Paris-Berlin-Moscow Alliance

Moscow as a Would-be Capital of Europe

By Alexandre Latsa, win.ru
December 20, 2010

From time immemorial — through the era of Carl the Great and Napoleon Bonaparte to Charles De Gaulle — France has been attempting to architect a united continental Europe. Today it seemingly shifts its role to Russia that has a chance to pave the way for new Europe — stretching from Lisbon to Vladivostok.

Almost every French man is a staunch Europhile, which is quite paradoxical in fact — most part of foreigners, visiting France are often stricken by their relatively narrow views, lack of foreign languages knowledge and their (at times excessive) chauvinism. Nevertheless, it were the Frenchmen who backed up the first attempt of European integration.

By the end of his rule in the 9th century Carl the Great, Emperor of the West reigned over the continental empire that included contemporary France, parts of Spain and Italy, German territories and the Balkans. For many intellectuals and historians Carl the Great is the founding father of today’s Europe. Fortunately for Europe or not, but after his death the empire was disbanded.

Second French attempt to create united Europe belonged to Napoleon — he hoped to control vast territory, stretching from Corsica to Moscow. It is well-known (in Russia especially) that this armed attempt to unite the continent by the power of arms failed in 1812, having met fierce resistance of Russians and the terribly cold winter.

After the Second World War, Europe fetched itself divided into two blocs — American trans-Atlantic bloc and the Soviet continental one. Western Europe was restored for American Marshall Plan funds in exchange for NATO integration, which was a U.S.-controlled military alliance found in 1949 and intended to prevent any imperial aspirations of the Soviet Union. In 1955 countries of the Eastern Europe, being under the Soviet auspice, entered the Warsaw Treaty, yet another military alliance, created as the NATO counterpoise. French Europhilia made itself visible once again in 1967, when General De Gaulle withdrew his country from the NATO and gave it an access to the nuclear energy.

Turning his back to the Anglo-Saxon world, De Gaulle maintained his farseeing project of continental Europe, temporarily tore down the iron curtain and stood up for the historical proximity with Germany and Russia within the framework of continental Europe stretching from Atlantics to the Ural Mountains. In 1960 Paris established itself as a political capital and France undertaken yet another attempt to re-create Europe. This Gaullist idea of Paris-Berlin-Moscow axis and the concept of Russia (Soviet Union at that time) being a part of Europe tended to turn fairer as the time went by.

There have always been discussions whether Russia really belongs to Europe in France. Many people, poorly knowing Russia or not knowing it at all, were asking me about this Gaullist border, which the Ural Mountains might have been. They asked if the Ural — border line between Europe and Asia — really was a border right in the heart of Russia or Europe. And are the people living over the Ural Mountains really different from those, living in its western part? These questions may undoubtedly cause a smile on the faces of those who know the country but they are not make-believe. In my opinion, semantic mistake of General De Gaulle and the relative lack of knowledge about Russia among the common Europeans make this quite understandable.

Since I live in Russia, I can only confirm that before my arrival I considered it to be a completely European country — so to say, European in its essence, be it the mentality of its citizens (Orthodox Slavs) or the dominating cultural legacy of Rome and Athens. This European tint is present all along its territory — from Moscow to the heart of Siberia, in Vladivostok, at the Pacific coast, in the Caucasus and Northern Karelia. Even Kazan with its eastern culture is not less European than, say, Sarajevo.

But I have to admit that Russia is not like the rest of European countries. Sheer size, variety of nations inhabiting it, territories stretching to Asia and Pacific Ocean — Russia is an empire, colossus, which spine is European but certain vertebrae may be Asian, Tatar, Muslim or even Buddhist. I often tell French friends of mine that we have a lot to learn from Russia in the field of "multi-cultural model" that Europe is trying to establish with such great efforts.

Today, while Russia and NATO discuss the creation of security architecture in the Northern hemisphere, stretching from Vancouver to Vladivostok, the discords remain. Via NATO, which extended itself up to the Eastern- and Western-European borders, the United States infiltrated the Eurasian continent — theater of war that is considered to be vitally important for orchestrating the world politics. Russia, being a member of Shanghai Treaty Organization, often called the Asian NATO is willing to attract Europe into new additional continental security system. In that sense, Russian initiatives on creation of continental security structure and a common integral economic space from Lisbon to Vladivostok are every bit as Gaullist as they are farsighted.

The only difference is that this time political impulse comes from Moscow, rather than from Paris like 40 years ago. There’s a certain reason for that: gauging from Moscow, Europe stretches 4.000 km to the Atlantic and 6.500 km to the East, through Siberia to the Pacific Coast. European political centre of gravity just shifted to the East. Paris-Berlin-Moscow alliance would have allowed Europeans — who failed to gain real political and military autonomy after the 1945 — not to get stuck in the unilateral NATO ties and to obtain an exit to the utmost important regions of tomorrow: Caucasus, Central Asia and Asian-Pacific region. In the past Paris was the capital of Europe, today it is Brussels — what if Moscow to become one in future?

Alexandre Latsa is 33-year-old French blogger living in Russia. Expert in the Slavic languages, he maintains the DISSONANCE blog, representing "different look upon Russia".

Paris and Berlin Outline Common 'Vision' for 2020

EurActiv.com
February 5, 2010

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel sealed a wide-ranging cooperation programme for the next ten years in Paris on Thursday (4 February), launching 80 "concrete" projects to forge closer economic ties by 2020. EurActiv France reports.

Background

The Franco-German relationship has long been considered an engine of European integration.

Yesterday's meeting, held in Paris between government ministers from all departments, is the twelfth time that the two countries have held joint cabinet meetings.

The Franco-German pledge to work together more closely in future comes as EU leaders prepare to meet on 11 February for a summit aimed at launching a new ten-year economic plan for Europe, known as 'EU 2020'.

"The era of grand declarations and great treaties will begin to recede a little,"said Sarkozy, presenting 'Agenda 2020', a Franco-German blueprint for future relations between the two countries, at a joint press conference with his German counterpart yesterday.

"What is growth in the 21st century?"asked Chancellor Merkel. "We have to respond to this question together,"she said.

The announcement comes as EU leaders prepare to discuss the bloc's new '2020' strategy for economic growth at a summit on 11 February.

On foreign affairs, the pair spoke of "a common initiative for the Middle East,"preparing jointly for big international meetings like the G20 and "following up"together on Russian President Dimitry Medvedev's proposals to Europe.

"The Europe-Russia relationship is fundamental,"Merkel argued. "We have to end the Cold War once and for all."

The 10-page document of proposals for further Franco-German cooperation breaks down into six areas: the economy, energy and the climate, research, foreign policy and defence, citizenship, and institutional cooperation.

Concrete "projects"include a Franco-German storage facility to alleviate cross-border gas shortages, a joint school textbook on Europe and European integration, and the launch of a satellite to monitor greenhouse gas emissions.

The document also features plans to launch "the world's first cross-border demonstration project for electric cars [...] to illustrate the limitless possibilities of electric vehicles".

Other objectives are more vague, referring only to "common implementation" of energy and climate legislation, or pre-existing initiatives such as a promise to table "common proposals for a strong food and agriculture policy".

Both nations pledged to push for EU-level action to reduce CO2 emissions, but did not specifically mention a tax on carbon. Last month, France outlined plans to unilaterally impose a carbon tax on large industrial installations from July, but the German government is known to be divided on the issue (EurActiv 22/01/10).

Neither leader mentioned a specific timeframe or budget for implementing the new proposals.

Positions

"Some proposals are rehashes of the programme presented by France and Germany in 2003 to mark the 40th anniversary of the Elysée Treaty,"Wolfram Vogel of the Paris-based Franco-German Institute told EurActiv France.

Vogel said around half of the forty proposals made at that time were taken up again in the 2020 agenda, including plans for French ministers to attend meetings of their German counterparts, and vice-versa.

The analyst was quick to stress that such "recycling" of old ideas is not necessarily a bad thing.

"Stressing once again the desire to work together is far from negative," Vogel said."Don't expect things to happen quickly," Vogel concluded, warning that it takes time for political declarations to produce tangible results.

"I think France and Germany are not so strong that they can convince the whole world to do what they want," Claira Demesmay, head of the French programme at the German Council on Foreign Relations, told Deutsche Welle.

"They are two nation states that are not all that big, and they know it. But just because you can't influence things, that's no reason not to act. They continue to try to convince the other countries, starting with the European Union and then moving further afield. But it's very difficult," Demesmay said.

As for the Agenda 2020 document, the analyst said "the focus seems to be quantitative, not qualitative. It's not a revolution".

Germany

German Soldiers Could Be Fighting Around the World if Conscription Phased Out Under New Plans

The Flu Case
June 7, 2010

The German government is on the verge of agreeing a major change to the army that will allow significant numbers of soldiers to serve abroad for the first time ever, and so could pave the way for Germany to engage in major conflicts in the Middle East and the rest of the world in the 21st century.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cabinet looks set to push through a plan to phase out national service and its 60,000 school-leaver conscripts.

Conscripts in the German army cannot serve abroad.

By switching to a volunteer, professional army, it will be possible for the German government, for the first time since the second world war, to send significant numbers of troops abroad and to engage in offensive wars.

Earlier this month, President Horst Köhler resigned after facing strong criticism to remarks he made on a visit to Afghanistan that suggested that using German troops to protect corporate interests was legitimate. Such a use of troops is currently banned by the Constitution, which limits the army to a defensive role.

Merkel plans to cut €70bn in spending by 2014 to keep the shortfall between spending and tax intake within European Union limits, and Merkel says the defence budget must be cut.

However, there is no evidence that abolishing conscription will save money as Baden Württemberg’s Minister President Stefan Mappus has pointed out. He recently said that he had seen no evidence that professional armies are less costly than conscript-based forces.

http://de.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idDEBEE65403K20100605

In addition, Germany has only notched up such a gigantic mountain of debt recently because of the sums given to banks, first in the form of a bank bailout in 2008, and second, in the form of a so-called Greek and “eurozone” bailout this spring.

These enormous sums are not going not to the Greeks or other country’s in Europe, but straight to the banks under the pretext of government having to pay interest on the sovereign debt incurred by the banks.

Much of the bailout money will also go to the purchase of weapons by Greece as Der Spiegel recently reported.

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,695569,00.html

Hans Olaf Henkel called for a parliamentary inquiry to be set up to investigate the financial crisis and the bailouts in a recent report in Die Welt.

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,695569,00.html

A similar parliamentary inquiry in Iceland showed how bankers, government officials and regulators were jointly responsible for destroying the country's financial system by inflating paper debt, which was then nationalised in order to suck interest payments out of taxpayers, crash the economy, and buy up the assets of Iceland for a pittance. Several bankers in Iceland have already been arrested.

But the German government has so far failed to implement any such investigation in spite of the overwhelming evidence of criminal activity.

The SEC in the USA is investigating Deutsche Bank's role in the financial crisis along with Goldman Sachs.

The German financial authorities have taken no action.

Instead of dealing with the criminal behaviour of the banks in sucking billions from taxpayers, the Merkel government is embarking on huge and savage cuts in the welfare system. The effect of draining so much money from the state will depress demand more and deepen the recession. But Germans who lose their jobs will find that they have very reduced rights to welfare payments under the new budget plans to be unveiled by Merkel.

Perhaps joining the army will seen an attractive option for many?

Though small at the start, a professional army can be expanded far more easily than a conscript army – especially at a time of economic hardship when there is a boost to recruitment. Such an army can be sent to serve in Iraq and the Middle East at the cost of billions to the taxpayers under the pretext of a false flag security requirement.

That the war in Afghanistan was engineered is widely accepted, in the meantime, in the USA.

There is scientific, verifiable evidence, also enumerated by US architects and engineers for 9/11 truth that show that the World Trade Centers in New York were destroyed by explosives also by elements operating inside the government. This “false flag” attack on the WTC was used by the Bush administration to justify the invasion of Afghanistan and, later Iraq, in an operation which has cost maybe millions of lives and cost trillions of dollars, and which shows no signs of having an end.

While the German public has remained relatively apathetic to the engagement of German troops in Afghanistan because of their limited role there, the US and UK public are growing increasingly hostile to the wars that drag on for no purpose other than generating enormous profits for the military industrial complex.

As a result of growing resistance in the US and UK, international corporate interests seeking to expand world war for more profit need a fresh supply of troops – and they appear to be thinking of harnessing Germany’s army and weapons industry as the motor for an expanded conflict in the Middle East.

Bild Zeitung and Der Spiegel recently reported on the secretive Bilderberg meeting of the global elite in Sitges in Spain, attended also by Deutsche Bank CEO Josef Ackermann. Chancellor Angela Merkel and Defence Minister Karl Theodor zuu Guttenberg are also Bilderberg members.

It was reported by insiders that the Bilderberg group are considering a nuclear strike against Iran.

A nuclear exchange is a shocking event but it will not lead to an expansion of the war on the scale that the Bilderbergs are reported to envisage for large profits.

To generate significant profits, the military industrial complex requires a large-scale military forces and equipment to be deployed on the ground fighting other military forces or civilian populations for a protracted length of time without a breakthrough.

And it looks like it will now be the turn of the German soldiers to serve in a war manufactured with the help of the controlled media as soon as conscription is abolished. The plan to switch the German forces from a conscript-based force must be opposed by everyone who is interested in future peace around the world.

The merits of Guttenberg’s and Merkel’s sudden and low-profile proposal to transform the German army under the cover of saving money must be debated in the open, at the very least, and its gigantic implications considered.

Bild Reports on the Bilderberg Conference: 12 Million Germans Hear About the Secret Meeting

The Flu Case
June 5, 2010

Germany’s biggest newspaper, Bild Zeitung, has reported today on the Bilderberg meeting underway in Sitges.

In a factual online report -- eschewing talk of conspiracies but mentioning a possible “world government” agenda -- Bild lists some of the German politicians and bankers who have attended Bilderberg meetings. Bild also gives information about when the meetings started and who initiated them, notes the security and secrecy. The report also speculates that the group is trying to rescue their euro (scam) over the weekend as polls show 64% of the Germans want a return to the D Mark.

Believed to reach about 12 million people in Germany, Bild Zeitung’s coverage of the Bilderberg meeting breaks new ground.

The exposure will surely make it much harder for Bilderberg Chancellor Angela Merkel and Deutsche Bank CEO Josef Ackermann to collapse the German economy for the profit of the banks and start a war.

In another setback for the Bilderbergs in Germany, Defence Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg is meeting tougher than expected opposition to his plans to abolish conscription under the pretext of having to save money.

West Germany was banned from maintaining any armed forces after World War two, but established armed forces based on conscription in 1950 because conscription was believed to ensure that the army remains a defense force committed to the country’s interests. German conscripts are not allowed to serve abroad, for example.

http://www.bild.de/BILD/politik/2010/06/05/spar-gipfel-verteidigungsminister-guttenberg/will-wehrpflicht-ende-csu-chef-seehofer-pfeift-ihn-zurueck.html

But Guttenberg this week unilaterally announced plans to create a volunteer, professional army, which would also be more able to serve the needs of the international corporate crime syndicate by fighting in Afghanistan and Iran etc.

The head of the CSU faction, Horst Seehofer, has, however, blocked Guttenberg.

The unprecedented and enormous coverage of the Bilderberg conference in Spain by the German media -- Spiegel and Bild -- will make it much harder for the Globalists to push through their agenda for economic collapse and war in Germany.

This is the Bild report:

http://www.bild.de/BILD/politik/wirtschaft/2010/06/05/bilderberg-treffen-zum-finanzmarkt/geheim-gipfel-zur-eurokrise.html

Global Government, Carbon Tax Agenda Failing, But Majority of Elitists in Favor of Air Strikes on Iran

By Paul Joseph Watson, Prison Planet.com
June 5, 2010

The 2010 Bilderberg agenda has been revealed by veteran Bilderberg sleuth Jim Tucker and it paints a picture of crisis for the globalists, who are furious at the increased exposure their gatherings have received in recent years, as well as being dismayed at their failure to rescue both the euro and the failing carbon tax agenda, but more alarmingly according to Tucker, the majority of Bilderberg members are now in favor of military air strikes on Iran.

American Free Press muckraker Tucker has proven routinely accurate with the information he obtains from sources inside Bilderberg, which makes this year’s revelations all the more intriguing.

According to Tucker, Bilderberg luminaries are dismayed at the fact that “many important people” are not attending this year because, due to increasing exposure, invitees are “getting in trouble at home” and constituents are embarrassing them by asking irate questions such as “what are you doing with these monsters?”

“All these people are exposing us, we get all this mail and calls,” Tucker paraphrased Bilderberg members as complaining.

This dovetails with the revelations overheard by Guardian journalist Charlie Skelton at the Hotel Dolce Sitges before the meeting began when he heard conference organizers lamenting the fact that protest numbers are growing at Bilderberg events each year and that they represent a “threat” to Bilderberg’s agenda.

In addition, prominent Bilderberg Zbigniew Brzezinski, the man who warned recently that a “global political awakening” was threatening to derail the move towards global government, was expected to be in attendance at this year’s meeting.

Tucker named his source as an international financial consultant who personally knows Bilderberg members and has done business with them for the past 20 years.

Turning to Iran, Tucker said that many Bilderberg members, including Brzezinski, were in favor of U.S. air strikes on Iran and were “leaning towards war,” although 100 per cent of members were not supportive of an attack.

“Some of them in Europe are saying no we shouldn’t do it but most of them are in favor of American air strikes on Iran,” said Tucker, adding, “They’re tilting heavily towards green lighting a U.S. attack on Iran.”

An attack on Iran would provide a welcome distraction to the globalists’ failings in other areas and would also allow them to war profiteer, pointed out Tucker.

On the subject of the euro, Tucker said that the Bilderberg elitists were determined to save the single currency even as it collapsed to a new 4-year-low at $1.19 against the dollar yesterday afternoon. As we have highlighted, the globalists are panicking at the euro’s fall and the ECB keeps intervening to try and hasten its decline. If the euro were to cease to exist, it would all but derail the ultimate agenda for a global currency because the perceived stability of using one currency for a plethora of nations would be discredited.

“The euro is important because it’s part of their world government program, they’re very downbeat because they’ve fallen so far behind,” said Tucker, explaining that the globalists had planned by now to have the European Union, the American Union and the Asia-Pacific Union already up and running.

With regard to the climate change agenda, on which subject Microsoft founder Bill Gates was personally invited to the conference to discuss, Tucker said that Bilderberg were still intent on pushing it in pursuit of a carbon tax despite the fact that the whole move was massively eviscerated in the aftermath of the Climategate scandal.

Tucker quoted one Bilderberg member as all but admitting defeat on the mission to hoodwink the public into paying taxes in the name of fighting global warming.

“On climate change, we’re about whipped,” said one of the elitists in attendance.

However, Tucker said that the globalists were working on putting out more climate change propaganda “even as we speak”.

On the issue of the BP oil spill, the Bilderbergers made it clear that President Obama’s apparent “outrage” at BP and his threat of criminal procedures against the company was an little more than an act and that British Petroleum, who have been represented at Bilderberg meetings in the past by people like Peter Sutherland, former non-executive chairman of BP, were still “one of our brothers,” according to the elitists.

The future of oil prices are always an important topic to Bilderberg and the leaks Tucker and other investigators relayed from previous Bilderberg meetings were proven accurate when oil prices hit $150 a barrel in 2008, which was precisely what Bilderberg had called for.

“Gas prices are going to be nice and cheap this summer,” said Tucker, adding that they would start to rise again to the $4 a gallon level around November when artificial scarcity is created.

On the march towards anti-democratic global government, Bilderberg members stated that America must be “Europeanized” and turned into a giant socialist welfare state with health rationing and higher income taxes.

Tucker said hat Bilderberg were intent on mandating a bank tax paid directly to the IMF to fund global governance and a global treasury department under the IMF, and that this would then merely be passed on to the consumer.

In summary, Tucker said that this year’s conference was the most downbeat and pessimistic Bilderberg meeting in history, with massive exposure of their agenda acting as a roadblock to the ultimate goal of an authoritarian world government run by the elite, for the elite.

German-French Alliance

The World from Berlin: 'Does Angela Merkel Still Trust Nicolas Sarkozy?'

By Daryl Lindsey, Spiegel Online
June 9, 2010

Angela Merkel's last-minute decision to cancel a dinner with Nicolas Sarkozy this week has left many questioning the state of relations between the two countries. But German papers warn that the common currency can only be saved through their leadership.

By the time Angela Merkel unexpectedly cancelled her planned dinner meeting with Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday, the French press corps had already landed at Berlin's Tegel Airport. In Paris and Berlin, the surprise move triggered endless speculation over why the chancellor had cancelled -- was she doing it to protect Sarkozy from a prickly domestic political debate over budget cuts or out of irritation over their differences on how to address the euro crisis?

The surprise decision came the same day the chancellor announced a contentious package of savings measures that would slash her government's budget by around €80 billion ($95 billion) by 2014 to meet the requirements of the European Unions's stability pact as well as the so-called "debt brake" amendment to the German constitution requiring a balanced budget by 2016.

In Germany and France, the cancellation is being perceived in the media as reflective of the growing divide between Paris and Berlin over how best to deal with the sovereign debt and euro crisis. Merkel has said she would like to adopt a savings package that would serve as a model for other European countries and show the way out of a crisis that has pressured the euro.

But in Paris, French government officials have rejected adopting the kind of heavy austerity measures being championed in Berlin. France's government minister in charge of stimulus efforts, Patrick Devedjian, on Tuesday warned against similar measures for his country, saying it "would be dangerous because it risks killing growth."

The two countries are also split on how to save the euro. Sarkozy is pushing for a euro zone economic governance which would include only the 16 euro zone member states in tighter coordination of economic policies. Merkel, however, would like to see greater economic policy coordination between all 27 EU member states and has called for the European Council to establish an economic policy forum. So far, neither side has shown a willingness to budge.

Nothing Is Possible without Merkel and Sarkozy

The French media were highly critical of Monday's cancellation. Liberation wrote,

"Does Angela Merkel still trust Nicolas Sarkozy? It is extremely rare that a bilateral meeting is cancelled only a few hours before it is to take place."

And French paper of record Le Monde wrote that Merkel was "not willing" to discuss the issues with Sarkozy on Monday night.

"That's too bad," the paper wrote, "Nothing is possible without agreement between the two."

Liberation has also reported that Sarkozy has stated "privately" that he is frustrated with Merkel's hesitance and delays in moving to prop up the euro. Speaking on French radio, former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, said the cancellation was a sign that Germany "has lost its faith in France."

In Berlin, the government has downplayed the kerfuffle, saying the French press speculation about a rift between Merkel and Sarkozy is "untrue." The German daily Frankfurter Rundschau claims that officials speaking off the record said Merkel was seeking to spare Sarkozy from Germany's "domestic showdown" over the savings package as well as possible uncomfortable questions from reporters on why France has no plans for major austerity measures.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, most German newspaper editorials don't buy that logic, arguing that Franco-German relations are ailing and Merkel's decision is a sign of the malaise.

After admonishing Merkel not to put "valuable" German-French relations at risk, the conservative Die Welt writes:

"Sarkozy and Merkel were supposed to meet to prepare for an EU meeting on June 17, but the views on how to address the crisis and the future of European economic policies have diverged in Paris and Berlin to a point not seen in years. Unfriendliness and misunderstandings are also increasing. France wants a European economic government and an institutionalization of the euro group, of which Sarkozy would very much like to be president. Germany is not enthused by the idea. And why should it be? Berlin doesn't want to reduce the Europe of 27 to one of 16 euro-zone countries. Berlin is also increasingly eyeing Sarkozy's knee-jerk style with irritation: German politicians believe he is more concerned about French interests than Europe's common good. In contrast to Paris, the Germans are insisting on stricter stability requirements. France rejects these. But what is weighing just as heavily as the political differences of opinion is the growing distrust between the partners. All of Europe is suffering as a result."

The conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:

"How else can one interpret this than as being a sign of irritation that has risen out of deep-seated differences of opinion, that the chancellor cancelled her meeting … at the last minute? … But a dispute like that is the last thing the EU and the German-French relationship needs right now. A rescue and lasting stabilization of the currency union will only happen if Paris and Berlin can negotiate as one on fundamental questions. Without credible German-French coordination, there will be no credibility in the euro zone."

On Tuesday, the center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung wrote:

"The EU is taking a hit with the economic crisis, the euro's decline, weak leadership in Brussels and introverted member states. It is threatened with creeping decline. Thus, it is again looking to France and Germany for leadership. ... And there is much more at stake here than the current crisis. Europe is not a nation. It is too heterogenous to live without a vision. It needs goals -- which the internal market and the euro once provided."

"Sarkozy and Merkel must point the way to the furture in order to pull the EU out of its apathy. Both are too smart to risk the German-French friendship. That's why, at some point, they will reach an agreement on the issues that divide them: the European economic government that Sarkozy desires, and the budget discipline that Merkel is calling for. But that will not be enough. The citizens of the EU don't know how they are supposed to push Europe forward after the crisis, and Sarkozy and Merkel don't either."

"The petty quibbling on both sides should be forgotten. In the past, the president has often appealed to Berlin and said that he was prepared to do great things together. The chancellor was always skeptical. But this time she should take Sarkozy at his word."

German-French Alliance

UK Bank Chief Fears Paris, Berlin Will Push for Eurozone Political Union

EUObserver.com
March 12, 2010

As trouble surrounding the Greek economy escalated earlier this year, Britain's top banker warned the US that France and Germany will push for political union inside the eurozone currency club and that this could damage London's influence within the EU.

The thoughts of Bank of England Governor Mervyn King were relayed to Washington by US Ambassador Louis Susman after the two men talked in February of this year, as revealed by a leaked cable from whistleblower site WikiLeaks.

"Germany and France will ultimately have no choice but to offer explicit guarantees of Greek debt, argued King," according to the cable.

"The eurozone could not risk a Greek default and euro devaluation would not be an acceptable political option for Germany or France. Germany and France will likely, as a condition of any guarantee, require the ability to scrutinize if not exercise some control over the Greek budget. Longer-term, the drive for greater political cohesion will accelerate."

In May, Greece was handed a €110 billion EU-IMF bail-out.

At the same time, the EU's statistics agency, Eurostat, was given greater powers to scrutinize member state economic data, and the subsequent setting up of a €750 billion eurozone rescue mechanism, only days later, further increased the determination of European leaders to better co-ordinate their economic policies.

A decade after warnings about monetary union being unstable without a parallel political union to co-ordinate economic policies were ignored, EU leaders appear to be coming round to the idea.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has put forward plans for a European "economic government," while European economy commissioner Olli Rehn has repeatedly said it is time to finally put the 'E' in Economic and Monetary Union (EMU).

Already in February, Mr King worried that this drive for eurozone consolidation could sideline Britain's influence inside the EU.

"The eurozone's move to greater political cohesion could poise some disadvantages for the UK, King speculated," reads the US ambassador's cable.

As an example, the central banker apparently pointed to a meeting of EU finance ministers earlier in February, during which "eurozone governments politely listened to chancellor [Alistair] Darling when he commented on the situation in Greece, but he was not invited to attend internal discussions since the UK is not part of the eurozone."

Mr King went on to warn:

"It would be incumbent for the UK to demonstrate that it has something meaningful to say and to be constructively engaged in the EU, should this greater political cohesion among the eurozone governments occur."

Separately, former French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing has insisted that the eurozone is not in danger of breaking apart, arguing that it would be impossible for any state to leave and reclaim its former currency.

"It is impossible. Imagine a country decides to return to a national currency. Its citizens do not want. What could they do well with a currency devalued by 40 percent? There is no space for a small change," he told Le Parisien on Thursday

The World from Berlin: 'The Greek Crisis Induces a Sense of Deja Vu'

Spiegel Online
March 4, 2010

Greece's drastic steps toward slashing its national debt have brought workers into the streets. German commentators are divided over whether the measures will help the debt-stricken country avoid default, with the predatory nature of speculators reminding some of the 2008 financial crisis.

Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou was cheered by political and financial leaders in Europe on Wednesday for a new package of budget cuts -- amounting to €4.8 billion ($6.6 million) -- to control the government's soaring deficit.

The austerity measures, which include drastic cuts in bonus payments to civil servants (on top of frozen wages and slashed benefits from earlier measures), have led Greek unions to call for strikes. The severe cuts aim to slash the Greek budget deficit to 8.7 percent of GDP from the current 12.7 percent. Euro-zone rules say national deficits can't exceed 3 percent.

Workers have poured into Athens streets, and on Thursday morning about 200 demonstrators took over the Finance Ministry building, preventing some staff from going to work. But they didn't prevent the Finance Ministry from announcing a new 10-year bond issue later in the day -- a sign of optimism that Greece will manage to avoid bankruptcy.

Demand for the crucial bond issue was high. The €5 billion issue was massively over-subscribed, with total offers amounting to around €15 billion. Greece reportedly had to offer a rate of about 6.47 percent on the bond -- around 0.40 percentage points above the previous rate -- in order to attract buyers. The rate is twice that offered on comparable German bonds.

Papandreou is plainly still hoping for a bailout from his fellow EU governments. According to the Bloomberg news agency, Papandreou told his ministers Wednesday:

"We have fulfilled to the utmost all that we must from our side; now it's Europe's turn. It is a historic moment for the European Union."

Papandreou is due in Berlin on Friday for a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Merkel tried to dampen possible Greek hopes of a German bailout when she told German TV on Wednesday that the new cuts in Greece send a welcome "signal" toward restoring confidence in the euro.

"I expressly want to say that Friday isn't about aid commitments," she said, "but about good relations between Germany and Greece."

German papers on Thursday have their own opinions.

The conservative daily Die Welt writes:

"It's more than symbolism for both the European Commission and the European Central Bank to support Greece's new budget cuts. Statements from politicians aren't worth much on financial markets; statements from central bankers are another matter. By taking such a step, the defenders of the euro are risking their most valuable asset, their credibility. Central bankers offer such praise only when they truly mean it."

"Chancellor Merkel will also welcome the cuts. Until now, she's been under pressure to make concrete offers of aid to Papandreou during his visit to Berlin on Friday. Now she can pat her guest on the shoulder, praise his willingness to make economic reforms, and make soft assurances that the euro zone will hold."

"Other governments in Europe have been testing the limits of responsibility with their budget deficits. So far there's no firm plan for the European Commission to deal with such delinquent governments in the future. How can Europe hold the euro zone together without broad agreement on fiscal and economic policies? At the same time, though, the people of Europe are hardly prepared to grant more power to Brussels. As long as these key issues remain unresolved, it will be hard to label German euro-skepticism as hysteria."

The left-leaning daily Die Tageszeitung argues:

"The Greeks have done just what the EU has demanded: They've introduced radical savings measures. But who profits? The euro, the Greeks, or neighboring Europeans? This drama could show that no one benefits at all; in fact everyone, perhaps, will suffer."

"In the Greek case, it's evident that radical savings during an economic crisis will just make the crisis worse. Workers who receive 7 percent less in salary will have 7 percent less to spend in the economy -- in restaurants or in businesses that may then have to lay off employees. (These budget measures) will steer Greece into a depression at record speed."

"The crisis in Greece can't possibly leave the rest of Europe indifferent, because the Greeks have not borrowed the money from themselves, but from banks in France or Germany. Those banks' loans will only get less, not more, secure if Greece plunges deeper into crisis. The new austerity measures, meant to calm financial markets, will in the long run just increase the unrest."

The business daily Handelsblatt, however, writes:

"Papandreou has scored a coup with these new austerity measures. Now the Greeks will be saved from bankruptcy and the markets will come to their side. Papandreou has gambled and now stands to win, because he's now receiving verbal and political support from every corner."

"If the situation with Greek government bonds can stabilize in the next few weeks -- which is expected -- then we will see the right environment for the issuance of a new Greek bond. The sheer size of the bond issue will in this case not play a decisive role. If the Greeks successfully place an issue of €3 billion - €5 billion with institutional investors, then the spell will be broken. What's important for the Greeks is to show clearly to the outside world that they again have access to international capital markets -- to say, 'We have the means to refinance our own debt.'"

"If trust in the Greek government returns among certain core investors, all other large investors will take notice. In spite of such a success, of course, interest payments would remain high. Greek bonds would be worth buying again."

The Financial Times Deutschland argues:

"Karl Marx famously said that important historical events happen the first time as a tragedy, the second time as a farce. It's remarkable how financial markets these days are proving the prophet right. The Greek debt crisis certainly induces a sense of deja vu."

"The bank bailouts from the first year of the global financial crisis are lodged firmly in the minds of bankers and fund managers. Many big market players are currently betting on the bailout reflexes stemming from those first months of panic. People in banking circles have been saying for weeks that the euro zone would never let one of its poor relations default."

"It should come as no surprise that the markets would test the limits of EU governments. Investors want to know for certain if Germany, in the end, will always come to the rescue of Greece and other member states holding enormous domestic and foreign debts. So interest rates on Greek bonds have continued to rise to levels that even many bankers think are too high."

"If the governments in Paris and Berlin over the next few days step in with aid, the farce will be perfect: a bailout as promised, with uncertain results. Every new bond issue in southern Europe could bring a new emergency, and no one knows when the markets will be satisfied. Will €4 billion or €17 billion be enough? Or should Germans maybe set aside €40 billion to rescue Greece? Debt managers in Athens will have to borrow at least that amount this year."

German-French Alliance

France and Germany Unite to Push Britain to EU Sidelines

The Times
October 1, 2009

France and Germany are planning a new treaty of friendship and an array of other joint schemes that could push Britain to the sidelines in Europe, according to sources close to President Sarkozy.

The plan to put Paris and Berlin back at the heart of the stalled European Union covers defence, immigration, a new industrial policy and a drive to loosen what the pair see as Britain’s grip on the European Commission.

The revamped Franco-German axis may include the permanent assignment of ministers in each other’s Cabinets. The initiative would exploit Britain’s situation, with Gordon Brown weakened and distracted by next year’s general election and the decision by the Conservatives to quit Europe’s main centre-right grouping, the European People’s Party.

Paris and Berlin, reverting to the old idea of a two-speed Europe, aim to push ahead with a separate headquarters for European defence and the promotion of industrial champions. Britain wants none of that. The scheme, already far advanced, will follow this week’s repeat referendum in the Irish Republic on the Lisbon treaty, whether the vote is “yes” or “no.”

A casualty of the deal, hammered out in secret and involving all main ministries since last spring, is likely to be Franco-German backing for Tony Blair as the first president of the EU, diplomats said. The post opens if the Lisbon treaty is ratified.

Among alternatives being considered are Felipe González, the former Socialist Prime Minister of Spain, and Jean-Claude Juncker, the long-serving Prime Minister of Luxembourg.

“Tony Blair is a man of the past and the United Kingdom is no longer any model,” said a French diplomat.

David Cameron’s advisers said that, regardless of how the Irish vote, he will stick to his pledge to offer a referendum on the Lisbon treaty if it is not ratified by next election — and “not let matters rest there” if it is.

The move may also mean the symbolic appearance of a German chancellor for the first time at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris for the next Armistice Day remembrance, sources said. The Élysée Palace refused to comment, but officials at Verdun confirmed that Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, is expected to attend.

The new Franco-German pact, backed more enthusiastically by Mr Sarkozy than Ms Merkel, will create a new “avant-garde” in an EU that has become diffuse but it is not a return to federal dreams, a French diplomat insisted.

The re-election of Ms Merkel at the head of a centre-right coalition on Sunday has cleared the way for the accord. The renewed partnership could be sealed at the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall next month.

If Ireland votes “yes,” there would not be such urgency and the relaunch could be in the new year. The counter-push by “old Europe” is a product of the global financial crash and Mr Sarkozy’s frustration over his failure to forge a new partnership with Britain and the US. President Obama’s rejection of the French leader’s overtures has infuriated Mr Sarkozy and further alienated him from the “Anglo-Saxons,” whom he blames for the crisis. France’s re-entry to full Nato membership this year has raised German confidence in Paris.

Joschka Fischer, a former German Foreign Minister, said the Franco-German axis had to come into its own again whatever the fate of the Lisbon treaty.

“The centre of gravity of Europe can only be Paris and Berlin,” he told Le Monde last weekend. “Britain has decided to stay on the edge. Italy is... Italy. Poland has a way to come. Spain is buried in deep crisis.”

The prospect of Britain electing a Eurosceptic Conservative government is said to have removed any French qualms and Mr Sarkozy has buried the differences with Ms Merkel that dogged the first 18 months of his presidency. He has appointed Germanophile officials, including Bruno Le Maire, his new German-speaking Agriculture Minister, given the task of securing a deal on Common Agriculture Policy spending. Mr Sarkozy and Ms Merkel have found common ground since the crisis of 2008, standing together against London and Washington over bankers’ pay and tax havens.

“There is a common will in Paris and Berlin to break with the ultra-liberalism of a Brussels Commission that has fallen into the hands of the English,” said Enjeux les Echos, a business magazine. “The future is again focused on an economy regulated by states.”

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German-French Alliance

Making Europe the Partner of America in the “Long War:” Enter the Franco-German Entente (Excerpt)

Global Research
Originally Published on August 29, 2007

The victory over Iraq [in the Gulf War] was not waged as ‘a war to end all wars.’ Even the ‘New World Order’ cannot guarantee an era of perpetual peace.” - George H. Bush Sr., 41st President of the United States (March 6, 1991)

Former U.S. national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski explained that although Japan was important to American geo-strategy, Europe as a geopolitical entity (via the EU and NATO) constitutes America’s bridgehead into Eurasia.

“Unlike America’s links with Japan, NATO entrenches American political influence and military power on the Eurasian mainland,” and that “the allied European nations [were] still highly dependent on U.S. protection, any expansion of Europe’s political scope is automatically an expansion of U.S. influence,” Brzezinski explained in regards to Europe and Japan.

Brzezinski was paying more than just lip service to America’s allies in continental Europe; he was stressing that they were crucial, albeit as subordinates, to American global interests.

The strength of NATO would rest on the vitality of the European Union, an Anglo-American and Franco-German device. To emphasis this Brzezinski wrote that “the United States’ ability to project influence and power in Eurasia relies on close transatlantic ties.” Brzezinski also added that France and Germany, the Franco-German entente, would be America’s vital partners in NATO expansion and securing Eurasia, but a united Europe was an essential prerequisite. In regards to the Franco-German entente, Brzezinski wrote in 1998:

“In the western periphery of Eurasia, the key players will continue to be France and Germany, and America’s central goal should be to continue to expand the democratic European bridgehead.” This was essentially the forecast of the “EU expansion” that has gone hand-in-hand with earlier NATO expansion since the end of the Cold War. According to Brzezinski, it would be up to the Franco-German entente to led Europe: “ America cannot create a more united Europe on its own—that is a task for the Europeans, especially the French and the Germans.”

None of the Pentagon’s geo-strategic plans can go forward without the EU and NATO. For this to happen it is essential that a strategic consensus between the Anglo-American alliance and the Franco-German entente be forged. The Anglo-American alliance has pursued this track and deeper integration with the Franco-German side, while also taking an adversarial stance against the Franco-German entente. Iraq is a symbolic testimony to this rivalry, while Lebanon and NATO expansion in the Eastern Mediterranean is a parallel testimony to the strategic cooperation between the Anglo-American alliance and the Franco-German entente. A contradictory and confusing message is sent from these tracks, but there is always more to the picture. However, it is clear that Franco-German and Anglo-American interests must be synchronized for America to expand its global control.

The Endgame: A “Single Market” Under One World Administration?

“I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer...” -Major-General Smedley D. Butler, U.S. Marine Corps Commander (War Is a Racket, 1935)

After the Second World War, it was believed that from the nucleolus of Britain and American that a “New World Order” would be formed. Britain and America even had a combined military staff and combined chiefs of military staff. Visions for a singular global polity have vividly been tied to the Anglo-American establishment. In 1966, Professor Carroll Quigley, a noted American historian, wrote in his book Hope and Tragedy: A History of the World in Our Time that economics and finance vis-à-vis banking conglomerates were the engine in this drive and the real forces controlling national policies. Carroll Quigley wrote in regards to the Anglo-American alliance:

“I have objected, both in the past and recently, to a few of its policies (notably to its belief that England was an Atlantic rather than a European Power and must be allied, or even federated, with the United States and must remain isolated from Europe), but in general my chief difference of opinion is that it wishes to remain unknown, and I believe its role in history is significant enough to be known.”

For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasia,” insists Brzezinski. He also contends, “Now a non-Eurasian power [i.e., the U.S.] is preeminent in Eurasia—and America’s global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained.” In 1997 Brzezinski also stated that, in order to co-opt the Franco-German entente, a “Transatlantic Free Trade Agreement, already advocated by a number of prominent Atlantic leaders, could also mitigate the risk of growing economic rivalry between a more united EU and the United States.”

There is opposition in North America to what is believed to be the emergence of a projected “North American Union.” This North American entity would further amalgamate Canada, the United States, and Mexico, but the mechanisms for a grander global confederacy have already been drawn. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the creation of the EU were stepping stones towards this aspiration. Economics is the key that fuses these polities.

A summit between the EU and U.S. has shed light on plans for economic amalgamation. The term used at the summit was “single market” by “renewing the Trans-Atlantic partnership.” This is the same term used to describe the “common market” as it intensified Western European integration, which eventually gave birth to the European Union. At the summit, President Bush Jr. met with Jose Manuel Barroso, the President of the European Commission, and Federal Chancellor Merkel. Frau Merkel, while officially there on behalf of the EU, represented the interests of the Franco-German entente while President Bush Jr. represented Anglo-American interests. Jose Manuel Barroso as the President of the European Commission represented both Anglo-American and Franco-German interests, because the EU is a joint Anglo-American and Franco-German body. America is a de facto EU power due to its alliance with Britain, one of the three major EU powers along with France and Germany.

An agreement was reached between the EU and U.S. to integrate the markets and regulations of America and Europe even further. This agreement was another layer to add to the strategic consensus that was reached at NATO’s Riga Summit. Both sides also stated that economics is the driving spirit in their relationship and that politics mattered very little. The liberal and conservative leaders of America and Europe are merely two sides of the same coin.

Decades after the end of the Cold War the globe is wrapped within a state of almost perpetual war dominated by the military might of America. The last lines in The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and the Geostrategic Imperatives reveal the ultimate objective of Anglo-American policy: “These efforts will have the added historical advantage of benefiting from the new web of global linkages that is growing exponentially outside the more traditional nation-state system. That web—woven by multinational corporations, NGOs (…) already creates an informal global system that is inherently congenial to more institutionalized and inclusive global cooperation [a reference to global government].”

Brzezinski goes on to predict that: “In the course of the next several decades, a functioning structure of global cooperation, based on geopolitical realities, could thus emerge and gradually assume the mantle of the world’s current ‘regent’ [a reference to the U.S.],” and “Geostrategic success in that cause would represent a fitting legacy of America’s role as the first, only, and last truly global superpower.” All around the globe nation-states are being absorbed into larger and larger political and socio-economic entities. This is part of the story of globalization, but it has its dark side. This is the globalization of the few and not of the many.

The Fight for Civilization and the Gathering Storm

“When all is said and done, the conflict in Afghanistan will be to the war on terrorism what the North African campaign was to World War II: an essential beginning on the path to victory. But compared to what looms over the horizon—a wide-ranging war in locales from Central Asia to the Middle East and, unfortunately, back again to the United States—Afghanistan will prove but an opening battle.” -Robert Kagan and William Kristol, The Gathering Storm (The Weekly Standard, October 29, 2001)

One cannot help but remember what was elucidated in 2001 during the start of the “Global War on Terror” by two members of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), stating that Afghanistan was only part of a “wide-ranging war.” Both Robert Kagan and William Kristol are deeply linked to U.S. foreign and military policy extending from writing presidential speeches to having a former spouse as the U.S. ambassador to NATO. It is not coincidental that a portion of their editorial from October of 2001 in The Weekly Standard has actually materialized. These men should be taken for their words when they say that Afghanistan is merely the “opening battle” compared to what is waiting in the horizon.

Referring back to Robert Kagan and William Kristol:

“This war will not end in Afghanistan. It is going to spread and engulf a number of countries in conflicts of varying intensity. It could well require the use of American military power in multiple places simultaneously. It is going to resemble the clash of civilizations that everyone has hoped to avoid. And it is going to put enormous and perhaps unbearable strain on parts of an international coalition that basks in contented consensus.”

The “international coalition” being referred to is NATO and the international military network based around the U.S. and the “unbearable strain” is war, but of an unknown scale. On August 10, 2007 Lieutenant-General Douglas Lute, the “War Czar” overseeing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and any expanded theatre, publicly talked about restoring a mandatory military draft. The march to war is not waning, but driving the world towards the abyss.

Afghanistan was the first volley in an advance phase of the global conflict that was in its preparatory stages decades ago during the Iraq-Iran War, the Gulf War, and the Kosovo War. Where this global conflict, this “long war” will lead us is unknown, but all humanity is in this together. The American people will sooner or later feel the pain of war as their freedom is effected. Autocracy is a prerequisite to grand empires. Brzezinski has pointed out that “America is too democratic at home to be autocratic abroad,” and “never before has a populist democracy attained international supremacy.” Deviancy is being normalized all over the globe because of this global project. Those that are behind such projects must be reduced to social leprids, as outcasts, denounced by all societies.

Resistance in the Middle East: The Power of the People

“The Iraqi Resistance is by definition democratic as it is the spontaneous expression of a people who took its destiny into its hands, and is by definition progressive as it defends the interests of the people.” -Hana Al-Bayaty (March 18, 2007)

Anglo-American planners have underestimated the capacity of the power of ordinary people and the human spirit. In the Middle East it has been the resistance of ordinary people that has brought militant globalization to a standstill. Popular resistance movements have bogged down the military might of the remaining global superpower.

A nation is only as legitimate as the people(s) who live in it define it. America is not at war with individual nations, but with the people(s) of these nations. Nor are the American people at war with these nations, it is the American ruling establishment and elites that are at war with these people(s).

The forces of resistance are the forces of the will of the people, without the support of the people none of them could last or stand up to some of the most powerful war machines in human history.

The wars in the Middle East are as much about choice as they are about the right to live. What is at stake is self-determination and liberty. These wars represent the drive to impose an overall monopoly of controls over other nations by a few who have hijacked the foreign policies of America and Britain to serve their own goals.

The Iraqi Resistance and the other resistance movements of the Middle East are movements of the peoples and by nature egalitarian. Would anyone in the so-called West dare label the French, Czechoslovakian, Greek, Libyan, Chinese, Malaysian, and Soviet resistance movements against Germany, Italy, and Japan during the Second World War as terrorist movements? However, the occupying Axis governments labeled these movements as terrorists. Did not France and the other areas occupied by Germany and the Axis Powers not have governments that said the Axis Powers were welcomed forces bringing stability as do the governments of Iraq and Afghanistan? For example, in France there was the Vichy Government; when Germany was defeated the leaders of the Vichy Government in France were executed as traitors.

The U.S. government misleadingly claims that it is bringing democracy to these lands, but since when was democracy forced from the top down to the bottom? Is this not the opposite of democracy; things being forced down from the top to the bottom? Democracy is an expression of the masses that manifests itself upwards and not from the opposite direction.

No force on earth can defeat the popular will of the people; this is why domestic populations are manipulated into supporting wars. It is only division that allows small groups to take temporary reign over the people(s). However, for every scheme and plan to create division and anarchy amongst the people(s) of the world there is a plan to unite them and strengthen them. This is one of the greatest fears of many in positions of power. This is the fear of any awakening of large societal groups and populations.

There is no greater ally to the movements of resistance in the Middle East and beyond than unadulterated public opinion in the rest of the world. The people(s) of Britain, Israel, and the U.S. are also victims of their own governments who manipulate their fears and create animosity between them and other nations. This in itself is a great crime. What differences exist between nations are only a means to test the best of them.

Fear and hate are the weapons of the real terrorists, the masters of deception, and those who belittle others for profit and personal gain. These are the terrorists who give orders in positions of political leadership in the White House and elsewhere at the expense of their own people and the rest of humanity.

The world is now embarking into the abyss of perpetual war and a period in which the contemplation of the use of nuclear weapons is being made. A stand must be made by individuals of good conscience and will. It seems possible that it will be a matter of time before the citizens of Europe, North America, and other lands will be compelled or necessitated to join the peoples of occupied lands in resistance.

War must be averted on two fronts; in the shorter-term (as differentiated from “short-term”) or near future, war must be averted from emerging in the Middle East, and in the longer-term in Eurasia. Only the resistance of the people and public opinion can stop war from enveloping the globe. Public opinion must translate into public action if humanity it to be spared from a massive war—a war that could prove to become a nuclear armageddon.

Countdown to 1984?

“In brief, the U.S. policy goal must be unapologetically twofold: to perpetuate America’s own dominant position for at least a generation and preferably longer still; and to create a geopolitical framework that can absorb the inevitable shocks and strains of social-political change...” -Zbigniew Brzezinski (The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives, 1997)

In a twist of Orwellian fate, the earth seems closer to appearing like a rendition of the world in George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, the road ahead is not scripted. The future is only anticipated and planned, but never certain in a universe of infinite probabilities. Time will tell where the road ahead will guide us. Those that see themselves as masters of destiny have had their ideas proven wrong in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Somalia, and Lebanon. It may look as if opposition to a war agenda is like tiny raindrops beating against an unrelenting mountain, but mountains can be eventually eroded by those tiny raindrops. There exists a “sensitive dependence on initial conditions,” commonly called the “butterfly effect,” whereas the flaps of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil may set off a tornado in Texas. Individual actions can offset the march to war that is unfolding on this planet.

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German-French Alliance

500 German Troops to be Deployed in France

AFP
January 17, 2009

Germany wants to send 500 soldiers to France in what would be its first deployment to the country since the end of World War II in 1945, Der Spiegel magazine reports in an article to be published Monday.

According to the news weekly, Chancellor Angela Merkel told the German defence ministry last week to station the soldiers in the border town of Colmar.

The soldiers will cooperate with their French counterparts in a joint force known as the Franco-German Brigade.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Merkel were expected to give further details at the Munich Conference on Security Policy at the end of February, after an initial decision to keep the brigade running was announced in November.

Der Spiegel also reported that Sarkozy would post a French infantry unit to Donaueschingen, southwest Germany, while a regiment based in the nearby town of Immendingen would return to France.

The Franco-German Brigade was set up in 1989 by the then French President Francois Mitterrand and German chancellor Helmut Kohl to increase military cooperation between the two former enemies.

It includes some 5,000 soldiers -- 2,800 of which are German. Until now, they have been stationed only in southwest Germany.

A handful of German officers, however, are already based in Strasbourg, east France, directly engaged with the NATO mission Eurocorps.

However, no independent German military unit has been stationed in the country since the end of hostilities in World War II over 60 years ago.

Germany to Station Troops in France for First Time Since WWII

Spiegel Online
February 2, 2009

Germany to Station Troops in France for First Time Since WWII

Germany will station troops in France as part their joint crisis reaction force, Angela Merkel and Nicholas Sarkozy have said. In a joint opinion piece published ahead of the Munich Security Conference on Friday, the two leaders call for greater European and world cooperation on security.

The leaders of Germany and France urged greater European and trans-Atlantic unity on global security on Wednesday and underscored their call by announcing that German troops will be stationed in France as part of the joint Franco-German Brigade, a rapid reaction force.

"Anyone who knows our common history will be aware of the historical significance of this new step in the Franco-German friendship," German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicholas Sarkozy said in a joint opinion piece published on Wednesday in Germany's Süddeutsche Zeitung and France's Le Monde.

SPIEGEL reported last month that a German army battalion of 500 troops would be stationed in the town of Colmar in France's Alsace region. French media have reported Strasbourg, Metz or Bitche as possible locations.

It will be the first stationing of German troops in France since World War II. The Franco-German brigade was set up in 1989 and has around 5,000 troops that, until now, have been stationed at seven locations in Germany. It has served in Afghanistan and in the Balkans.

"Europeans Must Speak with One Voice"

Merkel and Sarkozy said international coordination on security policy was essential to tackle the Middle East conflict, the dispute over Iran's nuclear program, terrorist attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as the international financial and economic crises.

"Security policy must be interpreted in a new and broader way," Merkel and Sarkozy said, adding that cooperation on military security needed to be complemented with a joint approach on the global financial architecture, energy supply and population migration.

They said it was essential that Europe and the US deepen their cooperation given the new risks they face in the 21st century.

"That means joint analysis, decision-taking and implementation. Unilateral steps would contradict the spirit of this partnership. But it also means that we Europeans must speak even more with one voice, which requires a strong measure of discipline from the member states," the leaders wrote.

"And we must further bundle and increase our capabilities, both civilian and military. The synergy between both is the trademark of European security policy," they added.

A Rocky Relationship

The statement is a show of unity between the French and German leaders who have had a rocky relationship over the last two years with disagreements on a range of issues including the financial crisis and French plans for a Mediterranean Union.

And despite repeated displays of harmony with warm embraces, smiles and kisses on the cheek for the cameras, there have been persistent reports that the two simply don't gel on a personal level.

Their joint statement comes ahead of the 45th Munich Security Conference which runs from Friday to Sunday, an important annual gathering of senior politicians, military top brass and security analysts.

US President Barack Obama is dispatching top members of his new administration to attend the conference including Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Adviser James Jones and Richard Holbrooke, Obama's point man for Pakistan and Afghanistan. US General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, is also attending. The conference will be closely watched for signs of a shift in US foreign policy under Obama.

Merkel and Sarkozy said Iran was openly speculating that the international community would stand by and let it proceed with its nuclear program.

"We will not permit an Iranian nuclear bomb because that would constitute a threat to world peace," they said. "And we are ready, in line with the expected involvement of the new American government, to stop the Iranian threat with increased dialogue but also -- if necessary -- with very determined sanctions."

2004 Poll: Over Half of France and Germany had Unfavorable View of Americans