It’s Not Just the Oil. The Middle East War and the Conquest of Natural Gas Reserves

Are the Wars in the Middle East and North Africa Really About Oil?

The Iraq war was really about oil, according to Alan Greenspan, John McCain,George W. Bush, Sarah Palin, a high-level National Security Council officer andothers.

Dick Cheney made Iraqi’s oil fields a national security priority before 9/11.

The Sunday Herald reported:

Five months before September 11, the US advocated using force against Iraq … to secure control of its oil.

The Afghanistan war was planned before 9/11 (see this and this).   According to French intelligence officers, the U.S. wanted to run an oil pipeline through Afghanistan to transport Central Asian oil more easily and cheaply. And so the U.S. told the Taliban shortly before 9/11 that they would either get “a carpet of gold or a carpet of bombs”, the former if they greenlighted the pipeline, the second if they didn’t. See this, this and this.

Congressman Ed Markey said:

Well, we’re in Libya because of oil.

Senator Graham agreed.

And the U.S. and UK overthrew the democratically-elected leader of Iran because he announced that he would nationalize the oil industry in that country.

It’s a War for GAS

But it’s about gas as much as oil …

As key war architect John Bolton said last year:

The critical oil and natural gas producing region that we fought so many wars to try and protect our economy from the adverse impact of losing that supply or having it available only at very high prices.

For example, the pipeline which the U.S. wanted to run through Afghanistan prior to 9/11 was to transport gas as much as oil.

John C.K. Daly notes:

The proposed $7.6 billion, 1,040 mile-long TAPI [Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India ... admittedly a mouthful, but you'll be hearing a lot about it in the coming months] natural gas pipeline has a long regional history, having first been proposed even before the Taliban captured Kabul, as in 1995 Turkmenistan and Pakistan initialed a memorandum of understanding. TAPI, with a carrying capacity of 33 billion cubic meters of Turkmen natural gas a year, was projected to run from Turkmenistan’s Dauletabad gas field across Afghanistan and Pakistan and terminate at the northwestern Indian town of Fazilka.

TAPI would have required the assent of the Taliban, and two years after the MoU was signed the Central Asia Gas Pipeline Ltd. consortium, led by U.S. company Unocal, flew a Taliban delegation to Unocal headquarters in Houston, where the Taliban signed off on the project.

The Taliban visit to the U.S. has been confirmed by the mainstream media.  Indeed, here is a picture of the Taliban delegation visiting Unocal’s Houston headquarters in 2007:

U.S. companies such as Unocal (lead on the proposed pipeline) and Enron (and see this), with full U.S. government support, continued to woo the Taliban right up until 2001 in an attempt to sweet-talk them into green-lighting the pipeline.

For example, two French authors with extensive experience in intelligence analysis (one of them a former French secret service agent) – claim:

Until August [2001], the US government saw the Taliban regime “as a source of stability in Central Asia that would enable the construction of an oil pipeline across Central Asia” from the rich oilfields in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan, through Afghanistan and Pakistan, to the Indian Ocean. Until now, says the book, “the oil and gas reserves of Central Asia have been controlled by Russia. The Bush government wanted to change all that.”

Pepe Escobar notes:

Under newly elected president George W Bush… Unocal snuck back into the game and, as early as January 2001, was cozying up to the Taliban yet again, this time supported by a star-studded governmental cast of characters, including undersecretary of state Richard Armitage, himself a former Unocal lobbyist.

***

Negotiations eventually broke down because of those pesky transit fees the Taliban demanded. Beware the Empire’s fury. At a Group of Eight summit meeting in Genoa in July 2001, Western diplomats indicated that the Bush administration had decided to take the Taliban down before year’s end. (Pakistani diplomats in Islamabad would later confirm this to me.) The attacks of September 11, 2001 just slightly accelerated the schedule.

Soon after the start of the Afghan war, Karzai became president (while Le Monde reported that Karzai was a Unocal consultant, it is possible that it was a mix-up with the Unocal consultant and neocon who got Karzai  elected, Zalmay Khalilzad).  In any event, a mere year later, a U.S.-friendly Afghani regime signed onto TAPI.

India just formally signed on to Tapi. This ended the long-proposed competitor: an Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline.

Competing Pipe Dreams

Virtually all of the current global geopolitical tension is based upon whose vision of the “New Silk Road” will control.

But before we can understand the competing visions, we have to actually see the maps:

And here are the competing pipelines backed by the U.S. and by Iran, before India sided with the U.S.:

With maps in hand, we can now discuss the great geopolitical battle raging between the U.S. and its allies, on the one hand, and Russia, China and Iran, on the other hand.

Iran and Pakistan are still discussing a pipeline without India, and Russia backs the proposal as well.

Indeed, the “Great Game” being played right now by the world powers largely boils down to the United States and Russia fighting for control over Eurasian oil and gas resources:

Russia and the USA have been in a state of competition in this region, ever since the former Soviet Union split up, and Russia is adamant on keeping the Americans out of its Central Asian backyard. Russia aims to increase European gas dominance on its resources whereas the US wants the European Union (EU) to diversify its energy supply, primarily away from Russian dominance. There are already around three major Russian pipelines that are supplying energy to Europe and Russia has planned two new pipelines.

The rising power China is also getting into this Great Game:

The third “big player” in this New Great Game is China, soon to be the world’s biggest energy consumer, which is already importing gas from Turkmenistan via Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to its Xinjiang province — known as the Central Asia-China Pipeline — which may tilt the balance towards Asia. Pepe Escobar calls it the opening of the 21st century Silk Road in 2009 when this pipeline became operational.  China’s need for energy is projected to increase by 150 per cent which explains why it has signed probably the largest number of deals not just with the Central Asian republics but also with the heavily sanctioned Iran and even Afghanistan. China has planned around five west-east gas pipelines, within China, of which one is operational (domestically from Xinjiang to Shanghai) and others are under construction and will be connected to Central Asian gas reserves.

China is also pushing for an alternative to TAPI: an Turkmenistan-Afghan-China pipeline.

Iran is also a player in its own right:

Another important country is Iran. Iran sits on the second largest gas reserves in the world and has over 93 billion barrels of proven oil reserves with a total of 4.17 million barrels per day in 2009. To the dislike of the United States, Iran is a very active player. The Turkmenistan-Iran gas pipeline, constructed in 1997, was the first new pipeline going out from Central Asia. Furthermore, Iran signed a $120 billion gas exploration deal, often termed the “deal of the century” with China. This gas deal signed in 2004 entails the annual export of approximately 10 million tons of Iranian liquefied natural gas (LNG) to China for 25 years. It also gives China’s state oil company the right to participate in such projects as exploration and drilling for petrochemical and gas industries in Iran. Iran also plans to sell its gas to Europe through its Persian Gas pipeline which can become a rival to the US Nabucco pipeline. More importantly, it is also the key party in the proposed Iran-Pakistan (IP) pipeline, also formerly known as the “peace pipeline.” Under this pipeline plan, first proposed in 1995, Iran will sell gas from its mega South Pars fields to Pakistan and India.

China’s support for Iran is largely explained by oil and gas:

Referring to China, Escobar states “most important of all, ‘isolated’ Iran happens to be a supreme matter of national security for China, which has already rejected the latest Washington sanctions without a blink” and that “China may be the true winner from Washington’s new sanctions, because it is likely to get its oil and gas at a lower price, as the Iranians grow ever more dependent on the China market.”

China has also shown interest in the construction of IP on the Pakistani side and further expanding it to China. This means that starting at Gwadar, Beijing plans to build another pipeline, crossing Balochistan and then following the Karakoram Highway northwards all the way to Xinjiang, China’s Far West. China is also most likely to get the construction contract for this pipeline. As stated above, Chinese firms are part of the consortium awarded the contract for the financial consultancy for the project. Closer participation in the Asian energy projects would also help China increase its influence in the region for its objective of creating the “string of pearls” across the region — which has often scared India as an encirclement strategy by the Chinese government.

Why Syria?

You might ask why there is so much focus on Syria right now.

Well, Syria is an integral part of the proposed 1,200km Arab Gas Pipeline:

Here are some additional graphics courtesy of Adam Curry:

So yes, regime change was planned against Syria (as well as Iraq, Libya, Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan and Iran) 20 years ago.

And yes, attacking Syria weakens its close allies Iran and Russia … and indirectly China.

But Syria’s central role in the Arab gas pipeline is also a key to why it is now being targeted.

Just as the Taliban was scheduled for removal after they demanded too much in return for the Unocal pipeline, Syria’s Assad is being targeted because he is not a reliable “player”.

Specifically, Turkey, Israel and their ally the U.S. want an assured flow of gas through Syria, and don’t want a Syrian regime which is not unquestionably loyal to those 3 countries to stand in the way of the pipeline … or which demands too big a cut of the profits.

Pepe Escobar sums up what is driving current global geopolitics and war:

What you’re really talking about is what’s happening on the immense energy battlefield that extends from Iran to the Pacific Ocean. It’s there that the liquid war for the control of Eurasia takes place.

Yep, it all comes down to black gold and “blue gold” (natural gas), hydrocarbon wealth beyond compare, and so it’s time to trek back to that ever-flowing wonderland – Pipelineistan.

Postscript: It’s not just the Neocons who have planned this strategy. Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser helped to map out the battle plan for Eurasian petroleum resources over a decade ago, and Obama is clearly continuing the same agenda.

Some would say that the wars are also be about forcing the world into dollars and private central banking, but that’s a separate story.

The Massive Threat to Public Health Posed by Food Insecurity and What is Being Done About It

The Massive Threat to Public Health Posed by Food Insecurity and What is Being Done About It
by Charlotte Kellogg

It should come as nothing new to readers of Milfuegos that increased pesticide use and poor resource management are posing a serious risk to global food security. There are a number of long-term fixes that could be implemented both at home and abroad, though, which is the focus of today’s piece. Writer Charlotte Kellogg regularly publishes articles for students enrolled in public health degree programs with a particular focus on global hunger and disease. Readers interested in turning their passion for sustainability into a career should check her out.

The Massive Threat to Public Health Posed by Food Insecurity and What is Being Done About It

As the global population booms, food security is fast emerging as one of the most pressing public health concerns both in Westernized countries and in the developing world. Though people in traditionally impoverished regions are at the most risk for hunger and malnutrition, the problem is endemic to the global community at large. Basic food availability is one of the biggest challenges, as more people need more food and production cannot always live up to the demand. More concerning is availability, however. Broken channels of distribution and regions of gross food waste abutting those of shortage shine light on what may be best described as a stewardship problem. The crisis has grown so large that there really is no single solution. Better international food management and the implementation of farming technologies both new and old may make a big difference, though, particularly if implemented in a coordinated, targeted way.

The food crisis is often most poignant when seen in terms of the very young. Children who grow up malnourished or with diseases related to food shortage often fail to succeed academically, and have less potential for advancement. For many, this essentially “locks” them into the downward spiral of poverty, all but guaranteeing that they will never rise above the conditions of their birth. Many scholars see better food security as one of the simplest ways of rectifying this situation.

“The benefits of better food in early childhood last a lifetime,” The Economist said when summarizing the results of a 2011 “nutrition trial.” The trial centered on starving children in Guatemala but, the editors said, could also apply to those living in impoverished communities anywhere.  “Those who got the extra food up to 36 months left school later, with much higher educational qualifications than those who were stunted by malnutrition. They married partners with more education. Women who were better fed as girls had fewer pregnancies and miscarriages,” the study found.  Even income and earning potential was affected: men who were well-fed as children earned about 20 percent more than their malnourished counterparts, and women increased their odds of living in a non-impoverished household by about 30 percent.

Ensuring that children have the food and nutrients they need in childhood is often easier said than done, however. A number of government and international aid initiatives have tried and failed to come up with lasting solutions over the past decades. While most have made some impact at least at first, it has been difficult to track sustained progress over time.

Part of this may have to do with approach. “In the short-term, measures such as school feeding programs, conditional cash transfers, and food-for-work programs can help to ease pressure on the poor,” World Bank president Jim Yong Kim said in a July 2012 briefing about the growing food security crisis in places like Africa. These measures are not in and of themselves a cure, though.  “In the medium- to long-term, the world needs strong and stable policies and sustained investments in agriculture in poor countries,” Kim said.

One of the best agricultural investments may come in the form of technology. Agricultural technologies exist in a wide spectrum. Some, such as green resourcing, aim to help farmers realize crop potential by learning more about their land and ecological indicators, and are virtually intervention-free. Others, such as genetic modification and biodynamics, aim to create more sustainable, drought-resistant or pesticide-resistant crops that can be grown with relative ease most anywhere.

Though the food security problem is growing, it does not have to turn into a global pandemic. Proper resourcing, better education, and responsible use of technology can all contribute to a tomorrow that will be brighter—and fuller—than most of the yesterdays in recent memory.

******
Charlotte Kellog is a writer with http://www.publichealthdegree.com/, a resource for current and prospective public health students.

Let Your Life Be a Friction to Stop the Machine

Let Your Life Be a Friction to Stop the Machine This Is A Must Watch Video A brief and crucial history of the United States

Jewish leaders meet Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in NYC

This video is banned for broadcast on News Networks in USA, Israel and Europe. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that Israel and US does not want you to see. Jewish leaders and prominent businessmen Greet Ahmadinejad with Inshallah and Bless him for long life. Jews have lived in Iran for thousands of years. Over 50,000 Jews live in Teheran.

Jesse Ventura on CNN Piers Morgan Sept. 17th, 2012 Full Interview

US could drone Libya to death

Join Noam Chomsky, Alice Walker, and Angela Davis at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine

Join Noam Chomsky, Alice Walker, and Angela Davis at the 

Russell Tribunal on Palestine

New York City ~ October 6-7, 2012

HURRY & REGISTER BEFORE SEP. 15TH FOR THE EARLY BIRD RATE!

Have you gotten your tickets for the Russell Tribunal on Palestine?  If not, you should act fast to secure the early bird rates! (Student one-day is $10, 2-day is $15; non-student one-day is $15, 2-day is $20)

Register for the RToP at — http://www.russelltribunalonpalestine.com/en/sessions/future-sessions/register

Watch the latest promotion video for the RToP featuring Archbishop Desmond Tutu and author Alice Walker — http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCYpFv_FljE#!

The world's most prominent public intellectual Noam Chomsky, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker, and the civil rights leader Angela Davis will be offering and weighing testimony at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (RToP), an international people’s tribunal that was created to expose human rights abuses and stir people to action in opposition to Israel’s recognized violations of international law. 

In addition to them, Russell Means and Dennis Banks, dubbed by the LA Times, "the two most famous Indians since Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse," will join Israeli historian Ilan Pappé, the former Palestine Liberation Organization spokesperson Diana Buttu, and a Who's Who of international human rights figures at RToP in New York City, Oct. 6-7,  2012.

RToP was launched in 2009 following the massacre of more than 1,400 Gazans perpetrated by Israel, and has since worked to bring together legal experts, scholars, activists, and other people of note to help shed light on the reality of Israel’s occupation of Palestine. RToP also shines a light on the active role that third parties—foreign governments and corporations—play in perpetuating human rights violations in Israel-Palestine.

Walker, Davis, Means, and Banks—all of whom are Black or Native American—are among the Russell Tribunal participants to issue an “urgent call to others who share our commitment to racial justice, equality, and freedom.” They invite people to attend the hearings in New York City on October 6 and 7, writing, “Each and every one of us—particularly those of us and our fellow jury members who grew up in the Jim Crow South, in apartheid South Africa, and on Indian reservations in the United States—is shocked by what Israel is doing to the Palestinians.” 

Previous sessions of the tribunal have been held in Barcelona, London, and Cape Town. These hearings have addressed, respectively, European Union support for Israel, the complicity of corporations in the occupation of Palestine, and the question of whether Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid. The fourth and final session will be held in New York City and will examine the role of the United Nations and the United States in perpetuating Israel’s impunity in depriving the Palestinian people of their right to self-determination. 

For more information about the Russell Tribunal on Palestine-NYC please contact rtop.nyc@gmail.com. 

To arrange for an interview with one of our speakers or jurors, please call Sherry Wolf at 773-991-3877 or e-mail sherrywolf2000@yahoo.com.

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SOLIDARITY STATEMENT by Alice Walker, Angela Davis, Dennis Banks, Russell Means and Stephane Hessel

We are writing to you on behalf of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine (RToP), an international people's tribunal that was created to expose human rights abuses and stir people to action in opposition to Israel's recognized violations of international law. We hope that you will help promote, attend, and participate in our final hearings in New York City on October 6–7, 2012.

RToP was launched in 2009 following the massacre of more than 1,400 Gazans perpetrated by Israel, and has since worked to bring together legal experts, scholars, activists, and other people of note, to help shed light on the reality of Israel's occupation of Palestine. RToP also shines a light on the active role that third parties—foreign governments and corporations—play in perpetuating human rights violations in Israel-Palestine.

Previous sessions of the tribunal have been held in Barcelona, London, and Cape Town. These hearings have addressed, respectively, European Union support for Israel, the complicity of corporations in the occupation of Palestine, and the question of whether Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid. The fourth and final session will be held in New York City this October, and will examine the role of the United Nations and the United States in perpetuating Israel's impunity in depriving the Palestinian people of their rights.

Each and every one of us—particularly those of us and our fellow jury members who grew up in the Jim Crow South, in apartheid South Africa, and on Indian reservations in the United States—is shocked by what Israel is doing to the Palestinians. This letter is an urgent call to others who share our commitment to racial justice, equality, and freedom. This sense of urgency knows no bounds and stretches across vastly militarized borders. In this way the dangers are unprecedented, but so are the opportunities that stem from uniting our struggles.

One of us, Angela Davis, participated in a delegation of indigenous and women of color feminists who traveled to Palestine in June 2011, to bear witness to the effects of the occupation and meet with Palestinians resisting on the ground. The delegation was deeply impressed by the insistence of many Palestinians to link their own struggle to other forms of injustice throughout the world. It is fitting that the fourth session of RToP is being held in the United States, which bears primary responsibility as the enabler of Israeli crimes against Palestinians. In line with the wishes of Palestinian activists and our communities, we link the struggle for Palestinian freedom and self-determination with the battles that shape the lives of poor people, especially people of color, living under the authority of the US state.

Not since Operation Wetback and Operation Gatekeeper have so many families been torn apart; not since Jim Crow have so many rights been denied; not since reservations and internment camps has the United States invested in so many apartheid walls, fences, and cages. The obsession with and militarization of our southern border and every community in between; the Supreme Court's ruling in favor of SB1070's “show me your papers” provision, and the racist anti-immigrant legislation spreading across the nation share troubling parallels with the treatment of Palestinians by Israeli occupation forces. These parallels are what student activists in the United States have deemed “concrete connections” between US-Israeli corporate interests that guide politics while profiting from war, apartheid, and incarceration.

Israeli violations of human rights in Palestine are mirrored in the United States and have not escaped notice. There is growing interest, especially among young people, to connect these struggles. Latino and immigrant justice groups and Students for Justice in Palestine committees, for example, are creating campaigns and arranging outreach and solidarity events among their constituencies.

Heeding the example of the international movement against apartheid South Africa in the 1980s, these groups are organizing to get their institutions and communities to divest, boycott, and sanction apartheid Israel. From California to Texas and Arizona, from Chicago to New York City and Providence, Rhode Island, mobilization efforts in solidarity with Palestinians are on the rise.

Distance does not diminish humanity, nor does shade, gender, tongue, sexuality, or religion. International solidarity is at the root of addressing injustices in Palestine. It is also at the heart of the Russell Tribunal as these sessions have brought together people from across the world and have helped arm them with the knowledge and legal tools to fight human rights abuses. 

Building solidarity is an empowering process. We hope that you will join us for the final session of the RToP in New York City on October 6–7, 2012.

We hope to see you there. 

Alice Walker

Angela Davis

Dennis Banks

Russell Means

Stephane Hessel

The Chávez Election

Dear friends and colleagues,

With less than a month before Venezuela’s presidential elections, I wanted to share this interesting article by Professor Steve Ellner published in Le Monde Diplomatique with you.  For more information on the elections remember to check our election webpage: http://venezuela-us.org/2012/06/01/elections-2012/

Best, Olivia

The Chávez Election

By Steve Ellner

Source: Le Monde Diplomatique

Friday, September 07, 2012

“You pay back a favour with favours,” said Joanna Figueroa, a resident of El Viñedo, a barrio in the coastal city of Barcelona in eastern Venezuela. She had pledged to work for the reelection of Hugo Chávez after receiving a house as part of the government’s ambitious Great Housing Mission programme. She helped build it, as part of a “workers team” that included a bricklayer, a plumber and an electrician appointed by her community council. Her job was to mix cement. As Chávez followers keep saying of their feelings towards their president, “You pay back love with love.” The frequency with which the phrase is used shows the deep emotional bond that exists between Chávez and many Venezuelans.

Much is at stake in the presidential election due on 7 October. The opposition’s candidate, Henrique Capriles Radonski, calls himself a reformer, free of any sort of ideology. Even so, he belongs to the conservative Justice First Party (MPJ), which stresses private investment and questions the effectiveness of state economic controls. The opposition has grown wiser since its failed coup in 2002 and its decision to boycott national elections. Now, opposition leaders fervently defend the 1999 constitution — which they opposed at the time, despite its overwhelming adoption in a popular referendum — and have even achieved a degree of unity under Capriles, nominated after a primary in February.

The achievements of the Housing Mission, building thousands of homes for the poor and including barrio residents in their planning and execution, does much to explain Chávez’s lead in the polls. The opposition’s claims that it is winning have a hollow ring: Chávez opponent and media owner Rafael Poleo recently attributed the “barren” results of an opinion poll in May to Capriles’s “failure to go anywhere”. The Datanálisis survey gave Chávez a 43.6% to 27.7% lead over Capriles. It also indicated that 62.4% of voters rate Chávez’s performance as above average; 29.4% consider it poor. Datanálisis is the most credible of the polling agencies with an impressive record. That its findings favour Chávez must annoy its owner, Luis Vicente León, who openly sides with the opposition.

Chávez’s lead is surprising as an erosion of support and enthusiasm for his movement is only to be expected after 13 years in power. His recent bout with cancer (his illness was originally announced without revealing the nature of the disease) might also not have helped. The opposition is quick to point out that the Chávez movement lacks a second-in-command who could step into the presidency and retain the nation’s confidence. And pro-establishment media, in Venezuela and abroad, tie the issue of Chávez’s health to the electoral contest: media expert Keane Bhatt notes that Reuters, Associated Press and the Miami Herald have stressed Capriles’s “youthful energy” in contrast to Chávez’s “frailty” (1).

The president’s illness has now made his movement pay attention to his leadership, and even he has begun to recognise the downside of his all-encompassing power: while ministers have come and gone, Chávez — whose face appears on most Bolivarian political posters — stands as the sole embodiment of a political process that now depends upon him.

On a visit to Brazil in April 2010, he was asked about letting another leader emerge. “I do not have a successor in sight,” he answered. But there may be a change in thinking. Last year Chávez told a former adviser, the Spanish academic Juan Carlos Monedero, who had warned of the danger of “hyperleadership” in Venezuela: “I have to learn to delegate power more.” During his extended medical treatment, several top leaders filled the gap and emerged as possible successors: foreign minister Nicolás Maduro (a former trade union leader), who headed the commission that drafted the new labour law; executive vice president Elías Jaua (popular among the Chávez rank-and-file); National Assembly president Diosdado Cabello (a former army lieutenant with a pragmatic approach and strong backing among the armed forces). In May, the critical Monedero remarked that formerly “some of us saw the difficulties of continuing this process” without Chávez, but “now we have lost this fear because I see dozens of people who could continue the process without any problem.”

Pragmatism all round

The key to Chávez’s political success is the continuous deepening of change. New programmes and goals, regularly formulated, invigorate the movement rank and file, as in the case of the Housing Mission. Chávez has come a long way since he was first elected president in December 1998, on a rather moderate platform to counter the polemical image he had acquired with his coup attempt seven years before. The moderate stage ended with the approval of a new constitution, the enactment of land reform and other radical social and economic legislation in 2001. Chávez embraced socialism in 2005, then nationalised strategic sectors such as telecommunications, banking, electricity and steel; since 2009 he has expropriated many smaller companies. These measures were accompanied by an escalation of rhetoric against the “bourgeoisie” and the “oligarchy” (terms which Chávez uses interchangeably) as well as against US imperialism.

The expropriations were designed to achieve what Chávez calls “food sovereignty”: state-owned companies are now producing rice, coffee, cooking oil, milk and other foodstuffs. The latest in June was the production of sunflower oil-based mayonnaise, considered a superior variety. The increase in production and successful management of services, including food processing, banking and telecommunications, show that the government is capable of effective management. Difficulties in state-run heavy industries such as steel, aluminium and cement are the result of labour unrest and the lack of commercial networks. To overcome that, the government has expanded into commerce and sale of construction material direct to the community, eliminating middlemen (who are notorious for creating artificial scarcities).

The UN’s Economic Commission on Latin America reports a 21% reduction of poverty rates between 1999 and 2010. But the middle classes do not like this change. A recent survey by the Venezuela Institute of Data Analysis says that though Chávez leads Capriles by 20%, relatively privileged voters support Capriles (with 52.5%; 32.5% for Chávez). Many vehemently oppose Chávez, partly out of fear, provoked by accusations from the opposition aired in the private media, that he means to eliminate private property. There is some evidence of class resentment towards the poor, who receive privileged treatment from government programmes. To neutralise this, the government has passed measures favouring the middle class, such as the sale of dollars at a special preferential exchange rate for foreign travel.

As Chávez has distanced himself from past policies, Capriles claims to be forward-looking. He points out that at 40, he is not tied to the mistaken policies of pre-1998 Venezuela — even those implemented by parties that endorse his candidacy. Capriles associates the “old way of doing politics” with the intolerance and polarisation that characterised the past, as well as the present under Chávez. As proof, he pledges not to scrap but to improve the Chávez social programmes, which have been successful. He proposes to introduce a “Missions Equal for All Law”, which would guarantee equal treatment for non-government supporters in social programmes.

But though the opposition recognises the government’s social advances, the two leaders have conflicting economic policies, shown by their positions on company expropriations. For Chávez supporters, these help to create a mixed economy in the construction, banking and food sectors, in which monopolies and oligopolies now face competition from public companies, which combats artificially created scarcities. “We are in an election year, so why don’t we have the scarcities we had in previous electoral cycles?” asks Irán Aguilera, a state congressman and Chávez supporter. “The answer is that state companies fill the gap created by the private sector for political reasons.”

Capriles has pledged to refrain from expropriating companies. “I’m not going to squabble with businessmen or anyone else,” he says. He claims, without statistics, that production in companies taken over by the state has declined sharply. He omits any reference to restrictions or conditions on foreign investments, which he hopes will help him reach his goal of creating 3m jobs during his presidency. In a proposal with neoliberal implications, Capriles calls for the transformation of the state-run social security programme into a mixed system that would include “voluntary individual savings”. In another electoral statement, the alliance of parties that support Capriles, the Democratic Unity Table (MUD), advocates making flexible the legislation that asserts state control over the oil industry “to promote competition and private participation in the industry” (2).

Capriles is not in the right place to go beyond the middle-class base of his MPJ party. He comes from a wealthy business family with multiple interests (real estate, industry, media), a background uncommon for Venezuelan politicians. He is also the former mayor of the municipality of Baruta, a fairly affluent community in Caracas. His boyish, middle-class appearance is hardly an asset in challenging Chávez’s popularity in the barrios.

‘A fraud and a failure’

The MUD calls the Housing Mission “a fraud and a failure” and criticises the government for expropriating land to build housing, and violating city zoning. Even so, the polling firm Hinterlaces indicates that, with a 76% approval rating, the Housing Mission is the most popular government social programme. In May, information minister Andrés Izarra announced that the programme was on target with 200,000 units built since it began in 2011.

True to his military background, Chávez declared the Housing Mission to be an all-out war and enlisted the support of his entire government and movement. In some barrios, students in the makeshift high school programme, the Ribas Mission, receive scholarship money to form construction work “brigades.” But the centrepieces are the estimated 30,000 community councils, which date to a law passed in 2006: they hire skilled and unskilled workers, all of whom generally live in the community, and select the beneficiaries. The signature programme builds new houses in place of dilapidated ones. To avoid the previous misuse of funds, there are new mechanisms — paying workers only after jobs are satisfactorily completed, with cheques drawn on state-run banks rather than cash handled via community councils. Steps have been taken to avoid speculation through the resale of public houses. “There’s a learning curve in which mistakes made at an earlier stage due to the lack of effective controls are being corrected,” says Leandro Rodríguez of the National Congress’s Committee on Citizen Participation.

Chávez cleverly chose the eve of the 1 May holiday, at the height of the presidential campaign, to introduce the new Labour Law. This reduces the working week to 40 hours (from 44), bans outsourcing for ongoing jobs and increases pre- and post-natal paid time off to 26 weeks (from 18). It also re-establishes the old system of severance pay, which neoliberal-inspired legislation modified in 1997. On leaving a company, for whatever reason, workers will receive a payment based on their last monthly salary multiplied by the number of years of employment — a major trade union demand. Capriles has attacked the law on the grounds that it does nothing to deal with unemployment or to benefit those with unprotected casual jobs. He claims: “This is a law that Chávez came up with to help him win on 7 October.”

The outcome on 7 October will have a major impact throughout the continent. Capriles pledges to reestablish friendly relations with the US, and his close allies promise a thorough revision of Venezuela’s aid programmes and alliances with the rest of Latin America. They also plan cheap credit arrangements with China in exchange for oil. When the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited in June, Capriles criticised the plethora of agreements signed with Iran, insisting instead that the government “look after the interests of Venezuela by generating employment for Venezuelans”.

Chávez has been a major promoter of Latin American unity, leading to the South American bloc organisations: the Union of South American Nations (Uuasur) headed by Chávez confidant Alí Rodríguez Araque), the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac) founded in Caracas last December), and the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean (Alba), bringing together Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua (3). In June, the Latin American bloc energetically protested the removal of the pro-leftist president of Paraguay, Fernando Lugo, and by doing so, overshadowed the Washington-based Organization of American States and left the US State Department on the sidelines. The firmest response came from Chávez who recalled his ambassador from Asunción and cut off the supply of oil, a measure criticised by Capriles.

The hemisphere’s enemy number one

Washington circles view Chávez as the ringleader of these expressions of Latin American nationalism and unity. For the right, and many in the political centre, Chávez is the hemisphere’s enemy number one. Three weeks before stepping down as president of the World Bank in June, Robert Zoellick declared that “Chávez’s days are numbered” and, with the elimination of his government’s foreign subsidies, other nations such as Cuba and Nicaragua will “be in trouble.” This chain of events, according to Zoellick, will present “an opportunity to make the western hemisphere the first democratic hemisphere” as opposed to a “place of coups, caudillos, and cocaine.” Michael Penfold, writing in Foreign Affairs,warned: “If Chávez wins in October, a vast majority of the opposition’s political capital will be dashed; in many ways, it will be back to square one” (4).

Even academics who are wary of extreme leftist trends in the continent distinguish between Chávez and other radicals such as Evo Morales. Maxwell Cameron and Kenneth Sharpe, in Latin America’s Left Turn,claim that while Chávez has “made efforts to politicise state institutions... [and] create an official party under his control... Morales embodies a political movement in which the role of the leader is not to monopolise power” (5).

That Chávez has gone further than his leftist counterparts in Bolivia, Ecuador and elsewhere is also recognised on the other end of the political spectrum. Jeffery Webber, a Trotskyist academic and co-editor of a book on the Latin American left, views Morales as a “reconstituted neoliberal” but applauds Chávez’s movement for “having done a great deal to rejuvenate the international critique of neoliberalism and to bring discussion of socialism back on the agenda” (6).

There is good reason why political actors and analysts of different ideological convictions single out Chávez for special treatment. Widespread expropriations and other reversals of neoliberal economic measures, the creation of a popular militia, the firm control of the armed forces, and the generous funding of programmes of international cooperation that bolster Venezuela’s standing in Latin America are distinguishing features of the Chávez government unmatched elsewhere.

Deepening of change

A Chávez victory in October will mean further deepening of change in Venezuela. New expropriations will create a mixed economy in important sectors stimulating competition between public and private companies. Chávez’s proposals for 2013-2019 call for state incursions into commerce and transport, to the detriment of middlemen, through the creation of “centres of local distribution for the sale and direct distribution of products.”

Another far-reaching goal outlined in Chávez’s electoral platform is the expansion of the power of community councils. Several hundred “communes in construction” group a dozen or more community councils each to undertake projects covering a wide area, such as gas and water distribution. Chávez proposes to promote the creation of new communes to represent 68% of the population. The communes are to be granted the same prerogatives as state and municipal governments, including budgeting, participation in state planning and, eventually, tax collection.

A Chávez victory will feed into the “left tide” in Latin America at a critical moment and will undermine US influence. The record of the left-leaning bloc and its banner of Latin American unity has been mixed recently. In 2009, the right triumphed in the presidential elections in Chile, but the popularity of its president Sebastián Piñera subsequently plummeted. In 2010, centrist candidate Juan Manuel Santos was elected president in Colombia, but he soon rallied to the shared aim of Latin American unity under the auspices of the left, and he has even allowed himself to disagree with Washington on key issues. Only Paraguay, with the removal in June of President Fernando Lugo, is now out of step with its neighbours.

But none of these developments matches the significance of the elections in Venezuela. A defeat for Chávez would represent (whatever his rival may say) a return to pre-1999 Venezuela. Another term in office would extend Chávez’s reign to 18 years; that’s a great deal, perhaps too much. Even so, Venezuela’s social transformation over so long a period, under a democratically elected president, is without parallel in contemporary history. 

Olivia Burlingame Goumbri

Social Outreach Adviser

Embassy of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

1099 30th Street, NW

Washington, D.C. 20007

Tel: 202-342-6854

www.venezuela-us.org

Veterans For Peace President Leah Bolger, Protests the Congressional Super Committee.

Alice Walker at VFP Convention 2012

OccuDoc

Protect Assange / Ecuadorian Homesick Blues

Welcome to the Kurdish Spring By Pepe Escobar

THE ROVING EYE
Welcome to the Kurdish Spring
By Pepe Escobar 

Turkish foreign policy, codified by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, used to be known in shorthand as "zero problems with our neighbors". When Turkey started calling for regime change in Syria, it turned into "a major problem with one of our neighbors" (even tough Davutoglu himself admitted on the record the policy change failed). 

Now, in yet another twist, it's becoming "all sorts of problems with two of our neighbors". Enter - inevitably - Ankara's ultimate taboo; the Kurdish question. 

Ankara used to routinely chase and bomb Kurdish PKK guerrillas crossing from Anatolia to Iraqi Kurdistan. Now it may be
positioning itself to do the same in Syrian Kurdistan. 

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan came out all guns blazing on Turkish TV; "We will not allow a terrorist group to establish camps in northern Syria and threaten Turkey." 

He was referring to the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Party (PYD) - affiliated with the PKK; after a quiet deal with the Assad regime in Damascus, the PYD is now in control of key areas in northeast Syria. 

So Ankara may provide logistics to tens of thousands of Syria's NATO "rebels" - which include plenty of hardcore Sunni Arab "insurgents" formerly known as terrorists; but as long as Syrian Kurds - which are part of the Syrian opposition - demonstrate some independence, they immediately revert to being considered "terrorists". 

It's all conditioned by Ankara's immediate nightmare; the prospect of a semiautonomous Syrian Kurdistan very closely linked to Iraqi Kurdistan. 

Follow the oil 
This Swedish report [1] contains arguably the best breakdown of the hyper-fragmented Syrian opposition. The "rebels" are dominated by the exile-heavy Syrian National Council (SNC) and its Hydra-style militias, the over 100 gangs that compose the Not Exactly Free Syrian Army (FSA). 

But there are many other parties as well, including socialists; Marxists; secular nationalists; Islamists; the Kurdish National Council (KNC) - an 11-party coalition very close to the Iraqi Kurdistan government; and the PYD. 

The KNC and the PYD may bicker about everything else, but basically agree on the essential; the civil war in Syria shall not penetrate Syria Kurdistan; after all, when it comes to the nitty gritty, they are neither pro-Assad nor pro-opposition; they favor Kurdish interests. The agreement was sealed under the auspices of their cousins - the Iraqi Kurds. And it explains why they are now in full control of a de facto Kurdish enclave in northeast Syria. 
As much as Turkish paranoia may apply, it's a long and winding road from a semi-autonomous area to an independent Kurdistan agglutinating Kurds in both Syria and Iraq - not to mention, in the long run, Turkish Kurds. Yet half of a possible, future, independent Kurdistan would indeed be Turkish. Ankara's nightmare in progress is that the closer Iraqi and Syrian Kurdistan get, the merrier the agitation among Turkish Kurds in Anatolia. 

Priorities though divert; the bottom line for Iraqi Kurds is independence from Baghdad. After all; they have loads of oil. On the other hand Syria Kurdistan has none. This means, crucially, no role in regional Pipelineistan. 

This concerns above all two strategic oil and gas pipelines from Kirkuk to Ceyhan - a direct deal between Ankara and the Iraqi Kurds which in theory bypasses Baghdad. 

Well, not really. As Baghdad has made it clear, there's no way these pipelines will be operative without the central government having its sizeable cut; after all it pays for 95% of the budget of Iraqi Kurdistan. 

Show me your terrorist ID
Iraqi Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani told al-Jazeera [2] that yes - they are training Syrian Kurds who defected from the Syrian Army to defend their de facto enclave. It was Barzani who supervised the key deal sealed in Irbil on July 11 that led to Assad forces retreating from Syrian Kurdistan. 

What is being described as "liberated cities" [3] is now being "jointly ruled" by the PYD and the KNC. They have formed what is known as a Supreme Kurdish Body. 

One can never underestimate the Kurdish capacity to shoot themselves in the foot (and elsewhere). Yet one can also imagine all this cross-country Kurdish frenzy terrifying quite a few souls in Istanbul and Ankara. This [4] columnist for the daily newspaper Hurriyet got it right; "Arabs are fighting, Kurds are winning." The Kurdish Spring is at hand. And it is already hitting Turkey's borders. 

Davutoglu must have seen it coming; when a formerly "zero problem" foreign policy evolves into housing the weaponized opposition to a neighboring government, you're bound to be in trouble. 

Especially when you start itching to kill "terrorists" living in your neighbor's territory - even though your Western allies may view them as "freedom fighters". Meanwhile you actively support Salafi-jihadis - "insurgents" formerly known as terrorists - back and forth across your borders. 

An increasingly erratic Erdogan has invoked a "natural right" [5] to fight "terrorists". But first they must produce an ID; if they are Sunni Arab, they get away with it. If they are Kurdish, they eat lead. 

Notes: 1. See here 
2. Iraqi Kurds train their Syrian brethren, Al-Jazeera, 23 Jul 2012
3. See Iraq's Kurdistan Peshmerga forces will be called into Syria when needed, PYD Leader says, Kurd Net, July 26, 2012
4. The Arab Spring has transformed into the Kurdish Spring, Hurriyet Daily News, July 27 2012 
5. PM declares Syria intervention a ‘natural right’, Hurriyet Daily News, July 27 2012 


Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007) and Red Zone Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge. His most recent book is Obama does Globalistan (Nimble Books, 2009). 

He may be reached at pepeasia@yahoo.com