Criminal Behavior: US May be Developing Biological Weapons

W.T. Whitney Jr.

The United States has great tolerance for wholesale killings. Think Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Think civilians killed in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq – in U.S. wars. Think biological weapons.

An article appearing October 4, 2018 in Science magazine deals with a U.S. Defense Department project named “Insect Allies” which began in 2017 and runs for four years. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)is providing four U.S. Universities with $45 million in funding to enable researchers to alter the gene make-up of plants grown as crops on farms. DARPA claims to be “addressing national security challenges in agriculture domestically and abroad.” Genes are being “edited”, says DARPA, so that plants can resist diseases, drought, floods, excessive heat, or “natural or engineered harmful biological agents,”

Yet the five authors of the report, evolutionary biologists and lawyers at German and French Universities, see the U.S. Defense Department as probably developing offensive biological-warfare capabilities. The United States, they explain, actually may be working on an innovative mechanism of genetic modification programmed to reduce productivity rather than to maintain or increase it.

The authors write that the “knowledge to be gained from this program appears very limited in its capacity to enhance U.S. agriculture or respond to national emergencies.” They condemn the project “as probably in violation of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), which took effect under United Nations auspices in 1975.

The 182 nations ratifying the BWC as of 2018 are committed to prohibiting the “development, production, and stockpiling” of such weapons. In 1969 President Richard Nixon announced that the United States would no longer be making offensive biological weapons.

The Science magazine report focuses on a new delivery system Defense Department researchers are using to transfer altered genetic material to crops in the field. The authors cite the BWC which says: “certain developments in science and technology have the potential for use contrary to the provisions of the Convention now or in the future. These developments include, inter alia…to develop novel means of delivering biological agents and toxins.” The idea of a “novel means” is crucial to what follows here.

For the reader to understand why the United States may be non-compliant with the BWC, some familiarity with relevant science is necessary. We review it briefly.

DARPA researchers are trying to insert altered genetic material into viruses, arrange for those viruses to infect certain insects, and then transfer the insects with doctored viruses to plants being grown for food. They are relying on a horizontal – or lateral – approach instead of the traditional one, which is to transfer the inheritance of genetic material vertically, from one generation of living things downward to the next. Whether taking place in the laboratory or in the field, the vertical method consumes time and money. The new, horizontal method is relatively inexpensive and is quick. It fits into one growing season.

DARPA’s process rests on two biological systems. One of them, known by the acronym CRISPR, utilizes sets of DNA sequences originating from the genetic material of single cell organisms. These are composed of DNA fragments from viruses that had infected those organisms. Under CRISPR, the sequences are combined with certain enzymes to achieve “editing” of the genetic make-up of an entirely different organism. And CRISPR enables those altered genes to be transferred to yet another life form.

The other system involves a virus known as a “horizontal environmental genetic alteration agent” (HEGAA). It contains genes modified as per CRISPR. That virus infects insects, specifically aphids, whiteflies or leafhoppers, and the insects are transferred to crops where they feed. Doing so, they insert the virus into the cells of plants, thus endowing them – CRISPR at work again – with new genetic material.  The plants thrive or fail depending on how humans engineered such material at the beginning.

In the Science magazine report, HEGAA technology is cast as one of the “novel means” proscribed by the BMW. The authors hold that gene modification achieved through HEGAA doesn’t fit with the intention proclaimed by DARPA, that of protecting U.S. agriculture. Any discussion of a project with such a purpose ought to have dealt with methods and arrangements pertaining to agriculture.

If indeed the Insect Allies program had been programmed as advertised, then consideration might have been given to regulatory mechanisms applying to food produced through HEGAA and about to enter national and international markets. That didn’t happen. Nor was there discussion of the full range of practical impediments to achieving benefits for agriculture.

There is silence also on the likelihood that HEGAA gene modification will lead to inconsistent results. The insects, for example, won’t reach all plants in a field and the outcome will be “quite different” from situations involving “laboratory-generated genetic modifications.” Gene modification via insects will likely affect crops other than the targeted ones. HEGAA technology also could end up reducing or finishing off seed production and leave no seeds to be marketed.  Seeds necessary for perpetuation of plant species might disappear. DARPA researchers discussed none of this.

The article points out that for normal plantings – even of crops that are threatened – the delivery of viruses by insects would work less well than delivery of viruses by overhead spraying equipment. Lastly, the authors, having noted that the researchers are allowing the virus-laden insects to survive for only two weeks, suggest that through simple modifications the insects’ lives could be prolonged for use in war.

These discrepancies, the authors say, signal the intentions of DARPA and the researchers and they are not about problems of maintaining or increasing agricultural production. The implication is that DARPA is developing the HEGAA system as a weapon of war.

The article concludes: “[A] party engaging in the development of biological agents for which a hostile-use case is plausible (or even obvious, in the case of the Insect Allies program) must present acceptable explanations that its research is only serving peaceful purposes.” The authors demand “robust explanations for the necessity of mandating insect dispersion in routine agricultural or emergency applications.” Without them, “Insect Allies risks being widely perceived as an attempt to develop a means of delivering HEGAAs for offensive purposes.”

University researchers working on the Insect Allies program “have publicly identified the target species for their experiments as maize— a crop upon which hundreds of millions of people rely for their basic nutritional needs, mainly in Latin America and Africa.”

News outlets reflecting scientific opinion criticized the program, as evidenced here and here. The U.S. mainstream media have not. The Washington Post, for example, communicated the DARPA program manager’s opinion that, “I don’t think that the public needs to be worried.” “That seems a stretch,” declared a Post editorialist commenting on weapons-production motives.  The New York Times reassuringly quoted the project manager: “This is biology we understand very well.”

While offering no direct proof that the U.S. government is developing biological weapons capability, the article illustrates the difficulty in assigning war-making purposes to technology with peacetime applications. And to tease out offensive purposes from research on defensive capabilities is no easy task. But the history and current manifestations of U.S research and development on biological weapons tell their own story.

Wider perspective

Research and development on biological weapons continued within the United States after 1975 when the BWC took effect, as evidenced by a report appearing in 2007 that mentions 400 bio-weapons laboratories operating in the United States. It notes the refusal by 113 U.S. biologic research institutions to comply with mandatory reporting requirements as to purposes of their microbiological research.

Currently a plethora of places and institutions are studying biologic agents, and apparently not for humanitarian or peaceful purposes. An extensive report dated April 29, 2018 from Bulgarian investigative journalist Dilyana Gaytandzhieva documents research activities the U.S. military carries out abroad. Accessible on her website and elsewhere, the report titled “The Pentagon Bio-weapons” provides circumstantial evidence of U.S. violations of the BWC.

Gaytandzhieva begins:

“The US Army regularly produces deadly viruses, bacteria and toxins in direct violation of the UN Convention on the prohibition of Biological Weapons. Hundreds of thousands of unwitting people are systematically exposed to dangerous pathogens and other incurable diseases.  Bio-warfare scientists using diplomatic cover test man-made viruses at Pentagon bio- laboratories in 25 countries across the world. These US bio-laboratories are funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) under a $ 2.1 billion military program… and are located in former Soviet Union countries such as Georgia and Ukraine, the Middle East, South East Asia and Africa. [DTRA] has outsourced much of the work under the military program to private companies.”

Her report is replete with images of U.S. facilities, victims, and U.S. military and intelligence documents. Her documentation of generous funding for the various projects and description of some of the microbiological species and illnesses don’t appear in the following summary.

She highlights the [Senator] Richard Lugar Center located near Tbilisi in Georgia and staffed entirely by U.S. citizens, all enjoying diplomatic immunity. Biologic specimens arrive by diplomatic pouch. At least three U.S. companies do research there for the Pentagon, CIA, and other U.S. agencies.

CH2M Hill and Battelle Companies operate bio-laboratories also in Uganda, Tanzania, Iraq, Afghanistan, and South East Asia. The latter company works in Armenia and at Fort Detrick in Maryland. Metabiota has laboratories in Georgia and Ukraine and formerly in West Africa.  The contracted research teams study a variety of disease-causing micro-organisms.

The Lugar Center has housed an insect facility since 2014 and “as a result Tbilisi has been infested with biting flies since 2015” and “flies similar to those in Georgia have appeared in neighboring Dagestan (Russia).” Researchers there study tropical mosquito species that transmit deadly viral illnesses. Those species are now showing up in Southern Russia, Northern Turkey, and throughout Georgia.

Lugar Center researchers study the anthrax bacillus, especially the strain engineered by Soviet germ warfare specialists. Gaytandzhieva disputes Pentagon claims as to the defensive nature of such research.She points to investigation at the Center of the “Genome Sequences” of the Soviet strain of the bacterium and to a U.S. history of developing anthrax as a weapon.

Tularemia is a subject of investigation, as are local ticks that carry tularemia bacteria, which the United States had once converted into a weapon. Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF) is another possibly tick-borne disease.  Gaytandzhieva claims that study of that disease at the Center caused a “sharp increase of CCHF human cases in 2014” in the surrounding area.  There were 237 cases of the disease in Afghanistan in 2017, “41 of which were fatal.”  Lugar Center researchers work there too.

The Defense Department funds 11 bio-laboratories in Ukraine, where U.S. personnel work under diplomatic cover. U.S. funding extends to the Science and Technology Center in Ukraine that, supposedly an international entity, “supports projects of scientists previously involved in the Soviet biological weapons program.” Gaytandzhieva attributes sicknesses and deaths among Ukrainians to leakage from U.S. bio-laboratories of organisms causing hepatitis A, swine flu, and cholera – from a new strain.  

The journalist reports that the Birmingham-based Southern Research Institute  constructed and has operated U.S. bio-laboratories in Ukraine, and also in Germany, Azerbaijan, Cameroon, Thailand, Ethiopia, Vietnam and Armenia. The Institute has sponsored anthrax research and for decades was a prime Pentagon biological weapons contractor.

Stopping at nothing

Gaytandzhieva mentions experiments on Botulinum neurotoxin, anthrax spores, and aerosol delivery systems that Metabiologics Company conducted for the U.S. Army at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah beginning in 2007.  She concludes with a survey of heavily funded U.S. studies of emerging viruses, synthetic viruses, and genetically engineered pathogens. The Defense Department is researching “binary biological weapons (a lethal combination of two viruses), host swapping diseases (animal viruses that ‘jump’ to humans, like the Ebola virus), stealth viruses, and designer diseases,” which target particular ethnic groups.

The probability that the U.S. government fashions weapons delivering deadly microorganisms or their products has dire implications. First, U.S. democracy is at great risk. National elections held on November 6 were supposedly about people weighing in on the people’s business. But biological warfare apparently is someone else’s business. The public knows almost nothing about this aspect of U.S. war-making.  People don’t get to judge.

Secondly, U.S. use of massively lethal weapons apparently serves the interest of those in charge. If so, U.S. leftists would do well to regard U.S. imperialism as involving more than just foreign interventions and wealth extraction by rich countries. Force itself, it seems, has its own place in the imperialist scheme of things. Biological warfare is an enforcement mechanism. It threatens the death of many, as do nuclear war, carpet bombing, and climate change. They are crimes for which the masters of capitalist imperialism are responsible.

Climate Change Action Would Kill Imperialism

Manuel Garcia, Jr.

Climate change action would kill imperialism, and that is why we can’t have it in America.

American political power is based on fossil fuels, and the US military is the engine that consumes those fuels to produce that power. So long as there is an American political elite that craves lucrative personal prestige and the ability to dominate internationally, the US economy will be fossil-fueled capitalism that maintains the military colossus that enables and protects those elite ambitions.

US military-enabled imperial power is of two varieties:

first: the hard power that overtly invades and seeks to control territory to impose American capitalist domination, as for example capturing pipeline routes south through Afghanistan and Pakistan–away from China–out of Central Asian oil fields; the guarding of sea lanes crucial for petroleum transport west, as at Suez and the Strait of Hormuz, and east to Japan, Korea and Australia (if they behave); and the securing of scarce metal ore and rare earth deposits in Afghanistan and Africa (for elements used in solid state electronics); and

second: the soft power of buying compliance to US hegemony from client states by gifting them with arms sales that enable them to exercise their own mini-imperialistic ambitions, as with Israel’s threat-projection in the Levant that is consistent with US aims of regional control, and Zionism’s own manifest destiny colonialist mania of persecuting the occupied Palestinians and shrinking their reservations; and with arms sales to Saudi Arabia enabling its genocidal war against Yemen, and giving the U.S. leverage to induce the opulent Saudi royalty to keep oil production high and oil prices low on the world market, so as to grease Western capitalism and also undercut the revenue streams supporting Venezuelan socialism and Iranian economic development.

Because of the fracking (oil shale) boom of the last two decades, the U.S. now produces as much oil as Saudi Arabia and is energy independent as a fossil fueled economy, but hegemonic ambition compels it to seek global control of petroleum distribution because to control the flow of oil around the globe is to throttle the imperial ambitions and economic development plans of all others.

American imperialism, mediated by its military, is intrinsically fossil fueled. It is impossible to power the trucks, tanks, gun-carriages, helicopters, airplanes, missiles, drones, ships and submarines of the US military with solar and wind power; only fossil fuels will do. Nuclear power–also based on a fossil fuel, fissile uranium–is used to propel particularly large destruction-projection platforms, specifically missile-carrying submarines and aircraft carriers. Military vehicles require high energy-density fuels, to provide a high amount of energy at a high rate of delivery from relatively small volumes of fuel-matter, in order to propel them quickly (and inefficiently) despite the weight of their armaments.

“Green” forms of energy–solar, wind, hydroelectric–are intrinsically of low energy-density; they are spread out over large areas from which they are collected rather slowly, rather than being chemically concentrated into relatively compact masses, like coal, petroleum, natural gas and fissile uranium, which can be ignited to release their stored energy explosively. 

Local sources of “green” electrical energy can power civilian infrastructure almost anywhere, because solar, wind and even hydro power are widely available around the globe. All that is required is investment in and installation of appropriate energy collection technology, and a local area distribution network for electrical power. Green energy is intrinsically a socialist form of powering civilization, because the energy to be used locally can be collected locally, which frustrates the capitalist impulse to monopolize narrowly-defined sites of high energy-density fuel deposits – like coal and uranium mines, and oil and gas wells – and tightly confined electrical generation plants that meter out their electrical power through a web of long distance transmission lines.

The United States can only address the existential threat of global climate change by disavowing the imperialistic and self-aggrandizing ambitions of its political and corporate elite. That means deflating American militarism and its vast war industries complex by abandoning capitalism, which is exclusionary (privatized, extractive) fossil-fueled and speculation-dominated economics, and transforming the US economy to nationally and rationally planned green energy socialism: people over profits, an equalizing domestic solidarity over classist international gamesmanship.

Transforming the American political economy to green energy socialism would be very good for the American people, but it would be the death of American fossil-fueled capitalism, and thus of America’s rulers’ ambitions and privileges.

What we know today is that America’s political and corporate elite would rather see humanity end within a century than disavow its imperialistic and self-aggrandizing ambitions. Their obsession is to rule to the bitter end, a bitter end hastened by their obsession to remain in control. America does not have a robust permanent national commitment to contain, ameliorate and possibly reverse climate change and ecological deterioration because that would necessarily require the overthrow of Imperial America’s capitalist elite and its classist and racist mentality.

The revolution necessary to overthrow American capitalism and enable a national response to the climate change crisis would first require an amazing degree of popular consensus, psychological and intellectual maturity, moral courage, popular solidarity and personal commitment throughout the public, to sustain it through whatever struggle would be necessary to overpower its ruling capitalist paradigm.

Will this ever be possible?, or would any popular American eco-socialist uprising be snuffed out as pitilessly as was the Syrian Revolution? Regardless, is CO2-propelled climate change now so far advanced that it is beyond any human ability to stop? No one can really say.

We are each left with a choice between: defeatist acquiescence to capitalist-dominated climapocalypse, or the dignity of rebellious aspiration and activism for green socialism, regardless of whether or not it will ever be realized politically, and even if it is now precluded by Nature’s implacable geophysical forces that humanity’s blind self-absorption has set into karmic motion.

Budget dispute between Italy and EU escalates

Peter Schwarz

On Wednesday, the European Commission decided to launch an “excessive deficit procedure” against Italy. This must be agreed upon by all the finance ministers in the euro zone, which is by no means certain. Then it can drag on for months. But in the end, there could be fines in the billions.

The Italian government is insisting on its planned deficit of 2.4 percent in the 2019 budget. This was announced by Finance Minister Giovanni Tria in a letter to the EU Commission on November 13. Four weeks ago, the Commission rejected the Italian budget and requested a revision. Tria has since made some corrections. More money than originally planned is to flow into investments, and debt reduction is to be accelerated through the sale of public property. However, he is sticking to the deficit target.

In the past, the Commission has repeatedly initiated excessive deficit procedures, including against Germany and France, who had violated the rules for years. But they all came to nothing. In the case of Italy, things are different. With debt at 132 percent of gross domestic product, the country has the second-highest debt in the euro zone after Greece. If the financial markets react with further interest mark-ups on Italian government bonds, it could lead to a chain reaction of bank bankruptcies that could spread to the whole of Europe.

Unlike Greece, where European governments and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) raised a total of €263 billion to save creditor banks while the Greek population had to bleed for it, Italy, with a ten times larger economy, is simply too big for such action. The euro zone is threatened with failure if the crisis continues to worsen.

The Italian governing parties, the fascist Lega and the populist Five-Star Movement (M5S), are deliberately fuelling the conflict with Brussels to present themselves as defenders of the Italian people against the EU’s austerity dictates. Lega head Matteo Salvini stands out in this respect. Not a day goes by when he doesn’t rage against Brussels. “All we need are the inspectors, the UN blue helmets and the sanctions against Italy,” he told radio station Rai. He has called for a demonstration against the policies of Brussels on December 8.

This has benefitted him in the polls. With 32 percent, the Lega is now the most influential party and almost twice as strong as in the parliamentary elections last March. It is followed by the M5S, with 27 percent. The Democrats (PD), the largest opposition party, continue to flounder at 18 percent.

Salvini can base himself on two factors. The first is the role of the PD and its left-wing appendages, which over the past two decades have consistently implemented the EU’s brutal austerity demands, with devastating consequences for the Italian population. Real personal income is at the level of two decades ago, official unemployment is ten percent and living conditions for middle-aged people and younger generations are “eroded”, according to the IMF’s latest regular report.

The second factor is the role of Brussels and Berlin, which brand any social concession, however small, as a violation of the sacred interests of capital, while supporting rapid increases in military spending.

Typical of the provocative arrogance of the German media is a comment in Handelsblatt, which accuses the Italian government of “jealously ensuring that the expensive election promises are implemented: earlier retirement, the basic income and tax simplifications and reductions.”

However, neither the Lega nor the M5S are genuinely concerned with social improvements. Salvini’s inhuman approach to refugees, which has massively raised the number of deaths in the Mediterranean, is symptomatic of the government’s attitude toward the entire working class. And the basic income, the central election promise of M5S, is nothing more than an Italian version of the German Hartz laws. It is associated with a duty to work and drastic sanctions if the recipients do not declare themselves willing to accept any work, however bad it may be.

Both parties unconditionally defend capitalist private property and rely on the bourgeois and petty-bourgeois classes. Many observers therefore assume that they will finally give in after the European elections in May at the latest, if the pressure of the financial markets increases.

It was only a matter of time before the government in Rome gives in on the debt issue, predicted Manfred Weber of Germany’s (Bavarian) Christian Social Union (CSU), who leads the slate of the conservative European People’s Party in the European Elections. “The realities, the facts will rapidly catch up with Rome.”

The populist government will likely pursue the same course as Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his pseudo-left Syriza-led coalition, which first confronted Brussels in the debt crisis and then gave in and imposed the EU’s instructions. But even if this is not the case, the nationalist course of Salvini and Di Maio leads to a dangerous impasse.

“Attempts to save economic life by inoculating it with virus from the corpse of nationalism result in blood poisoning that bears the name fascism,” wrote Leon Trotsky in 1933 in his essay, “Nationalism and economic life.”

The growing conflict between Rome and Brussels is part of the breakup of the European Union along national lines, which is also reflected in Brexit and the conflicts with Poland and Hungary. Throughout Europe, the ruling class is pursuing a policy of dismantling social protections, police build-up and militarism, relying more and more openly on fascist forces. In nine EU states, far-right parties are already in government.

The EU itself plays the leading role in imposing these polices, including demands for austerity, the build-up of a police state and the sealing of borders. It generates the centrifugal, nationalist tendencies it claims to fight. The working class can only stop this dangerous development by opposing both nationalism and the EU and fighting for United Socialist States of Europe.

Global conditions fuel Wall Street sell-off

Nick Beams

The wave of selling that hit Wall Street for the first two days of this week eased yesterday, as markets remained flat. It was significant, however, that gains made during the course of the day, which saw the Dow Jones index up by as much as 200 points, were lost by the close of trading.

The Dow shed a total of around 900 points on Monday and Tuesday, while the S&P 500 index dropped by 3.5 percent, with an 8.5 percent fall in the value of Apple, the world’s largest company by market value.

The market has been trending down since the start of October, led largely by high-tech stocks, the so-called Faangs—Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google’s parent company Alphabet—but this week the sell-off widened.

One factor appears to be that while companies have reported higher earnings and sales so far this year, there are doubts about whether this will continue in 2019 as the impact of the Trump administration’s corporate and income tax cuts begins to wear off.

The fall in Apple, for example, has been triggered by cuts in the production of its three latest models, released in September, with the company saying it would no longer issue figures for individual unit sales. Companies that supply the tech giant have reported reduced orders for components in the new models.

Apple has fallen by more than 20 percent since its high in October, losing $265 billion in market value, more than the entire market capitalisation of firms such as the drug company Pfizer, the Wells Fargo bank and the retail firm Procter and Gamble.

Overall, the Faangs have lost $1 trillion in market value since their October peaks, equivalent to almost half the value of the companies that make up London’s FTSE 100 index.

In another indication of the extent of the sell-off, the tech-heavy NASDAQ index has shed all the gains it made this year, a situation that is close to being replicated across the broader market.

While many causes are at work, the market turbulence is being fuelled by three broad global processes: signs of a slowing global economy after an upturn in 2017, the intensification of the trade war that centres on, but is not confined to, the conflict between the US and China, and tightening monetary conditions.

Last year, on the back of growth rate increases in a number of key global regions, the prospect was held out for “synchronised” world growth and a return to levels, if not reaching, then at least trending toward, those attained before the 2008 financial crisis. This has not eventuated. After a brief upturn, euro zone growth recorded its lowest level in the third quarter of 2018 for more than five years, with an actual contraction in the leading economy, Germany.

A further indicator of falling global demand and output is the fall in oil prices in recent weeks.

Following the 2008 crisis, the continued expansion of the Chinese economy, fuelled by government spending and a major expansion of credit, played a key role in propping up global capitalism, particularly commodity-exporting countries.

Now, China’s growth rates are down to their lowest levels since 2009, with little sign of any upturn as the government and financial authorities try to rein in debt growth. Financial markets have also fallen sharply, with the Shanghai Composite Index down 27 percent for the year.

While the Trump administration’s tariff measures have not yet had a major impact, the threat of their escalation hangs over the global economy. Senior US officials, such as US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, maintain that China must suffer more economic pain and bow to US demands.

Following the reports earlier this month that Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping had held a phone conversation on trade—after months of no communication between the two sides—and Trump’s tweets that he was hopeful of a deal, there was some guarded optimism of at least a limited agreement when the two met at the G20 summit at the end of next week.

But with US Vice-President Mike Pence’s attacks on China at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Papua New Guinea last weekend, that is now considered unlikely, and the US will press ahead with an escalation of the 10 percent tariff on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods to 25 percent at the start of 2019.

The Financial Times reported yesterday that all eyes were now on the G20 meeting. “Combined with rising interest rates, clouds over global economic growth and political tensions elsewhere, investors are awaiting the meeting with a degree of trepidation,” it said.

Tai Hui, JP Morgan Asset Management’s chief Asia-Pacific market strategist, told the newspaper the divisions between the US and China revealed at the APEC meeting meant a “material breakthrough” on the trade tensions was “highly unlikely.”

The G20 summit preparations indicate the organisers expect that trade conflicts will dominate the agenda. In an effort to appease the US, the final communiqué’s initial draft omits a long-standing reference to resisting protectionism, while promising to “recognise the importance of the multilateral trading system” and work to “keep markets open and ensure a level playing field.”

If no agreement is reached to at least delay the planned tariff hikes, this will have a major market impact, especially on high-tech companies because of fears that an intensified trade war will adversely affect both their global supply chains and markets.

The third major factor in the market turmoil is rising interest rates and tightening conditions. The bull-run on Wall Street, which started in March 2009, when the market reached its low point after the financial crisis, is now the longest in history. It has been sustained principally by the supply of ultra-cheap money by the US Federal Reserve and other major central banks. The slogan during previous sell-offs has been “buy the dips,” based on the assumption that cheap credit would lead to an upturn.

But with the US Fed, together with the European Central Bank to a lesser extent, pulling back on cheap money policies, interest rates are starting to rise. According to an equity analyst cited by the Wall Street Journal, the “buy-the-dippers are getting concerned” and increasingly saying, “let’s sell everything.”

The Fed is expected to go ahead with a further 0.25 percent increase in its base rate when it meets next month and that expectation largely has been priced into market valuations. The key question will be whether, with official US unemployment rates at historic lows and fears that wages may start to rise, the Fed indicates that it will continue the rising-rate path next year.

If further rate rises coincide with a fall in revenues and profits as the Trump tax measures’ effect wears off, this could be the trigger for a recession. JP Morgan Chase now rates the probability of a recession in 2019 at one in three, compared with its assessment of between 8 and 27 percent a year ago.

Interest rate increases and tightening credit conditions are affecting the stock market already. Bloomberg reported that for “investors with a sense of history the most stomach-churning spectacle has been the deterioration of credit,” with a widening gap between the yield being demanded on corporate bonds and the return on US Treasuries.

Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari, a long-time proponent of an easier monetary policy, has called for caution by the Fed. He told National Public Radio one of his concerns was that “if we preemptively raise interest rates, and it’s not in fact necessary, we might be the cause of ending the expansion,” thereby triggering the next recession.

If that were to occur, it would take place under uncharted conditions. No one knows what effect the unwinding of the historically unprecedented cheap money policies of the past decade could have both on financial markets and the economy as a whole.

Chinese president visits the Philippines

Joseph Santolan 

On Wednesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping concluded a two-day visit to Manila, where, in meetings with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, he signed a number of agreements which markedly increased diplomatic and economic ties between the two countries.

Among the deals signed was commitment to begin conducting joint exploration and exploitation of the oil resources of the South China Sea. Xi visited Manila in the midst of Washington’s continued escalation of economic warfare against Beijing and advanced preparations for direct military conflict.

Xi arrived in Manila from the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit where US Vice President Mike Pence issued a series of bellicose declarations against China, preventing the summit from arriving at a joint communique for the time in its history.

As it has throughout the Asia-Pacific region, Washington’s attempt to contain the rise of China and to reduce its massive economy to a semi-colonial status subordinate to US interests has riven Philippine politics. The dispute over increased ties with China and the intense pressure which Washington brings to bear upon any such moves within its former colony, have been at the heart of every major political dispute and corruption scandal over the past decade.

Former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo during her second term in office, from 2004 to 2010, sought to re-orient Philippine economic and diplomatic ties toward Beijing. She signed the Joint Marine Seismic Undertaking (JMSU) with China, a deal allowing for the joint exploration of the disputed South China Sea.

President Benigno Aquino III, of the Liberal Party, took office in 2010. Through a series of provocations against Beijing in the South China Sea and the filing of corruption charges against Arroyo and her political allies, he came to serve as one of Washington’s foremost proxies in the region.

The Aquino administration filed suit against China’s claim to the South China Sea in a case drawn up and argued by Washington before The Hague, and arranged for the return of US military bases to the country through the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA).

Duterte’s administration is a return to, and escalation of, the orientation of the Arroyo administration under conditions in which Washington has qualitatively intensified the danger of a global war. Whatever stance Duterte takes, it is being made on the frontlines of a rapidly worsening US-China confrontation. The personal and political volatility of the fascistic populist is, fundamentally, an expression of just how sharp the social and geopolitical crisis has become.

Speaking in Singapore to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit on November 15, Duterte stated that if war were to erupt in the South China Sea, “my country will be the first to suffer.” China, he declared “is already in possession” of the disputed waters, and the United States, with its repeated military exercises and Freedom of Navigation Acts, was “creating tension.”

Xi’s trip to the Philippines was the first state visit by a Chinese president to the country in 13 years, when Arroyo signed the JMSU deal. Speaking to the press in Manila, Xi described the relations between Beijing and Manila under Duterte as “like a rainbow after the rain.” At a banquet in his honor, Xi stated, “After President Duterte took office, our two sides have worked together to remove many obstacles. Our relationship has been turned around and put on the right trajectory.”

In addition to his talks with Duterte, Xi met with members of the Philippine legislature, holding a half-hour discussion with Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who is now Speaker of the House. Arroyo told the press that Xi’s visit would “provide a major boost to President Duterte’s envisioned massive infrastructure program.” She told Xi, “Infrastructure will be very important for the Philippines in the coming years. And there is no country in the world that matches China’s recent track record and capability in this area.”

Meeting with the members of the Philippine Senate and Congress, Xi stated that the deals which he was signing with Duterte would see increased traffic between China and the Philippines. He spoke of plans to bring more Chinese tourists to the Philippines and more Filipino teachers and nurses to China. More significantly, he declared that the agreements which they reached would transform the South China Sea into “a sea of friendship and cooperation.” Xi specifically called for a “maritime and air liaison mechanism” to allow the two countries to coordinate their naval and air movements in the disputed waters.

Over the course of his two-day visit, Xi signed 29 economic agreements, most for joint infrastructure projects and Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) loans from Beijing. Duterte has announced that the flagship project of his administration is a massive infrastructure project, which he has named “Build, Build, Build,” and which is officially projected to cost $US155 billion by 2022. The cornerstone of the proposal is Chinese investment.

The deals signed by Xi included the construction of a 639-kilometer railway linking Manila and Bicol, along with a number of other infrastructure projects, most slated to be funded by Chinese loans. The Chinese Steel Company, Panhua Group, signed a deal on the sidelines of the visit with Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Secretary Ramon Lopez for the investment of $3.5 billion in the construction of a steel manufacturing plant to be based on the southern island of Mindanao, which is currently in its second year of martial law.

The most significant deal was a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which effectively revitalizes the JMSU, allowing for the joint exploration and exploitation of oil and gas resources in the South China Sea. According to a draft released to CNN by opposition Senator Antonio Trillanes, the deal calls for joint work between the state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) and an as-yet-unnamed Philippine counterpart. Senate President Vicente Sotto III, tied to the Duterte administration, said that the Malacanang presidential palace had stated that the MOU agreed to a 60–40 sharing of mineral resources, with the majority share going to the Philippines.

The bourgeois opposition, gathered around the Liberal Party of former President Aquino, has raised an immense outcry over Xi’s visit and have denounced Duterte as a “puppet” of China. The hue and cry over national sovereignty in the “West Philippine Sea,” has reached a fever pitch.

Not one of these political figures cares a scrap for Philippine sovereignty, nor is there an anti-imperialist bone in their bodies. Washington established its direct colonial rule over the country in a bloody war of conquest that led to the death of over one million Filipinos. The politicians posturing in outrage over sovereignty are in their majority the heirs of the oligarchies brought to power by their former colonial master. Many of them likewise embraced the brutal wartime Japanese occupation. Aquino’s grandfather served as vice president of its puppet government. The hullaballoo over sovereignty and the vicious denunciations of China are being mobilized in service to US imperialism.

Opposition Senators Trillanes and Pangilinan declared that the MOU on the South China Sea violated the Philippine Constitution. Trillanes alleged that the deal had been drawn up by China. Presidential spokesperson Sal Panelo responded with a statement that it did not really matter who drew up the deal, but Duterte’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs Teddy Locsin, adopting the language of the president, declared, “Of course it f..king matters. I wrote it.”

Among the forces generally opposed to Duterte’s establishment of ties with China are the military brass, which have long historical ties to Washington. Duterte has stated his intention to defuse tensions with China by decreasing military exercises targeting Beijing in the South China. However, his Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana has, according to the New York Times, “quietly expanded the number of exercises it will conduct with the United States military next year.”

During Xi’s visit, Lorenzana oversaw a provocative live fire drill in the waters off the South China Sea, launching recently purchased Israeli missiles at “enemy ships.” He told the press, “We will use this technology to protect our seas.” When asked if he had deliberately timed the demonstration to coincide with Xi’s visit, Lorenzana ridiculously stated, “No. The weather was good.”

Arrest of Nissan chairman Ghosn roils global auto industry

Shannon Jones 

The arrest Monday by Japanese authorities of the leader of one of the world’s largest automotive alliances has drawn in the governments of France and Japan and shaken investors.

On Wednesday, a Japanese court extended the detention of Carlos Ghosn for an additional 10 days on charges of financial malfeasance, including hiding tens of millions in income from tax and other government authorities. Ghosn presides over an alliance of Japanese-based Nissan and Mitsubishi and French-based automaker Renault.

Prosecutors allege that Ghosn understated his income by about five billion Yen or $44 million in securities filings and that he used company assets for personal purposes. Authorities also arrested another Nissan executive, Greg Kelly, who they say helped in the scheme.

Under Japanese law suspects can be held for a period of time without the filing of formal charges and questioned by authorities without the benefit of legal counsel, though detainees can meet with attorneys.

Ghosn, who was credited with saving Nissan from bankruptcy, became a celebrity in corporate, media and political circles in Japan and around the world for his ruthless cost cutting. After a stint at Renault, Ghosn was assigned to Nissan where he carried out a restructuring involving the elimination of 21,000 jobs and the closure of five factories. Forbes anointed Ghosn “Businessman of the Year” in 2002 for his work at restoring Nissan to profitability. Later he carried out a similarly brutal restructuring at Renault earning him the appellation “Le Cost Killer.”

Ghosn stepped down as CEO of Nissan last year but remained the company’s chairman. He became CEO of Renault in 2005 and in 2016 he became chairman at Mitsubishi, receiving hefty compensation packages from all three companies.

The alliance sells some 10.6 million vehicles annually and if considered as a single entity was the largest auto producer in the world in 2017, ahead of Toyota, Volkswagen and General Motors.

The future of the Nissan, Renault, Mitsubishi alliance is now in question following Ghosn’s arrest. Nissan shares fell 15 percent on the news.

By some reports a full Nissan-Renault merger spearheaded by Ghosn was in the works, possibly just months away.

Opposition had emerged to the proposal for a Nissan-Renault merger. For one, the French government is a large shareholder in Renault and is unlikely to in effect cede control to Japanese-based Nissan, the most profitable of the three. There was also reported strong opposition on the Nissan board.

The arrest of Ghosn comes at a time when global automakers are under pressure because of slowing sales and the threat of disruptions due to trade war measures being enacted by the Trump administration in the United States and countermoves by the other major economic powers.

Moody’s credit ratings agency said that the arrest raised questions about Nissan’s governance and could affect its borrowing costs. Standard and Poors said it could lower the company’s credit rating. S&P said that Nissan’s profitability could suffer if it turned out that Ghosn’s alleged misconduct had hurt the company’s alliance with Renault and Mitsubishi.

The development of new technologies, including electric cars and autonomous vehicles, is sucking up enormous amounts of capital for research and development. It presages major changes in the auto industry whose ramifications are hard to foresee at this point. Whatever changes take place will entail sharp attacks on autoworkers.

Ghosn, a French citizen, was born in Brazil to Lebanese parents and was educated in France. His foreign heritage is unusual among CEOs in Japan.

There is speculation in some circles that Ghosn’s arrest may involve behind the scenes machinations by various parties, including possibly factions within Nissan. In a statement issued after Ghosn’s arrest, the Nissan board of directors said that CEO Hiroto Saikawa would introduce a motion to remove Ghosn and Kelly from their positions.

The Nissan board of directors is due to vote Thursday on the removal of Ghosn, and as of this writing appears to be divided on the issue. Many Renault senior executives are standing behind Ghosn and French President Macron indicated the government would not seek Ghosn’s ouster from leadership at Renault without proof that his illegal actions involved activities in France.

Meanwhile, Renault appointed an interim chairman and CEO to take over Ghosn’s duties while charges are pending.

The Lebanese foreign minister, Gebran Bassil, issued a statement saying he had instructed the Lebanese ambassador in Tokyo to follow the case and ensure fair treatment for Ghosn. Bassil said Ghosn “represents a model of Lebanese success abroad, and the Lebanese Foreign Ministry will stand by him in his crisis to make sure he gets a fair trial.”

There were apparently differences at Nissan over Ghosn’s focus on sales volume instead of profitability and quality. In particular, Ghosn sought to increase Nissan’s presence in the American market through heavy discounting. The new CEO at Nissan has questioned that approach.

The Ghosn affair is the latest of a number of scandals involving Nissan. In July the company admitted it had found that the majority of its factories in Japan had reported falsified emissions data. In 2017 the company acknowledged that it had allowed unqualified personnel to carry out preproduction tests at some of its plants, leading to the recall of vehicles.

Similar emission-rigging scandals have hit VW, Fiat Chrysler, GM, Daimler and Mitsubishi and Renault themselves.

Ghosn’s lifestyle illustrates the rapacity so typical of top-level corporate executives. He maintained homes in Paris, Amsterdam, Beirut and Rio de Janeiro and traveled around the world on a corporate jet. In 2016 he rented out the Grand Trianon at the Versailles Palace in France to celebrate his marriage to his second wife. The theme was based on Sofia Coppola’s film “Marie Antoinette” with guests dressed in pre-revolutionary costumes of the doomed nobility and featured extravagant desserts in homage to the queen’s supposed penchant for cake.

Nissan and Mitsubishi paid Ghosn some US$8.5 million in cash and stock and he received $8.4 million from Renault, enormous sums of money but still relatively modest in comparison to American CEOs. However, Ghosn’s compensation generated controversy in both Japan and France, where CEOs typically earn much less. Takeshi Uchiyamada, chairman of Toyota, for example, received $1.6 million in 2017.

In 2018 Ghosn agreed to take a 30 percent cut in compensation at Renault in order to ensure the backing of the Macron administration for another four-year term as head of the automaker.

According to a piece in the Washington Post one reason Ghosn may have sought to hide his income was to avoid further such problems.

Japanese broadcast organization NHK reported Nissan had paid Ghosn “huge sums” for luxury residences that were not for legitimate business purposes. The purchases were not declared on stock market filings while Ghosn did not pay, or underpaid, rent on the residences.

NHK alleged that nearly $18 million had been funneled through a Dutch subsidiary of Nissan to buy properties on the Copacabana strip in Rio de Janeiro and in Beirut. It went on to claim that Ghosn had secretly siphoned off money meant as compensation for other Nissan executives.

Kelly, Ghosn’s alleged accomplice and a reported “mastermind” of the scheme, is an American and the first US citizen to sit on Nissan’s board of directors. He first joined the company in 1988 as senior manager and associate legal counsel at Nissan North America. He was later named director of human resources.

These revelations only highlight how, under capitalism, the wealth produced by the sweat and blood of workers is squandered each day on to satisfy the grotesque appetite of the corporate and financial oligarchy.

A Non-Traditional Security Perspective on Sino-Indian Border Management

Siwei Liu

The unresolved ‘border dispute’ is undoubtedly the core issue in Sino-Indian relations. Border issues are not only important for the two sides’ territorial and military security but also concern many non-traditional security issues, such as water resources and ecological environmental issues. In view of the fact that both countries are currently strengthening the exploitation and utilisation of related resources and carrying out infrastructure construction in the border areas, both China and India should pay more attention to protecting the local ecological environment. Otherwise environmental deterioration around Sino-Indian border areas may deepen mutual grievances and upgrade the current security dilemma between two Asian giants.

The intrusion of border issues in the development of bilateral relations between China and India in recent years is obvious. In addition to regular border negotiations, the two countries have spent much time and diplomatic effort in dealing with their differences and friction incidents on border issues, including the 2013 tent confrontation and 2017 Donglang crisis, which had significant negative impact on bilateral ties.

Admittedly, Sino-Indian border issues are very complicated and there are many reasons for dispute that are difficult to resolve. For instance, the present upsurge of nationalist sentiment in the two countries is undoubtedly one of the important reasons for this. It is worth mentioning that both sides intensifying their development and utilisation of related resources such as water and minerals, as well as infrastructure construction in the border areas over recent years, also seem to have deepened each other's suspicions and divergent attitudes. Both regard the other side’s actions as seeking to change the status quo.

Fortunately, both China and India are willing to make efforts to manage differences and avert conflict escalation. The two countries agreeing on the establishment of the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination on India-China Border Affairs in 2012 can be regarded as one such effort. Thanks to these bilateral mechanisms, they have been able to maintain consultations and dialogue during crises. In addition, the respective top leaders having various meetings through multilateral platforms such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) has provided a productive channel to ease the tense situation and manage differences. This may be an important reason why the two countries can safely weather all kinds of border crises.

However, numerous potential risks still exist and many issues need to be addressed by two sides. For instance, ecological environmental challenges in Sino-Indian border areas are one issue that deserves more attention from both China and India. The warming of the earth’s climate is accelerating the melting of glaciers in the Himalayas, and is inevitably threatening the ecological environment of border areas to some extent. Other potential challenges also cannot be ignored. Both countries have attached great importance to the development and utilisation of water and mineral resources projects in border areas. If these projects are not carried out according to strict green environmental regulations, they may have a negative impact on local ecological environments.

It is clear that if environmental problems are not taken seriously, they are likely to complicate the Sino-Indian border dispute further. Another salient example of the negative effects of these problems on the interaction between the two countries is the uneasiness both have concerning the other's dam construction along the Yarlung Zangbo River Basin.

In the future, China and India should ensure that every project in border areas is thoroughly studied and rigorously planned so that project aims and the need for ecological environmental protection can be taken into account. Water resource projects should take environmental protections especially seriously. Due to the growth of domestic water demand in both countries, it is foreseeable that their water development and utilisation projects around the Yarlung Zangbo River Basin will keep growing. It is necessary for both to ensure that those projects will not change and damage the quality of local soil and water resources.

In addition, the two countries should strengthen green cooperation more widely. Given the sensitivity of border issues, China-India green environmental cooperation in border areas faces certain difficulties. But much wider cooperation between the two sides should be enhanced, such as through joint reduction in air pollution, tackling global warming, improving wastewater treatment and other waste disposal, and engaging in other areas where their interests align. Exchange and cooperation between both sides’ environmental protection agencies should also be encouraged.

If possible, China and India could also try to jointly launch a Himalayan Regional Environmental Action Initiative and invite other countries in the region to create a multilateral platform for environmental information-sharing about the Himalayan region. They could both also strengthen joint actions in dealing with natural disasters and reducing environmental pollution with other stakeholders in the region.

Crick African Network (CAN) African Career Accelerator Awards 2019 for Early-career Researchers

Application Deadline:

• Deadline for Expression of Interest is 1st January 2019
• Deadline for full applications is 1st February 2019, 16:00 GMT

Eligible Countries: African countries

To Be Taken At (Country): The African Career Accelerator Awards Fellowships will be undertaken in two locations:

• At the Francis Crick Institute (‘the Crick’, UK) and
• At one of the five African partner institutions: The University of Ghana (Ghana), Stellenbosch University (South Africa), University of Cape Town (South Africa), MRC Unit The Gambia at LSHTM (The Gambia) and MRC/UVRI and LSHTM Uganda Research Unit.

About the Award: The Crick African Network’s African Career Accelerator awards will provide Fellowship support for African Post-Doctoral researchers aiming to make the transition to becoming an independent researcher and launching their own research group.
The CAN African Career Accelerator Awards will invest in early-career researchers who have demonstrated strong scientific and leadership potential, as well as a commitment to continuing their research on the African continent. This call is made possible by funding from the UK’s Global Challenges Research Fund.
The fellowships will accelerate careers that have already shown great potential both scientifically and in leadership. These awards will identify individuals who will go on to make significant contributions to research as well as science and knowledge on the African continent and applicants should articulate how this award would establish them as a research leader.

Research Areas: The scope of the research themes which can be undertaken as part of this Award can be defined as the infectious diseases of poverty, with an emphasis on Tuberculosis, Malaria and HIV/AIDS, but also extending to neglected tropical diseases or non-communicable diseases with an infection component.
Clinical research is possible, but will have to be discussed specifically with potential supervisors/ advisors and institutions to confirm whether resources are available to support the research.

Type: Research, PhD

Eligibility: To be eligible for the African Career Accelerator Awards:

• Applicants must be a citizen of one of the 55 African nations, as defined by the African Union.
• Applicants will also have a PhD and have no more than 6 years’ post-doctoral research experience (with allowances for legitimate career breaks) but more than 2 years’ post-doctoral experience unless the applicant has an outstanding track record, supported by publication and employment history.

Competitive applicants

• will have a strong track record of research.
• will have a PhD, and have progressed to a postdoctoral role through which they are on a demonstrable path to independence.
• Prior experience of applying for grant funding is desirable but not required.
• Neither is it essential to currently be employed on the African continent, but applications should demonstrate the applicant’s desire to establish themselves as an independent researcher on the African continent.

Selection Criteria: Applications will be assessed predominantly on the quality of the science proposed, which will take into account the project, the individual, the research environments and the timeliness, relevance and feasibility of the project, by peer reviewers. The leadership potential of applicants and statements from supervisors will also be taken into account.

Number of Awards: Up to 6

Value of Award: Each Fellowship has a value of up to approximately £130,000.

• Fellowships may include personal salary, visa costs and research expenses to implement the research.
• Provision has been made to cover costs of travel for both relocation and conferences, as well as research related costs for consumables.
• Each fellowship also includes the option of the purchase of up to two pieces of equipment, each up to a value of £10,000.
• Fellows will be supported by two supervisors/advisors: one each from the Crick and the chosen African partner institution, as well as having the option of support from one of the 14 Crick Science Technology Platforms (STP) which specialize in specific techniques and technologies.

In addition to conducting the proposed research programme, Fellows will participate in advanced training which will provide the skills and competencies to make the transition to becoming an independent research leader on the African continent. To facilitate this, Fellows will be supported to submit a research grant proposal to major international funders in order to be able to continue their work after the end of the Fellowship.

Duration of Programme: Up to two years. Fellowships will commence no later than 31^st March 2019.

How to Apply: To apply for the African Career Accelerator Awards, applicants must first submit a mandatory Expression of Interest form (see Link below for Expression of Interest form) by emailing it to CAN-Fellowships@crick.ac.uk.


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World Bank XL Africa Acceleration Program 2019 for Technology Start-ups in Francophone Africa

Application Deadline: 14th January 2019

Eligible Countries: Francophone African countries

To be taken at (country): Bamako, Mali and Paris, France

About the Award: The program highlights include two one-week residencies, one in Bamako, Mali and another in Paris, France, giving entrepreneurs the opportunity to grow their business network and learn from mentors, peers, and local partners. The France residency will culminate in the Venture Showcase at the 2019 VivaTech conference in Paris, where the founders will present their business models to a large audience of corporations, investors, technology experts and media.
The program has partnered with leading VC funds and angel groups active in Francophone Africa, including Orange Digital Ventures, Investisseurs & Partenaires, Brightmore Capital, AHL Ventures, Outlierz, TLcom Capital, Accion, Goodwell Investments, Blue Haven Ventures, Comoe Investments, and IFC Venture Capital. Associated investors will play a key role in vetting and selection process, and will guide the entrepreneurs through investor readiness process. L’Afrique Excelle will also collaborate with corporate partners, such as Orange and GSMA.

Type: Training, Entrepreneurship

Eligibility:

• Your startup is for profit and registered, with a team of at least three people
• Your team is based in Sahel & Francophone Africa (please see list further down this page for a list of eligible countries)
• You have a very strong management team
• You have a digital or tech product/service available on the market right now, with tangible traction and evidence of revenue
• You have the potential to scale
• You are seeking investment capital in the range of $250K – $1.5m
• While there will be exceptions, mostly likely your startup has already received investment capital, as debt or equity, or received grants from donor organizations.

Number of Awards: 20

Value of Award: Entrepreneurs will receive mentoring from global and local experts, learn through a tailor-made curriculum, increase their brand visibility, and get access to potential corporate partners and investors. Through collaboration with prominent Francophone Africa-focused investment groups, L’Afrique Excelle will help the selected start-ups attract early stage capital between $250,000 and $5 million.

How to Apply:  Apply now

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

The World Order that’s Now Emerging

Eric Zuesse

The Post-World-War-II world order was dominated by the one WW II major combatant that had only 0.32% of its population (the lowest percentage) killed by the war: the United States. The Soviet Union’s comparable number killed by the war was the highest — it was 13.7% — 42 .8.times higher than America’s. The U.S. was the main force that defeated Japan and so won WW II in Asia. The U.S.S.R., however, was the main force that defeated Germany and so won WW II in Europe. The U.S.S.R. suffered vastly more than did the U.S. to achieve its victory. In addition to suffering 42.8 times the number of war-deaths than did U.S., the U.S.S.R.’s financial expenditures invested in the conflict, as calculated by Jan Ludvik, were 4.8 times higher than were America’s financial expenditures on the war.

Thus, at the war’s end, the Soviet Union was exhausted and in a much weaker condition than it had been before the war. By contrast, the U.S., having had none of the war’s battles occurring on its territory, was (by comparison) barely even scratched by the war, and it was thus clearly and overwhelmingly the new and dominant world-power emerging from the war.

That was the actual situation in 1945.

The U.S. Government did not sit on its haunches with its enormous post-war advantage, but invested wisely in order to expand it. One of the first investments the U.S. made after the war was the Marshall Plan to rebuild the European countries that had now become the U.S. aristocracy’s vassal-states. The heavily damaged U.S.S.R. possessed no such extra cash to invest in (rebuilding) its vassals. Furthermore, the U.S.S.R.’s communist regime was additionally hobbled by Karl Marx’s labor theory of value, which produced prices that contained no useful information about demand and thus no constructive information for planners. (Planning is essential regardless whether an enterprise is private or public.) Thus, the U.S.S.R. was doomed to lose in its economic competition with The West, so that the Cold War was actually a losing proposition for them, from the very start of the post-war era. America’s post-WW-II dominance, combined with Marx’s crippling economic theory, and produced the exodus of East Europeans to The West.

America’s aristocracy thus increasingly rose on top internationally. Like any aristocracy, the American aristocracy’s main concerns were foreign trade, and so U.S. international corporations increasingly expanded even at the expense of the corporations owned by its competing, now-vassal, aristocracies, and the U.S. aristocracy’s corporations and brands thus came to dominate the entire capitalist sphere. The growth-bug, if it becomes an addiction, is itself a disease. Out of control, it is a cancer, which can destroy the organism. This is what happened in America. Conquering also the communist sphere was the U.S. aristocracy’s long-term goal, so that they would ultimately dominate every nation, the entire world. By the time of 1980, the U.S. aristocracy’s top goal (world domination) became also the U.S. Government’s top goal. The cancer had spread to the culture’s brain. Growth, backed by “Greed is good” economics, became practically the American religion, viewed as patriotic, and not merely as the nation’s economic model (which was bad enough, with its increasingly imperialistic thrust — such as 2003 Iraq, 2011 Libya, 2012- Syria, 2014 Ukraine, 2016- Yemen, and maybe now Iran).

America’s unchallengeable dominance lasted from then till now, but clearly has now reached near its end. The United States is trying to restore its post-Soviet (post-1991) global supremacy, by intensifying the U.S. regime’s secret war against Russia and its allies, which started on the night of 24 February 1990 and which could reach a crescendo soon in WW III unless something will be done by America’s allies to force the by-now wildly flailing U.S. aristocracy to accept peacefully the end of the American aristocracy’s hegemony — the termination of their, until recently, unchallengeable control over the world. By now, with the Soviet Union and its communism and its Warsaw Pact mirror of America’s NATO military alliance gone since 1991 and yet no peace-dividend but only ever-increasing wealth-concentration into the tiny number of billionaires who benefit from war weaponry-sales and conquests, America needs to abandon its addiction to growth, or else it will proceed forward on its current path, to WW III. That’s its current path.

According to Josh Rogin in the Washington Post on November 14th, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence had just said, as Rogin phrased it, that “the United States has no intention of ceding influence or control over the [Pacific] region to Beijing” and that if China won’t do everything that the U.S. demands, then the U.S. is fully prepared to force China to obey. The same newspaper had earlier presented Robert D. Kaplan, on October 9th, saying, “The United States must face up to an important fact: the western Pacific is no longer a unipolar American naval lake, as it was for decades after World War II. The return of China to the status of great power ensures a more complicated multipolar situation. The United States must make at least some room for Chinese air and naval power in the Indo-Pacific region.” But the U.S. regime is now making clear that it won’t do that.

The U.S. regime appears to be determined to coerce both Russia and China to comply with all American demands. With both of those countries, as with Iran, the U.S. regime is now threatening hot war. Trump, as the “deal-maker,” is offering no concessions, but only demands, which must be complied with, or else. The United States is threatening WW III. But what nations will be America’s allies, this time around? If many European nations abandon the U.S., then what?

Key for the U.S. regime is keeping the U.S. dollar as the world’s reserve currency.

Rockefeller Capital Management, Global Foresight, Third Quarter 2018  presents Jimmy Chang, Chief Investment Strategist, headlining “Nothing Trumps the Dollar, Yet”. He writes: “The reserve currency status gives the U.S. a significant advantage in handling its finances. American economist Barry Eichengreen observed that it cost only a few cents for the U.S. to print a $100 bill, but other countries would need to produce $100 of actual goods or services to obtain that $100 bill. The world’s need for the greenback allows the U.S. to issue debt in its own currency at very low interest rates. French Finance Minister Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, who later became the president, coined [in 1965] the term ‘exorbitant privilege’ to describe America’s advantage” of the U.S. dollar over any other nation’s currency. That “exorbitant advantage” never went away. Chang concludes: “As for the King Dollar, its short-term outlook appears robust.” However, few other observers now share that view. Increasing numbers of countries are pricing goods in other currencies, and China’s yuan and the EU’s euro are especially significant contenders to end dollar-dominance and to end the advantages that U.S.-based international corporations enjoy from dollar-dominance.

Other than dollar-dominance, the key barrier to world peace is NATO, the military alliance of the northern aggressor-nations. Proposals have been put forth for the EU to have its own army, which initially would be allied with NATO (i.e., with the U.S. regime). On November 17th, Russian Television bannered “EU army: Will it be easy for Europe to get rid of American political diktat?” and pointed to the U.S. vassal-nations that would be especially likely to stay in NATO: UK, Poland, Netherlands, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. Perhaps the other EU nations and Russia could form their own military alliance, which will formally be committed to the independence of those U.S. vassal-nations, and which will welcome individual peace-treaties with each of them, so as to indicate that aggression is only the U.S. regime’s way, and thus to lay the groundwork for peace instead of war, going forward. Clearly, the people who control the U.S. are addicted to invasions and coups (“regime-change”s), instead of to respecting the sovereignty of each nation and the right of self-determination of people everywhere. America’s conquest-addiction threatens, actually, every other nation.

Perhaps a reformed and truly independent EU can provide the new reserve currency, and also in other ways the foundation for global peace between nations. NATO will be irrevocably opposed to this, but it could happen. And if and when it does, it might tame the aristocratic beast that rides the American warfare state, but this isn’t likely to happen anytime soon. A step forward toward it is the courageous statement by “The Saker” at the American news-commentary site, Unz dot com, on November 15th, “Thanking Vets for Their ‘Service’ – Why?” He boldly notes that after World War II, all U.S. invasions have been criminal, and that it’s a remarkably long string of evil — and this doesn’t even include the many coups, which have likewise destroyed some nations.

Nationalism is just as evil in today’s America as it was in Hitler’s Germany. It is hostile to people in any other nation. It demands conquest. And wherever nationalism rules, patriotism dies and is replaced by nationalism.

Only by restoring patriotism and eliminating nationalism can WW III be avoided. Ending dollar-dominance is part of the path toward an internationally peaceful world that focuses more on serving the public’s needs and less on serving the aristocrats’ cravings. But ending NATO is also necessary.

Either these things will be done, or there will be WW III.