described, calling them terrorists, racists and teabaggers, just for opposing Obama's policies. Conservatives on college campuses and in businesses could lose their jobs for saying something as simple as "Marriage is between a man and a woman."

The Democrats have gotten away with phony and illegal anti-Trump investigations and impeachments, encouraging antifa-blm fascists to riot and burn down small businesses, using pandemic lockdowns to shut down millions of small businesses, censoring any news that criticizes Biden or exposes Hunter Biden's criminality, and flooding the country with millions of unsolicited ballots and using the the resulting chaos to rig the election with voting fraud and steal the election from Trump -- all with total impunity. The Democrats are gloating that they can get away with anything, and they are escalating their threats.

During the last year, antifa-blm fascists, encouraged by Democrats, tore down statues and burned down not only businesses, but also police stations, courthouses, and even St John's Episcopal Church, near the White House. These are clearly terrorist acts, but the Democrats not only didn't condemn them, but encouraged them and censored them in the media. That's why these acts by the Democrats are analogous to the Nazi Kristallnacht.

Biden's vitriolic comments towards Trump supporters at his press conference last week not only expressed his personal hatred of Tea Partiers and Trump supporters, but also incited further violence. Biden even compared Republican Senators to Nazis. I'm tempted to say that these remarks prove that Biden is the one with the neurological disorder, not the hated Tea Partiers. Biden even was an admirer of Robert Byrd, a Great Kleagle (or something like that) in the Ku Klux Klan that lynched and tortured blacks.

There's increasing evidence that the Democrats provoked the attack on the Capitol building by providing only a bare skeleton security force to protect the building, even though it was known for many days that an attack was imminent.

Obama's Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta criticized the Capitol Police for being completely unprepared, even though "everyone knew that there would be people ... creating havoc":

"What the hell was law enforcement on Capitol Hill thinking by not having secured the Capitol today? ...
Everybody knew that there would be a disturbance. Everybody knew that there would be people who were interested in doing nothing else but creating havoc in the Capitol. And very frankly, it was the responsibility of law enforcement and the Capitol Hill police to secure the Capitol, and I'm not sure what happened that allowed this event."

It is now reported that the FBI and the NYPD both warned the Capitol police that there were groups planning violent attacks, but the Capitol police only provided a skeleton force to block them, in effect indirectly provoking those attacks.

These facts may come out in the investigation. But whether the Democrats purposely provoked the attack, or whether it was simply incompetence by the police, it is clearly the violent incident that the Democrats hoped for and are using as part of their strategy to completely destroy the Republican Party and Trump's supporters.

As I've said repeatedly, these kinds of actions are not rare. They're common, and they're occurring today in many countries in various stages. Still, it is almost beyond belief to me that four companies -- Google, Apple, Twitter, Facebook and Amazon -- have successfully colluded to completely shut down Parler.com, a successful and growing online service with millions of users -- for purely political reasons as part of the Democrats' Genocide Playbook strategy. This is the kind of thing that occurs in Russia and China and Cuba and North Korea and Venezuela and totalitarian countries. It was never supposed to happen in America.

Even though this is very common, I never never thought I'd see the Genocide Playbook being used in America. This is the darkest time for America in my memory.

How will this end?

Will the Democrats' use of the Genocide Playbook lead to actual genocide and ethnic cleansing? No. For that they would at least need backing from the army, which obviously they don't have.

In fact, what the Democrats are doing is so completely bizarre and outrageous, so destructive and self-destructive, and so un-American, that it can't possibly last long.

Still, how is this going to end?

First, Donald Trump and his 75 million supporters are not dead and buried. Every Trump voter I've seen interviewed on TV says the same thing: That Trump actually speaks to them, and the others in Washington ignore them. That's why they're loyal to Trump. Trump says that he has some major announcement coming. We'll see what he says.

Second, Parler.com is not dead and buried. The Democrats have gotten Parler offline for now, but Parler has enough support to build its own datacenter and cloud to replace Amazon's AWS, and it will be online again.

In fact, if I were a business using Amazon's AWS cloud service, then I would look at this situation in horror, knowing that Amazon could shut me down at any time for any foolish reason. No one believes that shutting down Parler had anything to do with violence. It had everything to do with isolating 75 million Trump supporters and with eliminating a competitor to twitter. If Amazon can come after Parler, they can come after anyone.

Furthermore, Twitter, Google and Facebook made huge amounts of money because of Trump in the last few years because of Trump. With Trump gone, and with their contemptuous treatment of Trump supporters, they're going to lose a lot of money. But, no worry, the execs will be ok. Many of them are taking jobs in the Biden administration.

It's quite possible that Parler will come back with a vengeance and become a major business threat to Twitter. If not Parler, then another service. This is what always happens.

In fact, another conservative social media service, Gab.com, has signed up millions of new users in the last few days. If you access the site, the reason that it's slow is because it's being overwhelmed by new users.

Third, and this is how it will really end.

As I've been saying for years, there will be a global financial crisis and third world war with China, and this will unify the country, and end all political divisiveness. That will be the end of silliness and political correctness, and the beginning of a real existential crisis.

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16-Dec-20 World View -- China escalates hostility with Australia through threatened coal ban

China's delusional geopolitical strategy

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

China escalates hostility with Australia through threatened coal ban
New evidence of massive slavery of Uighurs in China
China's delusional geopolitical strategy
Cognitive dissonance

China escalates hostility with Australia through threatened coal ban

A rally in Hong Kong in December last year in support of Uighurs in Xinjiang province. In the back, one officer draws a pistol. (AFP)

A rally in Hong Kong in December last year in support of Uighurs in Xinjiang province. In the back, one officer draws a pistol. (AFP)

China state media reports that China's top economic planner has authorized power plants to import coal without clearance restrictions from several countries "except for Australia." This implies that China is formalizing its ban on imported Australian coal. Australian coal been informally banned for months in the sense that dozens of vessels carrying Australian coal have been stranded offshore, blocked from entering China's ports.

China began an economic war on Australia in April, with economic boycotts and blacklisting of imports from Australia, when Australia called for an international investigation on the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. China responded by telling Australian officials, "China is angry. If you make China the enemy, China will be the enemy."

Australia has also criticized China over the arrest of millions of Uighurs and imprisoning them in concentration camps. These criticisms have also infuriated the Chinese Communists.

The ban on Australian coal imports has not yet been officially confirmed by the Chinese Communists. However, the state media report is another escalation in China's war of threats, extortion and bribery against Australia.

New evidence of massive slavery of Uighurs in China

China's escalating economic war on Australia comes at a time of newly discovered documents that provide a clear picture of how up to a million Uighurs are being forced into slavery in manufacturing, in garment making, and in picking of cotton.

It's been obvious for years that this has been going on, as I've written in the past. Xi Jinping is an admirer of Adolf Hitler, who created one of the largest forced labor systems in history: Over twenty million foreign civilian workers, concentration camp prisoners and prisoners of war from all of the occupied countries were required to perform forced labor in Germany.

The picking of cotton is a particularly emotional issue because American black slaves were forced to pick cotton for their white masters, prior to the freeing of the slaves by Abraham Lincoln. Xi Jinping is going in the opposite direction of Abraham Lincoln. Xi Jinping is forcing more and more Uighurs to pick cotton for their Chinese Communist masters. It's likely that Tibetans and other minorities are being treated the same way. China supplies 20% of the world's cotton.

China's delusional geopolitical strategy

A web site reader has forwarded to me an investment newsletter written by an analyst close to the Chinese Communist Party that describes Xi Jinping's geopolitical strategy over the next five years for gaining hegemony over the entire world. It could have come from China's Central Committee. It's a breathtaking plan, comparable to similar plans by such historical luminaries as Adolf Hitler and Julius Caesar.

I'll be posting a full analysis at some point, but here's a summary: Guided by China's leadership, countries throughout Africa, Asia and the Mideast will put aside their disagreements. Old hatreds will be mended by necessity, to attract capital for investments. These include countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, India, and Pakistan. China will create a "global colossal," of dozens of countries in a massive multi-country partnership, bound together by China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

The plan specifies concessions to be made by one nation after another to "mend old hatreds," but it doesn't contain a single example of China making any concession whatsoever.

According to the newsletter: "The big question is how America will respond to the challenge of connecting so much of the world through trade and peace. Their containment policy has failed so far. The choice is either to join this more peaceful venture or to fight it. If the latter choice is adopted it will result in a global war between America and its remaining allies and the combined forces of China and Russia."

This is a completely delusional fantasy, of course, but it feeds into the Chinese Communist and Confucian view that they're the Master Race, and the rest of us are barbarians, with no other purpose than to work for and pay tribute to the Chinese, in the same way that donkeys work for farmers.

Cognitive dissonance

As Leon Festinger has shown, the problem with a person believing in and being committed to a totally delusional fantasy is that when something goes wrong, the person suffers cognitive dissonance and desperately doubles down on the fantasy, trying to make it come true. In countries, this only happens when the country is a dictatorship, where no one can challenge the fantasy view without being jailed, tortured or executed. That explains what happened in Mao Zedong's disastrous Great Leap Forward in the late 1950s. In Xi Jinping's case, this could involve Chinese military action that leads to a regional war, spreading to a world war.

China's delusional geopolitical strategy has been fed a powerful drug-like boost this year by the Chinese Communists' apparent success with the Wuhan Coronavirus. Donald Trump is the first president in decades to stand up to the Chinese, rather than appeasing them. At the beginning of 2020, it appeared that Trump would coast to re-election. But instead, China's intentional spread of Wuhan Coronavirus to countries around the world, including the United States, has resulted in the election of Joe Biden who, along with his son Hunter Biden and other Democrats, have totally compromised relationships with China. At the very least, China can expect to use threats, bribery and extortion on the Bidens and the Democrats to force the US to return to a policy of full-scale appeasement.

This apparent victory would be like a drug to the Xi Jinping, who is convinced that their plan of global hegemony is working.

But an example of what can go wrong occurred in April when Australia called for an international investigation of the source of the pandemic. China responded by telling Australian officials, "China is angry. If you make China the enemy, China will be the enemy." Such an investigation would derail the Chinese plan, and so they doubled down on their strategy by declaring economic war on Australia.

The Chinese Communists will certainly consider this to be another victory since, we assume, no other country would now dare to call for an international investigation of the source of the pandemic. China's policy of threats, bribery and extortion has won again.

John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/World-View-Between-Prepared-Generational/dp/1732738637/

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11-Dec-20 World View -- Morocco normalizes ties with Israel in exchange for Western Sahara

Israel's 'pragmatic' foreign policy

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Morocco normalizes ties with Israel in exchange for Western Sahara
Agreement mediated by Donald Trump changes the status of Western Sahara
Israel's 'pragmatic' foreign policy

Morocco normalizes ties with Israel in exchange for Western Sahara

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Donald Trump and Morocco's King Mohammed VI (AFP)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Donald Trump and Morocco's King Mohammed VI (AFP)

Morocco and Israel on Thursday agreed to normalize relations, in an agreement mediated by president Donald Trump, and described as "historic." This is the fourth such agreement since September, after agreements between Israel and United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Sudan were also signed. The first Arab countries to recognize Israel were Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.

As part of this deal, the United States changed longstanding US policy and recognized Morocco�s claims over the disputed Western Sahara region.

Morocco has had a large Jewish population for centuries. Before Israel's establishment in 1948, Morocco was home to a large Jewish population, many of whose ancestors migrated to North Africa from Spain and Portugal during the Spanish Inquisition. Today, hundreds of thousands of Israeli Jews trace their lineage to Morocco, making it one of the country's largest sectors of Israeli society, and a small community of Jews, estimated at several thousand people, continues to live in Morocco.

Trump announced the agreement in a series of tweets in which he thanked Morocco for being one of the first nations to recognize the United States shortly after it declared independence from Britain:

"Today, I signed a proclamation recognizing Moroccan sovereignty over the Western Sahara. Morocco�s serious, credible, and realistic autonomy proposal is the ONLY basis for a just and lasting solution for enduring peace and prosperity!
Another HISTORIC breakthrough today! Our two GREAT friends Israel and the Kingdom of Morocco have agreed to full diplomatic relations � a massive breakthrough for peace in the Middle East!
Morocco recognized the United States in 1777. It is thus fitting we recognize their sovereignty over the Western Sahara."

As in the case of the previous agreements, the Palestinian authorities are infuriated. In Gaza, Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said: �This is a sin and it doesn�t serve the Palestinian people. The Israeli occupation uses every new normalization to increase its aggression against the Palestinian people and increase its settlement expansion.�

The Trump administration is pressuring Saudi Arabia to join with the other countries in normalizing relations with Israel. The Saudis have given tacit approval to the normalization process, but Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud said last week Riyadh would only consider such a move if a peace deal "delivers a Palestinian state with dignity and with a workable sovereignty that Palestinians can accept."

Agreement mediated by Donald Trump changes the status of Western Sahara

Map of Western Sahara (Britannica)

Map of Western Sahara (Britannica)

The agreement is receiving criticism from the United Nations, because the UN does not recognize Morocco's sovereignty over the Western Sahara.

The region, Spanish Sahara, was a Spanish protectorate until Morocco achieved independence in 1956, and then claimed sovereignty over Western Sahara in 1957, although Spanish troops repelled the Moroccan military from the territory.

In the 1970s, a guerrilla insurgency of nomadic ethnic Sahrawis sprang up, calling itself the Polisario Front, and calling for the formation of a new nation, the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR). This led to clashes between the Moroccans and the Polisario Front, until a ceasefire was agreed in 1991.

The ceasefire broke down last month. The Polisario Front has declared a "state of war," and the UN has received reports of several "shooting incidents" made by either side.

The Polisario Front is supported by Algeria and South Africa. The intervention by the Trump administration is an important symbolic change in the situation, and will energize the Moroccans. The U.S. is now the only Western country to recognize Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, providing a diplomatic breakthrough for which the kingdom has lobbied for decades.

Israel's 'pragmatic' foreign policy

As I reported in February of this year, 15 years ago Israel made a startling policy change and adopted a new "pragmatic" foreign policy. (See "6-Feb-20 World View -- Israeli diplomat reveals Israel's startling new 'pragmatic' foreign policy")

In the new "pragmatic" foreign policy, adopted around 2004, Israel no longer considers itself to be a Mideast country, so much as a European country. It no longer pretends to try to integrate itself into the Mideast. Instead, under Israel's pragmatic policy, the Arabs and Israelis continue to hate each other, but Israel would use money and trade incentives to "buy" peace with its Arab neighbors. The Trump-mediated peace agreements with UAE, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco appear to be the implementation of this pragmatic strategy.

Al-Jazeera's political analyst Marwan Bishara, who hates Israel but who hates the Palestinian Authority even more for traitoriously negotiating peace with Israel, said that the new announcement was another example of "America as a diplomatic mercenary on behalf of Israel. ... Let�s call it what it is � the imperial proclamation. At the end of the day, Washington is using its influence around the world on behalf of Israel, or rather Israel is outsourcing American power for its own benefit in the greater Middle East."

Bishara puts his hatred of Israel on full display, but his political interpretation is more or less consistent with Israel's pragmatic foreign policy.

As regular readers know, Generational Dynamics predicts that there is an approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, pitting the "axis" of China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries against the "allies," the US, India, Russia and Iran. Part of it will be a major new war between Jews and Arabs, re-fighting the bloody the war of 1948-49 that followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. The war between Jews and Arabs will be part of a major regional war, pitting Sunnis versus Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and various ethnic groups against each other.

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28-Nov-20 World View -- Australia-China relations become more toxic through boycotts and accusations

China's official list of 14 blunt complaints about Australia's government

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Australia-China relations become more toxic through boycotts and accusations
China's bribery and extortion
China's official list of 14 blunt complaints about Australia's government
National security threat of China's Huawei 5G networks

Australia-China relations become more toxic through boycotts and accusations

Australian crayfish are one of the products targeted by China (9News)

Australian crayfish are one of the products targeted by China (9News)

The toxic relationship between the government of Australia and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has become increasingly apparent after a blunt verbal CCP attack on Australia's government, accusing it of "poisoning bilateral relations," at the same time the China is escalating its economic boycotts and blacklisting of imports from Australia.

Commenting on China's action, a CCP official said to Australian officials: "China is angry. If you make China the enemy, China will be the enemy."

On Friday, China announced 107% to 212% tariffs on wine imported from Australia. This is only the latest economic attack by China on Australia. In recent months, China has been blacklisting one Australian product after another, including lobster, cherries, beef, sugar, cotton, barley and timber. Another blacklisted import is coal. More than 50 ships have been anchored off Chinese ports for months waiting to deliver $500 million of Australian ports.

However, the most important commodity that China imports from Australia remains untouched -- the $60 billion worth of iron ore that Australia exports to China annually, and which China desperately needs.

Although these disputes have been simmering for years, China began an extremely agressive series of economic attacks on Australia in April, when Australian officials called for a joint international investigation of the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. Australia's announcement was thought to be targeting China, which has repeatedly tried to dodge responsibility for the Wuhan Coronavirus.

Earlier this year, the CCP was blaming the US army for developing the virus and somehow secretly spreading it in China's Wuhan wet markets. Lately, CCP officials have been promoting a bizarre claim that the virus originated elsewhere and arrived in China on frozen food packaging.

So an Australian call for an international investigation on the origins of the virus has brought about the CCP's usual hysterical rantings and threats and demands that everyone shut up and do as China tells them. However, this time, the CCP has backed up its hysterical rantings with the boycott of Australia's products.

The CCP has also been infuriated by Australia's criticisms of China's National Security Law, which has effectively ended the Hong Kong democracy that was supposed to last until at least 2047.

China's bribery and extortion

Bribery and extortion are the CCP's standard foreign policy tools, and China has used these tools for years to force dozens of countries to involuntarily end diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Now China is using the same techniques against a much larger country, Australia.

Australia�s former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull says that China's tactics fail will only damage China's standing abroad.

"The fundamental point is this: when someone tries to coerce you or bully you, threaten you, you can�t take a backward step.
If you do, then all that will do is invite more coercive activity. The best thing that can happen, frankly, is for this episode to come to an end, and for Australia and China to get back to a traditional, businesslike relationship.
Has it won China more influence? No. Has it won China more friends [or] persuaded other countries to be more compliant? No ... if the object of your foreign policy is, among other things, to win friends and increase your influence in the world, how is any of this helpful?"

Turnbull is saying in calm diplomatic terms the same thing that I've been saying for years: That the CCP policies are insane, and always make any situation worse.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, mutual relations between China and Australia have become increasingly hostile for the last few years, and as the populations of both countries are becoming increasingly nationalistic and belligerent in the generational Crisis era, this worsening situation will lead to war.

This is also a good time to respond to the frequently heard statements like, "Countries A and B will never go to war, because trade between the two countries is good, and war will be bad for business." If this were true, there would never have been a war. What actually happens is that trade does not prevent a war. Instead, trade makes the situation worse, because the stronger trading partner uses trade as one more weapon of war, as we're seeing now in the case of China and Australia.

China's official list of 14 blunt complaints about Australia's government

Last week, in another incredibly bizarre CCP move, a sheet of paper containing 14 blunt complaints about Australia's government was leaked to three Australian news agencies. In other words, these were official complaints by the CCP, but instead of notifying Australia's government directly, or instead of posting them on a web site, the Chinese Embassy called up reporters and scheduled meetings, but said nothing at the meetings except to hand over, in each case, the sheet of paper.

The list included complaints about Australia's banning Huawei's 5G routers on national security grounds, complaints about speaking out about the South China Sea, and complaints about "siding with the US" anti-China campaign.

The following is the official list of 14 complaints, as they were printed on the Embassy official's sheet of paper:

foreign investment decisions, with acquisitions blocked on opaque national security grounds in contravention of ChAFTA/since 2018, more than 10 Chinese investment projects have been rejected by Australia citing ambiguous and unfounded "national security concerns" and putting restrictions in areas like infrastructure, agriculture and animal husbandry.

the decision banning Huawei Technologies and ZTE from the 5G network, over unfounded national security concerns, doing the bidding of the US by lobbying other countries

foreign interference legislation, viewed as targeting China and in the absence of any evidence.

politicization and stigmatization of the normal exchanges and cooperation between China and Australia and creating barriers and imposing restrictions, including the revoke of visas for Chinese scholars.

call for an international independent inquiry into the COVID-19 virus, acted as a political manipulation echoing the US attack on China

incessant wanton interference in China's Xinjiang, bong Kong and Taiwan affairs; spearheading the crusade against China in certain multilateral forums

the first non littoral country to make a statement on the South China Sea to the United Nations

siding with the US' anti-China campaign and spreading disinformation imported from the US around China's efforts of containing COV1D-19.

the latest legislation to scrutinize agreements with a foreign government targeting towards China and aiming to torpedo the Victorian participation in B&R

provided funding to anti-China think tank for spreading untrue reports, peddling lies around Xinjiang and so-called China infiltration aimed at manipulating public opinion against China

the early dawn search and reckless seizure of Chinese jounalists' homes and properties without any charges and giving any explanations

thinly veiled allegations against China on cyber attacks without any evidence

outrageous condemnation of the governing party of China by MPs and racist attacks against Chinese or Asian people.

an unfriendly or antagonistic report on China by media, poisoning the atmosphere of bilateral relations

In other words, shut up and do as you're told.

National security threat of China's Huawei 5G networks

This is a good time to repeat the situation with China's 5G routers. It is absolutely certain that these routers contain "backdoors" that permit China's military not only to spy on any traffic traveling through them, but also to control them, possibly shutting down entire networks in time of war.

First off, I'm the expert on this subject, not some reporter or politician who majored in sociology or women's studies in college. I spent five years of my career developing board-level operating systems for embedded systems, so I know how easy it would be to install a "backdoor" into a device that would allow the device to be controlled remotely by China's military. Furthermore, an implementation that uses public/private key encryption technology could be designed in such a way that the backdoor could not be detected, even by someone who suspects that the backdoor is there.

I have the skills to do this fairly easily, and there are undoubtedly many Chinese engineers with the same skills. So it would be very easy for Huawei to install undetectable backdoors into all its devices, allowing the devices to be controlled by China's military. Furthermore, in 2017, the CCP passed the National Intelligence Law, which demands that all organizations, including Huawei, "support, cooperate with, and collaborate with" China's military in collecting intelligence, even when doing so is illegal. That makes it certain that Huawei's routers can be controlled remotely by China's military.

So any country or company that has installed Huawei networks and devices can be easily spied on by China's military, and the network can be controlled or shut down by China's military, for example at time of war.

Sources:

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22-Nov-20 World View -- Afghan 'peace talks' threatened by terrorist rocket attack on Kabul

Conflicting American values in Vietnam and Afghanistan

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Afghan 'peace talks' threatened by terrorist rocket attack on Kabul
Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail
Conflicting American values in Vietnam
Conflicting American values in Afghanistan
When is a war winnable?

Afghan 'peace talks' threatened by terrorist rocket attack on Kabul

Taliban fighters relax after lunch (Washington Post)

Taliban fighters relax after lunch (Washington Post)

A terrorist barrage of dozens of rockets were fired into residential areas of the the heavily fortified Green Zone of Kabul, Afghanistan's capital city, killing at least eight civilians and wounding dozens more on Saturday.

The Taliban, which is engaged with the United States in so-called "peace talks" taking place in Doha, Qatar, has denied responsibility for the attack.

On the other hand, ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attacks. ISIS is a terrorist group, imported from Syria, in competition with the Taliban to win the prize as the better terrorists.

This occurs amid the backdrop of negotiations taking place in Doha, Qatar, between representatives of America and the Taliban. For a long time, the Taliban refused to allow the Afghan government of president Ashraf Ghani to send representatives to the negotiations, but they've generously lifted that restriction in the last few months. However, as I understand it, the Taliban and Afghan government do not talk to each other, but only engage in "proximity talks." This hilarious phrase means that the two groups are in separate rooms, and a negotiator trots back and forth between the rooms to further the "talks."

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was in Doha on Saturday, where he met separately with the Taliban and Afghan government negotiators. Presumably, Pompeo served as the proximity talk mediator on this occasion.

According to reports, the talks have not even reached the stage for producing a timeline. The original claim was that the Taliban would end its terrorist violence, but, as I understand it, the current demand is that the Taliban "tone down" the violence. (Believe it or not, that's the phrase used by an analyst on tv.)

So the peace talks are a huge joke, and have never been anything but a huge joke. But they do have one purpose: They provide political cover for the Trump administration to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan, which was a campaign promise made by Donald Trump. Trump had claimed that he would get all American troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2020.

He didn't accomplish that, but he did go ahead with announcement that shocked a lot of people. First, on November 9, he fired his Defense Secretary Mike Esper, apparently because Esper opposed removing any troops from Afghanistan. Trump replaced Esper with an acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller, who announced on November 17 that 2,000 troops will be withdrawn from Afghanistan by mid-January. That would reduce the troop level from 4,500 to 2,500.

No one seriously believes that the Taliban will adhere to commitments made in a peace deal once the American troops are all withdrawn. The Taliban want Afghanistan to be governed by the Taliban, as it was prior to 9/11/2001, after which US forces declared war on Afghanistan, a war that's still going on. The Taliban want the war to end and want American troops gone, so that they can go back to hardline jihadist policies, such as closing girls' schools, as well as beating, raping and torturing the Hazaras and other ethnic enemies.

So why did ISIS launch Saturday's terrorist attack? Since ISIS and the Taliban are enemies, they presumably wish to sabotage the peace talks, so that the Taliban can't over the whole country. We'll probably know within a few months.

We may also know within a few months whether the American withdrawal will destabilize the relationships among other countries in the region -- China, Pakistan and India. These countries all have an interest in Afghanistan and have benefited from the American presence, and may now feel it necessary to fill the vacuum created if the Americans leave.

Why the Afghan peace agreement must fail

In 2007, president George Bush launched a "surge" policy in the Iraq war which, much to the surprise of many people, actually worked and won the Iraq war.

So in 2009, president Barack Obama decided that what worked in Iraq would also work in Afghanistan. As I wrote at the the time, and have written many times since then, Iraq and Afghanistan are completely different situations, and a "surge" that worked in Iraq would not work in Afghanistan. This prediction