First permanent deployment of US troops on Russian border since Cold War

Andre Damon

Some 4,000 US troops, together with tanks, artillery and armored vehicles, arrived in Poland over the weekend, further escalating tensions with Russia ahead of the January 20 inauguration of US President-elect Donald Trump. It is the largest US troop deployment in Europe since the Cold War.

The troops will be dispersed over seven Eastern European countries, including the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, all of which border Russia. After nine months, the troops will be replaced with another unit, making the deployment effectively permanent. NATO plans to deploy a further four battalions to the Russian border later this year, including one each to Poland and the three Baltic states.

The deployment follows a week in which US politics was dominated by denunciations of Russia and President Vladimir Putin. In Senate confirmation hearings for Trump administration cabinet nominees, senators called Putin a “war criminal,” an “autocrat” and a murderer, while newspaper reports and TV broadcasts have been filled with charges of Russian plots to subvert the US elections.

The US deployment to Poland is part of the quadrupling of the US defense budget for Eastern Europe in 2017, announced by Defense Secretary Ashton Carter last February. Annual US military spending in the region will rise from $800 million last year to $3.4 billion this year.

In addition to deploying ground forces, the US plans to construct a missile defense system in Poland and further stockpile munitions and armaments along the Russian border.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the buildup “a threat to our security… especially as it concerns a third party building up its military presence near our borders.” He added, “Any country may and will take a buildup of foreign military presence along its borders negatively. This is exactly how we take it.”

The deployment was originally scheduled to take place at the end of this month, after the inauguration, but it was expedited by an Obama administration anxious to prevent any retreat from the aggressive anti-Russia line demanded by dominant sections of the US military and intelligence establishment.

The deployment was welcomed by the virulently right-wing and anti-Russian Polish government, which received a formal warning last year from the European Union for violations of “the rule of law, democracy and human rights.” Since coming to power in October 2015, the Law and Justice (PiS) Party has sought to pack the country’s courts with right-wing ideologues and has cracked down on oppositional media.

Polish officials hailed the US troops on Saturday with a ceremony in the western Polish town of Zagan. The officials made a series of hysterical remarks, seeking to present Russia as an aggressive menace to the sovereignty of Poland and other Eastern European countries.

“We have waited for you for a very long time,” Polish Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz told the assembled troops. “We waited for decades… feeling that we were the only one who protected civilization from aggression that came from the east.”

He said the presence of the US military would ensure “freedom, independence and peace in Europe and the whole world.” Prime Minister Beata Szydlo added, “This is an important day for Poland, for Europe, for our common defense.”

Speaking at the ceremony on Saturday, Paul Jones, the US ambassador to Poland, said the latest deployment signaled an “ironclad commitment” to Washington's NATO allies. “This is America’s most capable fighting force: a combat-ready, highly trained US armored brigade, with our most advanced equipment and weaponry.”

One of the battalions supplied by the United States will be stationed in eastern Poland in the so-called Suwalki Gap between Belarus and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. These troops are intended to serve as a “tripwire” force, raising the chance of a full-scale military conflict between Russia and the US in the event of a border conflict.

The nominal reason for the stepped-up deployment is the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014, portrayed by the US and NATO as an act of unilateral aggression by Russia.

In reality, Russia’s move on Crimea was primarily of a defensive character, a response to the February 2014 US-backed and fascist-led coup in Ukraine that threatened to cut off Russia’s access to its naval base in Sevastopol. The annexation followed an overwhelming referendum vote in mainly Russian-speaking Crimea to secede from Ukraine and join Russia.

The US and its NATO allies used the annexation as the pretext for a series of retaliatory measures, including economic sanctions directed against the Russian government and individuals.

The deployment of US troops has been largely downplayed in the US media, evoking a single mention, as an aside, on ABC’s “This Week" interview progam on Sunday. It was almost entirely ignored on  “Meet the Press” and “Face the Nation.” To the extent that US news outlets, like CNN and the New York Times, reported the deployment, it was to present the move as a defense of small states on Russia’s border.

Completely absent from this reporting was any historical context. The Second World War, which led to the deaths of 26 million Soviet citizens, began with the 1939 invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, which saw the conquest of Poland as the prelude to an invasion of the USSR. Nazi Germany's "war of annihilation" against the Soviet Union began in June of 1941. Hilter considered the conquest of Soviet Russia to be the key to making Germany a world power capable of competing with the United States.

Now, as the United States seeks to cement its stranglehold over Eurasia in preparation for a showdown with its main international rival, China, it prepares for a military clash with Russia, the world’s second-ranked nuclear power.

While for now Trump has signaled a more accommodative stance toward Russia, this is only for the purpose of focusing US diplomatic, economic and military aggression against China. In an interview published this weekend by the Wall Street Journal, Trump simultaneously said he was open to lifting economic sanctions against Russia and reiterated his willingness to reconsider Washington's longstanding policy of not recognizing Taiwan. The Chinese have warned that such a policy move would lead to a rupture of diplomatic relations.

Trump's nominee for secretary of state, former Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson, used his Senate confirmation hearing last week to declare that the US under Trump would block Chinese access to its island posessions in the South China Sea. Chinese sources in response called any such action an act of war.

In the increasingly bitter faction fight within the US political establishment over foreign policy, both sides favor military escalation against nuclear-armed powers, whether against Russia or China, with catastrophic consequences for the entire world.

Between And Betwixt Freedom And Fear In Bangladesh

Fazal M. Kamal

Since women and men don’t live by bread alone it obviously follows that they can’t live only by economics either. And even that is coming under pressure for any number of causes in recent times. Humans, by nature and as has been repeatedly proven over historical time, seek after a point certain intangibles and perhaps even the metaphysical, verging on the sublime, to feel content (provided they ever do; but that’s one whole other story).

In Bangladesh, as has also been previously attempted in many other countries, the notion that is being promoted with some zeal is that development and economic progress should suffice for the nation. And on the other hand, restricting in extreme proportions dissent and criticism, and strangulating opposition politics are prices that ought to be worth paying since the administration is offering muscular statistics that should please.

That, it must be underlined, is a proposal that has lived past its sell-by date and, to some extent, even in a place like China where people have existed through numerous emperors and invaders; and even Russia has experienced stirrings of opposition to the iron hand of Kremlin residents in spite of inexplicable deaths and detentions on murky pretexts. But of course one can say little about some so-called “newly-independent” states mostly in Central Asia and Eastern Europe where a number of rulers with the assiduous support of henchmen have continued to lord it over while avariciously enriching themselves.

But to cut to the chase in this instance, despite the numbers and figures proudly proclaimed by government spokespersons, it is indubitable that a disquiet of one degree or another does vex the nation. And this in spite of or perhaps because of flagrant flackery in circles normally extant in stratospheric regions. The stifling of voices other than those preferred by the powers that be, definitely, also doesn’t help improve the situation; rather it takes on the power to aggravate several degrees more. Consequently, at some point the wonderful taste of success morphs into distasteful excesses.

One reality at present that cannot be emphasized enough is the fact relating to deaths happening every single day in unexplained circumstances and corpses being discovered all across the country, as if society has gone berserk, and this deadly fact doesn’t include what has come to be described as extrajudicial annihilation in so-called shootouts a la Wild Wild West, as it were. Or not, maybe. What, however, makes all of this more unpalatable is the inability of the law enforcement machinery to stanch the persistent slide in this murderous direction.

It has to be noted by administration leaders—though not all of them will have the ability to do so—that you can squelch thoughts critical of government policies and/or decisions, you can muzzle dissent that isn’t meant to harm anyone specifically, and you can curb the activities of the political adversaries only up to some, perhaps, unspecified point; but after that it becomes a futile exercise (as has been demonstrated repeatedly over the centuries) and this may even come back to gnash into your gluteus maximus. Not an actuality that hasn’t been known to occur often over the eons.

In this context it is valid to note an observation made recently by Human Rights Watch: “The rise of populist leaders in the United States and Europe poses a dangerous threat to basic rights protections while encouraging abuse by autocrats around the world. Donald Trump’s election as US president after a campaign fomenting hatred and intolerance, and the rising influence of political parties in Europe that reject universal rights, have put the postwar human rights system at risk.” It added that “demagogues threaten human rights” in these present times.

The perennial fear is that governments appealing to the most basic instincts and base nature of the electorate, as underscored in the above paragraph, can and mostly likely will act on their crudest tenets when push comes to shove, as the phrase goes. To one extent or perhaps to another, Bangladesh over the decades has already tasted this type of abomination. But the greater worry is that as the world has continued to evolve, so has the poisonous stuff in statecraft. In fact, a perusal of missives of felicitations sent to D. Trump after his triumph by state leaders from around the world makes for a wonderfully revealing read!

Apart from facing economic challenges, now and in the near future particularly due to the dearth of opportunities available to those who have received a fair amount of education or training as also due to the exigencies in the world’s economies, in Bangladesh there is a persistent anxiety engendered by insecurity of life, limb and property. In such cases lately it has been observed there are increasing instances involving the so-called minority communities; a deeply despicable fact by and in itself with one organization stating that in the past year alone there has been a five-fold rise in attacks on these people many of whom feel vulnerable even in other times.

While reviewing this scenario it can’t be helped but peer into the role enacted by law enforcement entities. Whether because of outside pressure (mainly from politically influential honchos) or whether because of apprehensions arising out of not toeing the party line or whether because of the actions of rogue elements, law enforcement plays an outsize and conspicuous role which, obviously and naturally, often appear to go against the interests of the populace. Ditto with persons mandated to collect internal revenue—though evidently their actions at times can rise to the level of Keystone Cops! But that of course in no way assuages the feelings of the affected people.

And we haven’t even touched upon such matters as sticky fingers, greased palms, extortion under threat of being kneecapped, largess being spread around like it’s going out of style tomorrow (while on this point, it maybe noted that tomorrow in fact never comes for some), purported masters of the media succumbing to pressure and intimidation, mostly unemployed youths but most times claiming to be students taking comprehensive advantage of links to the ruling party and in general functioning as loose cannons all over the country, and so on and so forth. Yes, the laundry list can be as long as an arm and a leg.

The ultimate reality is that mysterious disappearances, unexplained murders, incarceration on absurdly tenuous grounds, constant hounding of political adversaries and similar other actions have not ever—as in never ever—assured the tranquil continuation of any order without the willing acquiescence of other essential actors and more importantly and primarily that of the people. Legitimacy in governance can be attained only from the free participation of the electorate.

Given the circumstances it will be most pertinent to conclude by quoting Thomas Jefferson: “The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide, whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” At another time he declared, “Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”

Anyone listening? Yet?

Government and employers attack striking apparel workers in Bangladesh

Wimal Perera

The Bangladesh government and the country’s garment industry employers are continuing a joint assault on apparel workers who have been involved in major strikes and protests for higher wages and other demands in a Dhaka industrial area. The repression is aimed at preventing a broader eruption by workers against the living and working conditions they face.

In the Ashulia industrial belt of Dhaka’s Savar district, at least 1,600 workers have been sacked and around 1,500 sued, accused of “inciting” the agitation, “trespassing,” “vandalism” and “theft.” Most of the sued workers fear arrest at any time, preventing them from seeking employment at other factories.

Thirty workers and union leaders have been arrested already, with some remanded in custody. The Awami League (AL) government has used the Special Powers Act, a notorious military-era law, to detain them. Raids are being conducted throughout Ashulia, hunting for the sued workers, and arrest warrants have been sent to the police stations of their home districts.

Factory managements are using this state repression to intimidate workers in order to intensify their exploitation. In the factories on the outskirts of Dhaka, employers are forcing employees to work extra hours without any overtime payments. At IDS Group, the management threatened workers with arrest if they refused to work the extra hours.

The Ashulia workers’ campaign started with a walkout at the Windy Group apparel factory on December 11, demanding a revision of the minimum wages. This provided a spark for other workers facing worsening conditions. Workers from about 25 apparel factories subsequently joined the strike, putting forward 16 demands, including a wage rise to 16,000 taka ($US200) a month, from the present 5,300 taka. Ultimately, the striking workers’ numbers swelled to about 150,000, many of whom were on strike for 10 days.

Fearing that the strike would spread to other factories in Ashulia, apparel companies and authorities responded by locking out workers at about 85 factories. Prime Minister Sheik Hasina’s government deployed the police, Border Guard Bangladesh and the notorious Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) to suppress the growing protest. At least 10 workers were injured as police baton-charged and fired tear gas shells on the protesting workers.

When some 59 of the locked-out factories were re-opened on December 26, most sacked dozens of workers. There was a clear indication of the government’s collaboration in this witch-hunt. At a meeting with the garment employers earlier, state minister for labour Mujibul Haque threatened “stern action against those who instigated the workers in Ashulia and those who will be caught doing the same in future.”

Further, Haque said the government and the employers were “gathering information from different sources to know the identities of the instigators.” He branded the strike as “illegal” and “misconduct.” In line with Haque, the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) labelled the workers’ agitation as a “conspiracy.”

On December 23, police seized Ekushey Television journalist Nazmul Huda for allegedly inciting the unrest. He was accused of “inaccurate reporting” on the protests. A Dhaka court on December 27 remanded Huda for interrogation by the police.

Hasina’s government is seeking to justify its repression by branding the workers’ actions as a “conspiracy” instigated by outsiders and is also moving to use the workers’ protests to silence its political opponents.

On December 22, the Dhaka District Bangladesh National Party (BNP) president and former MP, Dr Dewan Mohammad Salahuddin Babu, was sued for “alleged involvement in the instigation of the workers for creating the recent RMG [ready-made garment] unrest.”

The anti-working class record of the BNP while in power, however, makes clear that this right-wing party is just as hostile to workers as the ruling AL.

Contrary to government’s allegations about outside “instigations,” the Ashulia garment workers’ struggle was triggered by their appalling conditions. The New Age on December 20 reported that workers complained that “prices of all essential goods increased by at least 100 percent but their wages [had] remained the same since 2013.”

Babul Hossain, an apparel worker told the newspaper that the rent of a room had gone up by 1,000 Taka to 1,500 Taka, but workers received only a “five percent yearly increment on our basic salaries.”

The minimum wage of 5,300 taka a month, set through an agreement between the trade unions and the government in 2013 after massive apparel workers’ protests, in no way matches the skyrocketing prices for essentials. But even that meagre wage is not paid by many factory owners.

The strikes and protests of Ashulia garment workers developed outside the official trade unions, which were desperately trying to prevent such a movement. The actions broke out following the breakdown of talks between the BGMEA and unions on November 25.

Sramik Karmachari Federation (SKF) general secretary Arafat Jakaria Sonjoy told the Dhaka Tribune: “The factory closure is hurting both the workers and owners as well as the country’s economy. That is why, we urged the BGMEA to hold such meeting to resolve the deadlock.”

The SKF leader added: “I think there is no direct connection of organised trade unions and it was not a right decision to go on strike without placing the list of demands.”

The common fear of the government, employers and unions about the Ashulia workers’ campaign is underscored by the importance of the industrial belt for the country’s garment industry. The D aily Star reported on December 25: “Ashulia is known as a hub of more than 350 most compliant garment factories. The contribution of the factories amounts to 20 percent of the total export of garment items of $28 billion in the last fiscal year.”

The past few months have seen a growth of industrial action by Bangladesh workers. In October, about 600 employees of state-owned mobile operator Teletalk started an indefinite strike across the country, demanding a 100 percent increase in basic salaries.

In November, around 100 CNB Composite Ltd garment factory workers demonstrated in Ashulia, demanding the reopening of their factory, payment of wage arrears, and reversal of the sacking of 20 workers.

In December, several hundred Rezaul Apparels workers in Dhaka city started, demanding payment of wages and compensation for the relocation of the factory. Workers at Burimari land port staged a two-day strike for a wage increase.

The Awami League government fears that any increase of wages would undercut the employers’ competitiveness with other apparel-producing countries. The country’s garment sector monthly wage—about $US67 or 5,300 takas—is the lowest in the world and far less than $112 per month in India and $280 in China.

The government’s current budget has approved 46 special economic zones, and the government has vowed to establish a total of 100 zones in 15 years in order to attract more investment for the apparel sector. To maintain the lowest wages, Hasina’s administration is determined to keep the working class suppressed. This will further intensify the already explosive social and political situation.

Millions of disabled Australians to be denied national insurance support

Max Newman

Millions of disabled people face being locked out of the Australian government’s National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) and left to receive negligible or inadequate assistance. This includes more than 200,000 people with severe mental illnesses who have a primary diagnosis of a psychosocial disability.

Now being rolled-out nationally, the NDIS is a voucher-based plan launched by the previous Labor government in 2012, designed from the recommendations of a 2011 Productivity Commission report.

While the corporate media and the entire political establishment presented the NDIS as a progressive and compassionate “reform,” the recommendations focused on cost-cutting and privatising measures. These included the closure of all state-run and government disability support programs, and their replacement by services offered, on a market basis, by profit-making or non-government operators, a process already underway.

Labor, which lost office in 2013, also instigated a related drive to push about half, or 400,000, Disability Support Pension (DSP) recipients off the pension, with a heavy emphasis on shifting disabled people into low-paid work.

Part of the plan was to limit the number of NDIS participants to 490,000. This is dramatically below the number of people living with a disability in Australia which is, according to a Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) 2015 report, one in five Australians, or 4.3 million people.

Most of those, 78.5 percent, report living with a physical disability, while the remaining 21.5 percent report mental health or behavioural problems. The Productivity Commission limited the number of people with severe mental illness permitted to access the NDIS to just 57,000. The NDIS has since capped the number from this category to 64,000 by 2019–20.

According to unpublished findings from the National Mental Health Service Planning Framework, reported in the Australian, of those identified by the 2015 ABS survey, at least 290,000 require ongoing psychiatric and community support for mental health problems. Of this group, at least 100,000 have or are losing all support services as the NDIS rolls out.

Mental health programs and facilities have been chronically-underfunded for years, leaving many in need unable to obtain help and support. This social crisis will now worsen.

Among the programs on which those with mental illness currently rely are the federally-funded Personal Helpers and Mentors program (PHaMs) and the Mental Health Carers Respite scheme, each worth about $200 million annually. Over the next three years, they will be shut down, despite large waiting lists.

The acting CEO of the Anglicare charity in Tasmania, Darryl Lamb, said that by its estimates at least 30 to 40 percent of those current receiving support via its delivery of PHaMs program in that state will be ineligible for the NDIS.

Since the NDIS rollout began nationally last July, there has already been a significant impact in the areas initially targeted. In the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), the quota of 5,075 NDIS places was filled in just three months. More than 2,000 others, particularly those with serious mental health conditions, have been told they cannot access the scheme unless a person dies or their circumstances change.

The federally-funded Partners in Recovery (PIR) program in the ACT supports around 160 people with severe and persistent mental illness, but only 20 to 30 participants were determined to be eligible for the NDIS. This was compounded in December by the closure of The Rainbow, a psychosocial rehabilitation program in the ACT that provided outreach and community support, as well as supported accommodation, for those with acute psychiatric disorders.

Mental Health Community Coalition of the ACT executive officer Simon Viereck said there had been an expectation that all of those accessing PIR would be eligible. He told the media there was now great uncertainty about the future for those denied help.

Similar concerns are being expressed across the country. Connie Digolis from the Mental Health Council of Tasmania told the media: “As we’re starting to understand more about the criteria and how people are being assessed for their eligibility, then we’re starting to see figures that are suggesting perhaps 90 percent of people with a mental illness who are currently receiving services may not qualify for NDIS.” Many of those excluded “may end up becoming more ill.”

The Turnbull Liberal-National government has denied there are problems. A Department of Social Services representative said there was “no evidence” from the trial sites of inaccurate forecasts of people with psychosocial disability. “Any of our Commonwealth clients who are not eligible for the NDIS will receive continuity of support,” she said.

This “continuity of support” is to be delivered in the NDIS’s second-tier program, which the Productivity Commission predicted would affect four million people with a disability. Entitled Information, Linkages and Capacity (ILC), this arm of the NDIS is slated for roll out from this year with paltry funding of just $132 million over four years, which is estimated to equate to around $8 per person in need, per year.

The treatment of the mentally-ill is a graphic expression of the pro-business agenda behind the NDIS, which is designed to outsource and cut services, as part of a wider drive to slash welfare and social programs. It was announced by the Gillard Labor government in 2012 alongside similar “reforms,” including cuts to aged pension and sole parent payments.

Resignation of Sinn Fein’s McGuinness throws Northern Ireland into crisis

Steve James

The sudden January 9 resignation of Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein leader and Northern Ireland’s Deputy First Minister, has provoked a political crisis. If he is not replaced, then his Unionist counterpart is forced from office as well, the result of a power-sharing stipulation set by the Good Friday Agreement of 1998.

Sinn Fein has made clear it will not nominate a replacement for the suddenly ailing McGuinness. Northern Ireland is therefore set, at the very least, for weeks of direct British rule and a new general election that has been described by outgoing First Minister Arlene Foster of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) as likely to be “brutal.”

In his resignation letter to the speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly in Stormont, McGuinness bitterly complained of the DUP’s “crude and crass bigotry” and the British government’s refusal to “honour agreements” or to “resolve the issues of the part while imposing austerity and Brexit against the wishes and best interests of people here.”

This was the backdrop, McGuinness continued, against which the “current scandal over the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) has emerged,” which “has led to enormously damaging pressure on our public finances and a crisis of confidence in the political institutions.”

Foster, who is at the centre of the RHI scandal, has, according to McGuinness, refused to “recognise public anger or to exhibit any humility,” which was “inflicting enormous damage on the Executive, the Assembly and the entire politic.”

RHI is a British government scheme under which enterprises switching to bio-mass fuel sources can claim subsidies on their fuel bills for up to 20 years. In Northern Ireland, the scheme was rolled out, when Foster was in charge of the Department for Enterprise Trade and Investment, with none of the cost limits in force in mainland Britain. As a consequence, RHI in Northern Ireland has become an enormous boondoggle for farms and businesses.

Nearly £500 million appears to have been handed out before the project was exposed by a whistle blower. Thereafter, the DUP has been attempting to cover its tracks over what, according to Colum Eastwood, the leader of the opposition Social Democratic and Labour Party, is “the biggest finance scandal in the history of devolution.”

The DUP has been accused of delaying closure of the scheme, has refused to allow a list of its major donors to be reconciled with beneficiaries of the scheme, and has refused a public inquiry.

The RHI scandal is only the latest in a string of corruption scandals around the DUP, the hardline unionist party founded by the late Protestant evangelical demagogue, the Reverend Ian Paisley, and which has been sharing power in Northern Ireland with Sinn Fein since 2007.

In 2010, Paisley’s replacement, then First Minister Peter Robinson, temporarily stood down while allegations surrounding his wife Iris were investigated. In 2012, Robinson was accused of protecting a now defunct housing outfit, Red Sky, over a maintenance contract. Robinson finally stepped aside in 2015 with allegations swirling around him over so-called “Namagate,” concerning sale of a vast property portfolio held by the Irish government’s “bad bank,” the National Asset Management Agency (NAMA), set up in the aftermath of the 2008 financial collapse.

Over this entire period, Sinn Fein, and McGuinness in particular, has doggedly defended power-sharing and their relationship with the DUP, for whom they have systemically covered.

Despite their mildly left rhetoric in the South, in the North, the bourgeois nationalists of Sinn Fein have been at great pains to present themselves as a responsible party of capitalist government whose greatest concern is to ensure the political stability necessary to attract investment capital. In coalition with the bigots of the DUP, Sinn Fein has imposed one austerity measure after another on the working class, with both parties ignoring the stack of unresolved murders, allegations and deep suspicions of 30 years of the “Troubles” to manipulate and inflame tensions as and when required.

This time around, Sinn Fein again did their best to prop up Foster until the last possible moment, prevaricating on the need for an independent inquiry into “cash for ash” and refusing to call for her resignation when she defied assembly rules in attempting to cover her tracks. Foster was even opposed from within the DUP, when former Stormont Minister Jonathan Bell accused the DUP of attempting to “cleanse the record” regarding their efforts to keep RHI going.

Two factors, besides what appears to be a very rapid decline in McGuinness’ health, have made it impossible for Sinn Fein to carry on as before.

First is the growth of social inequality. Northern Ireland remains significantly poorer than the rest of the UK, and as everywhere else in both Britain and Ireland, inequality is sharply deepening. In 2013-14, according the Northern Ireland government’s own figures, over one year the poorest 20 percent of the population saw their income fall by 6 percent, while the richest 20 percent got richer by the same amount. Some 101,000 children of a population of only 1.8 million are living in poverty, as are 63,000 pensioners. In 2014, 22 percent of the total population, 395,100, were in poverty, an increase of one percent in one year.

This has led to an erosion of support for all of the leading parties. The leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, displaced by the DUP as the leading unionist party in the aftermath of power sharing, Mike Nesbitt, complained in the Belfast Telegraph, “Stormont is held in contempt by a large part of our population.”

Nesbitt pointed to a steady decline in the proportion of eligible voters casting ballots, from 70 percent in 1998 to 55 percent last year. “Cash for ash does not sit well with ever lengthening NHS waiting lists, Troubles victims seeking pensions to compensate for lost life opportunities and the elderly facing the winter dilemma of ‘heat or eat,’” he said.

This has particularly impacted Sinn Fein, who have been losing support to the pseudo-left People Before Profit alliance. Since 2016 the alliance have had two members in the Northern Ireland Assembly, led by Eamonn McCann of the Socialist Workers Party.

Looming over events is Brexit, which is likely to dominate any election. Northern Ireland, which voted to remain in the European Union, is likely to be badly hit by the economic impact of Brexit, which the DUP and People Before Profit support and which all the other parties, including the UUP, oppose.

As the recipient of considerable EU regional subsidies, and sharing a border with the Republic of Ireland, which will remain in the EU, Northern Ireland faces a long period of uncertainty, a loss of funding and, despite all the protestations from the British government and the DUP, an economically problematic border of some form with the South. The impact will be all the greater if, as seems increasingly likely, the Westminster government is forced into a “hard Brexit” involving exit from the Single Market, or even a complete collapse of relations with whatever remains of the EU.

Sinn Fein’s decision to force an election about the time when the British government triggers the Article 50 process to leave the EU appears therefore to be a gamble, in conditions of deep class tensions, on utilising the Brexit and RHI crises to strengthen its own position on both sides of the border—possibly even paving the way for a referendum on unification as provided for under the Good Friday Agreement.

It is in this context that the Irish Times reported that an unnamed senior Sinn Fein source suggested that the party could live without Stormont because the “cash for ash” crisis will serve the party’s all-Ireland ambitions.

In line with this, just before McGuinness’ resignation, the minority Irish government’s chief whip, Fine Gael’s Regina Doherty, broke ranks with her party by publicly stating she was open to forming a coalition with Sinn Fein. For his part, right-wing, pro-austerity Irish Taoiseach, Fine Gael’s Enda Kenny, has repeatedly stated that Brexit offers an “uncomplicated route” to Irish unification.

More restrictive laws target refugees after Berlin attack

Martin Kreikenbaum

Less than three weeks after the terrorist attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, Justice Minister Heiko Maas (Social Democrats, SPD) and Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière (Christian Democrats, CDU) have agreed on a number of more restrictive laws targeting, above all, refugees and migrants. A dramatic expansion of deportation detention is planned, as well as a tightening of residency regulations for asylum seekers and the introduction of electronic tags for so-called “potential threats.”

“The protective rule of law is the best answer to the hatred of the terrorists,” Maas stated at the press conference following consultations with de Maizière. Both ministers also got backing from Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU), who announced on Monday that the government would rapidly draw the appropriate conclusions and “really [show] its true colours” on questions of internal security. In fact, the current tightening of regulations represents an assault on basic democratic principles and clears the way for the creation of thought crimes and the concept developed by Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt of enemy criminal law.

In total, Maas and de Maizière have agreed on nine measures.

The restriction on detention pending deportation for those obliged to leave the country, among those who cannot be deported within three months, is to be lifted. As a result, any rejected asylum seeker could end up behind bars for up to 18 months even if they have committed no crime.

In addition, custody prior to departure, a form of internment ordered by a court to ensure the deportation of a refugee, is to be lengthened from the current maximum of four to 10 days. This measure, which was only established in July 2015, will also be used much more frequently. According to the wishes of de Maizière, a large number of detention centres will be built close to airports. Refugees taken into custody prior to departure will be gathered there and deported.

Even more significant is the introduction of a new legal justification for detention pending deportation. Thus far, detention pending deportation, referred to legally as “security detention,” could only be ordered if a foreigner was obliged to leave and it could be proven that he or she wanted to avoid deportation. For this, the suspicion that someone poses a “terrorist threat” or “a significant threat to security” will be sufficient, as de Maizière explained.

This refers to “potential threats,” a concept that has no legal basis. It actually refers to people whom the police or intelligence agencies suspect of representing “a danger to public security,” without any firm grounds for that suspicion existing. The Federal Criminal Agency (BKA) reportedly counts some 550 people as being “potential threats,” of whom less than half live in Germany. Only 62 of them are, in fact, obliged to leave the country.

The term “potential threat” was introduced in September 2001 under the anti-terrorism law implemented by then Interior Minister Otto Schily (SPD). In immigration law, Schily introduced the concept of a “threat to public security” as an additional reason for deportation. On the basis of a simple suspicion that someone supported a terrorist organisation and poses a threat to security, asylum applications could be automatically dismissed since this change.

Maas and de Maizière are pushing this regulation to the limit by effectively removing the presumption of innocence for foreigners. They can now be detained for up to 18 months without having been legally convicted of a criminal act or even being suspected of a specific crime.

This thus amounts to the creation of a system of enemy justice, whose traditions go back to the jurist Carl Schmitt, who used it to provide juridical cover for the crimes of the Nazis, and finds its contemporary expression in the US prison camp in Guantanamo, Cuba.

Detention pending deportation is thus returning to its historic roots. It was first introduced into German law in May 1919 in Bavaria after the suppression of the Munich Soviet Republic. Detention pending deportation served at that time as a preventive measure against the activities of foreign socialists so as to block revolutionary upsurges. In 1938, the regulation was adopted word for word by the Hitler regime and written into the policing order on foreigners, where it survived beyond the end of the Nazi regime and remained as law in the Federal Republic until 1965.

The surveillance of “threats” by means of an electronic tag agreed to by Maas and de Maizière leads in the same direction. Originally, the justice minister only wanted to use tags on criminals who had been convicted of terrorist crimes and released from custody. But instead, this drastic attack on personal freedom will be expanded to include the simple suspicion that a person could pose a threat.

However, criminologists and jurists question whether this will bring any benefit to security. The former president of the Constitutional Court in North Rhine-Westphalia, Michael Bertrams, views the electronic tag and the use of detention pending deportation on “threats” as a clear violation of Germany’s Basic Law. He wrote in the Kölner Stadtanzeiger, “The preventive detention or internment of threats, who are seen as innocent before the law, cannot be legitimised in a state under the rule of law. I doubt whether a law regulating this would pass judgement with the Federal Constitutional Court.”

But this has not troubled the ministers for justice and the interior, whose offices are actually supposed to protect the constitution. On the contrary. Maas already signalled prior to the announcement that democratic rights ought to be jettisoned. He stated that “confirmed threats who are obliged to leave must be deported as quickly as possible. To ensure the deportation of ‘threats,’ we must take them into detention pending deportation. Detention pending deportation ought therefore to apply to ‘threats’ in the future when their state of origin fails to cooperate with repatriation.”

Additional legal changes agreed include the tightening of residency requirements for asylum seekers who make false claims about their identities. This will mainly affect civil war refugees unable to travel with identification documents or who were compelled by smugglers to dispose of them.

States refusing to accept rejected asylum seekers from Germany will face sanctions in the future, either by cutting development aid or increasing requirements for citizens to obtain travel visas. Maas said at the press conference, “We must increase the duties placed on countries of origin. We should not exclude the cutting of financial aid. It must be clear that whoever does not cooperate will be sanctioned.”

The two ministers explicitly avoided dealing with the plans previously presented by de Maizière to radically restructure Germany’s security agencies by centralising them and to do away with the separation between the police and intelligence agencies. These demands contained in his guidelines for a strong state aim to transform Germany into a police state.

But this is how legal changes are enforced which do away with basic democratic rights, particularly for refugees and immigrants. The Berlin attack is being systematically exploited to place foreigners, refugees and immigrants from North Africa in particular under a cloud of suspicion and massively strengthen the state apparatus.

The deployment of police during New Year’s Eve in Cologne, which implemented personal checks on people based on their obviously non-German appearance and issued bans on them being present in the local area, was welcomed by all parties represented in parliament as a harsh but necessary measure to deal with allegedly aggressive foreigners willing to use violence.

In the case of Anis Amri, the police and intelligence agencies had close contact with the alleged Berlin attacker over a period of many months and knew a great deal about his intention to conduct a terrorist attack. The attack, which killed 12 and injured dozens more, occurred under the noses of the security agencies and raises the question as to whether Amri was allowed to strike in order to provide a justification for the reorganisation of the security authorities and a drastic restriction of basic democratic rights.

But virtually nobody is questioning this. The reason is that all of the political parties agree on the abolition of democratic rights, the expansion of surveillance and police powers, and the centralisation of the security agencies. This not only applies to the governing parties, but also to the Left Party and Greens.

After Green chairwoman Simone Peter was publicly savaged for her criticism of the Cologne police on New Year’s Eve, all party leaders are now demanding an expansion of video surveillance and an acceleration of deportations.

Left Party leader Sahra Wagenknecht has in the meantime adopted the slogans of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and blamed the influx of refugees for the Berlin attack. As she put it, “Along with the uncontrolled opening of the borders, the police have also been cut to the breaking point, and no longer has the personnel or equipment appropriate to the threat level.”

PS candidates signal continuity with French President Hollande’s policies

Alex Lantier

On Thursday night, seven Socialist Party (PS) and allied presidential candidates participated in the first nationally televised debate in the run-up to the PS presidential primary on January 22 and 29.

The debate takes place amid a historic collapse of the PS—one of the French bourgeoisie’s main ruling parties since its foundation in 1969—which has been deeply discredited by President François Hollande’s agenda of austerity, police-state rule and war. At 4 percent approval ratings, Hollande is France’s most unpopular president since the creation of the office in 1958. Hollande himself has declined to stand again, and there are rising fears in ruling circles that the PS could disintegrate and collapse, like its social-democratic sister party, Pasok, in Greece.

This underscores the extraordinary character of Thursday’s debate. The fears of the imminent annihilation of the PS notwithstanding, not a single candidate could make a forthright criticism of Hollande or call for a shift in policy in the interests of working people. The seven presidential candidates all signaled, in their own fashion, that they would continue the basic thrust of Hollande’s despised agenda.

The first speaker was Hollande’s former prime minister, Manuel Valls, the candidate most directly representing Hollande’s legacy. He issued a bald defense of Hollande’s policies of austerity, police-state build-up, and appeals to far-right sentiment, while cynically presenting his candidacy as a barrier to those of the conservative François Fillon and the neo-fascist Marine Le Pen.

“According to every prediction,” Valls said, “the left will be eliminated from the second round of the presidential election. Our country would only have two options: the far right or the hard right. I refuse to accept that. I love France, she gave me everything.”

Having admitted that the French people despise the Hollande administration’s record, Valls went on to defend its most draconian policies, including the imposition of a regressive labor law without a parliamentary vote, as well as of an indefinitely extended state of emergency.

Valls, backed by the other candidates, insisted that France was “at war” with terrorism and defended Hollande’s targeted extrajudicial murders: “What must be done must be done, what should be kept secret should be kept secret.”

Valls thrust aside criticisms of the PS’s failed attempt earlier this year to inscribe in the French constitution the policy of deprivation of nationality. This was an appeal to the far right, as the policy was used in the Nazi Occupation to justify the initial deportation of Jews, particularly children, to death camps and to outlaw the French Resistance. “But come on, who did this law target? It did not target the children of the Republic due to their origins. It targeted terrorists,” Valls said.

The other candidates—PS ex-ministers Arnaud Montebourg, Benoît Hamon, and Vincent Peillon, former Green deputy François de Rugy, Democratic Front leader and ex-Green Jean-Luc Bennahmias, and Radical Left Party (PRG) candidate Sylvia Pinel—either endorsed or made perfunctory criticisms of Hollande’s record.

While Peillon said it provoked “incomprehension” and de Rugy called it “mixed,” Montebourg said it was “hard to defend but contains some improvements.” Hamon declared that it gave off an “unfinished feeling, as if we abandoned a lot of things in midstream.”

The debate featured a long discussion of Hamon’s plans for a universal guaranteed revenue, which he presented as a way of addressing the lack of jobs in France, by allowing people to survive based on long-term unemployment. Insofar as the monthly revenue Hamon wants to guarantee would be somewhere between €600 and €800, this simply underscores that his plan is to legislate generalized poverty and joblessness—and then try to pass this program off as progressive.

One measure of the discrediting of the PS was that the moderators raised the possibility that the PS candidate would be eliminated and would have to back either Hollande’s former economy minister, investment banker Emmanuel Macron, or possibly former PS minister and former Left Party leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the second round of the elections.

Business circles are promoting Macron, a pro-austerity and pro-European Union (EU) candidate who has met during the campaign with right-wing nationalists like Philippe de Villiers, and was in Berlin this week to pledge more austerity. It appears that their concern is not only to ensure a safe pair of hands to continue Hollande’s policies, but also to try to find a leader around which the French ruling elite can rebrand the PS machine and prevent the collapse of the EU.

Financial magazine Challenges wrote, “if Macron is ahead, the PS candidate will have a choice of falling in line behind him or collapsing. If it falls in line, the PS survives. If it collapses, it dies.”

The PS primary debate exemplifies the deep political crisis facing the French and indeed the entire European bourgeoisie. After nearly a decade of deep economic crisis and social austerity since the 2008 Wall Street crash, and escalating imperialist interventions from Mali and Libya to Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine, longstanding institutions of European bourgeois rule are deeply discredited. After the collapse of Pasok and of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE), the PS is heading for a debacle of historic significance.

The PS was built after the May-June 1968 general strike as a bourgeois party designed to block a revolutionary struggle of the working class and stabilize bourgeois rule in Europe. It was always deeply hostile to the working class and to socialism. A party that regrouped ex-Vichy collaborators like François Mitterrand, former social democrats, and various ex-Trotskyist and ex-Stalinist forces, it was well to the right of the old social-democratic party.

It formed the Union of the Left alliance with the Stalinist French Communist Party (PCF), as well as with various renegades from Trotskyism, in order to associate itself falsely with the 1917 Revolution in Russia. At the same time, it supported the denunciations of Marxism and of proletarian revolution by postmodernists like Michel Foucault and his allies, anti-Communist New Philosophers like Bernard-Henri Lévy and André Glucksmann. This paved the way for Mitterrand’s election to the presidency in 1981 and a vast shift to the right in official politics in France.

After less than two years in office, Mitterrand had abandoned the social concessions he had pledged to make and was rapidly moving to implement a pro-business agenda. The PS justified its “austerity turn” with claims that they were necessary to continue European integration and align France on the most competitive European economies. Throughout the 1980s, it pushed for the formation of the EU, culminating in the 1992 Maastricht treaty and of the common euro currency, which it hoped to use to contain Germany.

The discrediting of the PS and the collapse of social-democratic parties across Europe is part of the broader discrediting of these institutions, set up by the European bourgeoisie twenty-five years ago at the time of the Stalinist dissolution of the USSR. With the EU a byword for austerity and war and the euro torn apart by tensions between the different countries in the euro zone, the PS has nothing to offer but even more attacks on the working class.

Report to Davos summit: Rising inequality threatens “market capitalism”

Nick Beams

The year 2016 was characterised politically by the emergence of deep hostility to the official political and economic establishment as a result of rising social inequality. This was manifested most sharply in the Brexit vote in Britain and the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency, with right-wing nationalist forces being the main beneficiaries to date due to the reactionary anti-working class policies of what passes for the political “left.”

This shift has found expression in a warning sounded by the World Economic Forum, which hosts its annual gathering of world business and political leaders in Davos, Switzerland next week. The annual “risks report” prepared for the meeting concludes that the growing concentration of income and wealth at the very top of society is the biggest single risk to the stability of the economic and political order over which the millionaires and billionaires assembling in Davos preside. The report identifies “rising income and wealth inequality” as the most significant force driving global politics over the next decade.

The report cites the weakness of the economic “recovery” following the financial crisis of 2008 as one of the reasons for the anti-establishment backlash, but warns that boosting growth is not sufficient to shore up the credibility of the capitalist system.

There is a need to revive growth, “but the growing mood of anti-establishment populism suggests we may have passed the stage where this alone would remedy fractures in society: reforming market capitalism must also be added to the agenda,” the report states.

It continues: “The combination of economic inequality and political polarization threatens to amplify global risks, fraying the social solidarity on which the legitimacy of our economic and political systems rest.”

The report notes that the policy of quantitative easing by the world’s central banks—the pumping of trillions of dollars into the global financial system—has “exacerbated income inequality” by boosting “the returns enjoyed by the owners of financial assets, while workers’ real earnings have been growing very slowly.”

Productivity growth has been slow to recover from the crisis and structural rates of unemployment remain high, particularly among young people in Europe, while in the United States there has been a marked decline in the labour participation rate, signifying that large numbers of workers are dropping out of the workforce.

The report points out that “in contrast to the pre-crisis era, when China’s rapid expansion bolstered overall growth rates, there is no market game-changer on the horizon,” with China in a gradual slowdown as its economy moves away from investment-led growth.

“In sum, it is difficult to identify routes that will lead back to robust global rates of economic growth,” the Davos report concludes.

In line with other studies, the report points to rising inequality in the US, with the incomes of the top 1 percent rising by 31 percent between 2009 and 2012 compared to less than 0.5 percent for the rest of the population.

“Middle-class income stagnation,” it states, “is particularly affecting youth; recent research shows that 540 million young people across advanced economies face the prospect of growing up to be poorer than their parents.”

In examining longer-term trends, the report dwells on the impact of new technologies associated with the advance of computerisation and the Internet. According to one study it cites, some 47 percent of jobs in the United States are at risk from automation, affecting more than 80 percent of low-income work.

“Technology is also contributing to the changing nature of work, with secure and predictable jobs giving way to more sporadic and short-term self-employment,” with research suggesting that the number of people in so-called “alternative work arrangements” in the US increased faster than overall employment between 2005 and 2015.

In fact, the rate at which this is taking place is increasing. A recent study has found that 94 percent of the 10 million jobs created during the Obama administration were temporary, contract or part-time positions, with the proportion of the workforce engaged in such occupations rising from 10.7 percent to 15.8 percent. The number of full-time jobs today is 1 million below the level at the start of the recession.

The increased use of technology provides the material foundation for the advance of living standards. But under the profit system, it is the means for driving down the living standards of the mass of the population.

According to statistics prepared by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and cited in the World Economic Forum report, up to 80 percent of the decline in labour’s share in national income between 1990 and 2007 was the result of the impact of technology. This trend will only have accelerated in the past decade.

The report warns that one way in which technological change could prove disruptive is via the labour market, with incomes pushed down and unemployment pushed up in affected sectors and regions, leading to “disruptive” social conditions. This is in line with the overall finding of the report that “the most important of global risks is the pairing of unemployment and social instability.”

While pointing to the rise of populist and nationalist movements, the report does not offer much in the way of in-depth analysis. But it does at least indicate one of the most significant factors, noting that “the economic policies of historically mainstream parties from the right and the left have converged in recent decades,” making it possible for “once-fringe movements” to rise by “portraying the established parties as part of the same technocratic political class, focused on self-enrichment.”

The overriding fear of the World Economic Forum, though not stated explicitly in the report, is that popular opposition will shift to the left. As other commentators have noted in this, the centenary year of the Russian Revolution, there is a parallel between the conditions that prevailed a century ago and those of today.

Summing up its findings, the report concludes that it is a “febrile time for the world,” where “deep-rooted social and economic trends are manifesting themselves disruptively across the world,” and “persisting inequality, particularly in the context of comparative economic weakness, risks undermining the legitimacy of market capitalism.”

The World Economic Forum, which begins in the alpine resort of Davos, Switzerland on Tuesday, will involve the usual round of networking by business chiefs, political leaders and the heads of NGOs, as lucrative deals are made and relationships established. Of course, it will produce no solutions to the deepening social, political and economic malaise. How could it, as the forces gathered there preside over the very social order that has produced the crisis?

But for the global elites, the taste of the champagne, the delicacy of the canapés and the flavour of the haute cuisine may be somewhat tainted by the smell of death wafting up from the grave opening up before them.

China and Russia to counter US anti-missile systems in Asia

Peter Symonds

China and Russia have agreed to take unspecified “countermeasures” against US plans to install a sophisticated anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea. While nominally directed against North Korea, Washington’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) deployment is part of an expanding US network of anti-missile systems in Asia aimed at preparing for war against China and Russia.

The two countries issued a joint statement following a meeting co-chaired by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov and Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Kong Xuanyou. The countermeasures, the statement declared, “will be aimed at safeguarding interests of China and Russia and the strategic balance in the region.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said yesterday that the US decision to deploy the THAAD anti-missile system “seriously threatened China’s security interest” and also undermined the regional strategic balance. “China and other countries have to address our own legitimate security concerns and take necessary measures to safeguard our security interest,” he said.

Russian Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov also expressed concern in October over the continued build-up by “the US and its allies of the Asia Pacific segment of their global missile system, which will inevitably lead to disruption of established strategic balances both in the Asia Pacific and beyond.”

Antonov said the “deployment of US missile defense systems in South Korea clearly goes beyond the tasks of deterring ‘the North Korean threat’.”

Moscow and Beijing are fearful that the continual expansion of US anti-missile systems is aimed at laying the groundwork for a devastating first nuclear strike by the United States. The THAAD and other anti-missile systems are being installed to neutralise any retaliatory strikes by Russia or China.

This year’s US National Defence Authorisation Act significantly expanded the scope of the American anti-missile program by amending the 1999 National Missile Defence Act. It now calls for “robust” defences against complex threats, rather than anti-missile measures to counter a “limited” threat.

The US has currently deployed a THAAD battery in Guam, as well as two associated X-band radar systems in Japan. The high-altitude inceptor system is part of a more extensive network involving shorter range land-based and ship-based anti-missile systems.

The presidency of Trump, who has called for a major expansion of US nuclear forces and the military more generally, will greatly heighten tensions in Asia and internationally. Trump has already threatened trade war measures against China, denounced its land reclamation in the South China Sea and criticised Beijing for failing to rein in North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.

In his confirmation hearing on Thursday, Trump’s nominee for Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson went far further, declaring that the US would not allow China to access the islets it controls in the South China Sea—implying that US warships and aircraft would block Chinese ships and planes, which would be an act of war.

At the same time, Tillerson ramped up the pressure on China over North Korea, saying the US could not continue to accept “empty promises” from Beijing about putting pressure on Pyongyang. He said his approach to North Korea would involve a long-term plan based on further sanctions and their proper implementation.

Asked if Washington should consider imposing “secondary sanctions” on Chinese entities found to be violating existing sanctions on North Korea, Tillerson said: “If China is not going to comply with those UN sanctions, then it’s appropriate ... for the United States to consider actions to compel them to comply.”

Trump has already indicated that North Korea will be at the top of his foreign policy agenda when he assumes office amid continuing speculation, particularly in the American media, that Pyongyang will soon have a nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Trump has emphatically tweeted that a North Korean ICBM test launch “won’t happen”—a menacing threat not only to Pyongyang, but also Beijing. Neither Trump nor Tillerson has indicated how they would strong-arm China into preventing a North Korean missile launch or pressuring Pyongyang to disarm. But any punitive measures will only compound an already tense situation.

A Russian foreign ministry statement yesterday declared that the situation around the Korean Peninsula was “exhibiting a high likelihood of becoming volatile.” Without naming Washington, it criticised “the counter-productiveness of the line being taken by certain governments in exacerbating these tensions and instigating an arms race in the sub-region, as well as the increase in the scale of military drills.”

As well as the installation of THAAD battery, the US is restructuring its bases in South Korea and has adopted an aggressive operational plan—OPLAN 5015—in the event of war with North Korea that includes pre-emptive strikes and the assassination of top North Korean leaders. This year the US and South Korea held their largest-ever joint military exercises, involving 300,000 South Korean troops and 17,000 US personnel, backed by sophisticated armour and artillery, as well as air and sea power.

China and Russia have given no indication as to what countermeasures they will adopt to the installation of the THAAD system in South Korea. The two countries held a joint anti-missile drill last May after Washington and Seoul began discussions about deploying a battery. They have announced a second drill will take place in October this year.

South Korea has complained that China is taking “retaliatory measures” over the THAAD decision. Seoul has pointed to a partial ban on South Korean television broadcasts as well as some pop singers. China has also launched an investigation into South Korean retail giant Lotte, which does business in China.

This week South Korean Trade Minister Joo Hyung-hwan told parliament that he planned to raise the issue again during a meeting with Chinese officials yesterday over a free trade agreement.

The determination of the Trump administration to confront China across the board—diplomatically, economically and militarily—including on dangerous flashpoints such as the Korean Peninsula and the South China Sea, will only intensify the danger of an accelerating arms race in the region and a plunge into war.

Obama expands NSA spying

George Gallanis

With the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump only days away, the Obama administration announced on Thursday a vast expansion of the spying power of American intelligence agencies. Under the new rules, the National Security Agency (NSA) can now share raw bulk data consisting of private communications with 16 other intelligence agencies, including the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.

In response to the recent rules set forward by the Obama administration, NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden Tweeted on Thursday, “As he hands the White House to Trump, Obama just unchained NSA from basic limits on passing raw intercepts to others.”

Previously, NSA analysts were required to sift out information they judged irrelevant and withhold the names of individuals deemed innocent before passing along information to other agencies. Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch signed the new rules, which grants multiple agencies access to “raw signals intelligence information,” on January 3. The director of national intelligence, James R. Clapper Jr., approved the measure on December 15, 2016.

Executive Order 12333, enacted into law by the Ronald Reagan administration and then expanded by the George W. Bush administration, serves as the quasi-legal basis for much of the NSA’s vast surveillance dragnet. Through it, the NSA gathers information from around the world via phone and internet servers and connections, from sites such as Google, and consumes entire phone call records from whole countries and monitors satellite transmissions.

In 2014, The Intercept disclosed that the NSA used Order 12333 to search over 850 billion phone and internet records and amass raw, unfiltered information on the activities of millions of American citizens.

The new rules stipulate the NSA to share explicit surveillance information and feeds to different agencies only if the information is deemed pertinent to that agency’s surveillance operations.

Agencies may be granted access if they intend to use the raw bulk data for foreign intelligence or counterintelligence investigations, and if an American citizen is found to be an agent working for a foreign country. In other words, agencies will use the raw data to spy on foreign individuals across the globe and American citizens in the United States.

In an attempt to present some kind of checks and balances to its new sharing capacities, according to the New York Times, the NSA will only grant agencies access to information “it deems reasonable after considering factors like whether large amounts of Americans’ private information might be included and, if so, how damaging or embarrassing it would be if that information were ‘improperly used or disclosed.’”

This will do nothing. Given that the personal information of millions upon millions of people has already been amassed and carefully combed through by the NSA and other intelligence agencies, it is unlikely any agency will be denied access.

In short, raw data previously investigated by the NSA will be thrown open to 16 other agencies, with entire personal information of millions of people exposed to and combed through by the CIA, FBI, and other agencies.

Perhaps most significant, under the new rules, any incriminating information of American citizens will be sent to the Justice Department, setting forth a wave of possible new accusations and investigations for thousands of people, if not more.

The Obama administration has sought to downplay the significant dangers of the new rules. Robert S. Litt, the general counsel to Clapper, stated, “This is not expanding the substantive ability of law enforcement to get access to signals intelligence. It is simply widening the aperture for a larger number of analysts, who will be bound by the existing rules.”

In reality, this is another step in the attack against democratic rights and a turn towards more authoritarian forms of rule, which has characterized the legacy of outgoing president Barack Obama.

During the last eight years, Obama has not only continued the illegal spying on billions of people around the world, but has dramatically increased it.

In May 2011, Obama signed three provisions of the widely-hated USA Patriot Act. Under the new provisions, spy agencies were granted access to using “roving wiretaps,” the authorization to intercept all communications of suspects; unlimited access to business, purchases, and travel records of suspects; and the surveillance of individuals with no suspected connections to foreign organizations.

In July 2013, Obama renewed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which forces US telecommunications companies to turn over bulk telephone records to spy agencies. The FISA act was used by the George W. Bush administration to warrantlessly wiretap millions of people.

The revelations of whistleblower Edward Snowden showed the NSA had, under the Obama administration, illegally collected phone records from over 120 million Verizon customers. Snowden also revealed the existence of the massive surveillance program known as PRISM, which collected the e-mails, phone calls, text and video chats from Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Apple and other tech giants of both foreigners and Americans.

In the aftermath of Snowden’s revelations, the Obama White House crafted an NSA “reform” package, based on recommendations by a panel representing the spy agencies themselves, that further institutionalized the NSA’s illegal domestic spying operations, while putting in place stringent security measures to prevent disclosures of its crimes.

The Obama Administration has prosecuted more whistle-blowers than any presidency in American history, and has viciously victimized those who sought to expose this program, imprisoning Chelsea Manning and forcing Julian Assange to seek refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and Edward Snowden to go into hiding in Russia.

Throughout his term, Obama worked to defend and facilitate the crimes of the intelligence agencies, working with the CIA to suppress the revelations of the Senate’s report on torture under the Bush Administration and shielding the architects of the torture program from prosecution.

The complete cynicism and hypocrisy of Obama was on full display during his farewell speech in Chicago on Tuesday. Touting himself as a champion of American democracy, he neglected to mention the mass state spying apparatus which he has expanded and prepared for Donald Trump.