PARIS, May 5 (UPI) -- Le Journal du Dimanche reports Sunday that Osama bin Laden's al Qaida terrorist network is preparing to kidnap hundreds of people throughout Europe over the next few days.
The aim of the operation would be to acquire a number of European hostages and then exchange them for Islamic activists currently being held in various European cities, the Paris-based paper reported.
The newspaper cited Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper, and French intelligence sources in its report.
According to the report, about 30 members of al Qaida from Iraq, Iran, Yemen and Sudan are preparing to strike targets in France, Great Britain and Germany and take a large numbers of hostages in each country.
The plan, according to Le Journal du Dimanche, is to kidnap about 300 to 400 people in each country by taking control of crowds in places such as cinemas, churches, or even by hijacking cruise ships sailing in the Mediterranean.
The report said the terrorists are prepared to kill themselves along with their hostages.
The paper added that the intelligence was acquired by BKA, the German intelligence agency, in Pakistan and was immediately shared with other European agencies.
Germany has already dismantled at least three terrorist cells operating on its territory since Sept. 11, including one believed to be connected to the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks.
I assume they aren't considering kidnapping the FAcup?
Billionaire Predicts Nuclear Attack
Sun May 5,10:28 PM ET
By JOE RUFF, Associated Press Writer
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - Investment guru Warren Buffett offered a bleak prediction for the nation's national security, saying a terrorist attack on American soil is "virtually a certainty."
Envy and dislike of the United States have fueled rage against the country even as the ability to build a nuclear device has spread, Buffett said Sunday at the final day of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s annual meeting.
"We're going to have something in the way of a major nuclear event in this country," said Buffett, the firm's chief operating officer. "It will happen. Whether it will happen in 10 years or 10 minutes, or 50 years ... it's virtually a certainty."
Washington and New York would be the top two targets because terrorists want to traumatize the country and kill as many people as possible, Buffett said.
Chemical or biological attacks are similarly high risks, Buffett said.
Buffett is the second-richest man in the world with holdings in Coca-Cola Co., American Express and The Washington Post, but his main business is insurance.
Berkshire Hathaway's insurance companies — particularly General Re Corp. — took a $2.4 billion underwriting loss because of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
The companies are now writing policies on terrorism but limiting their liability in any nuclear, biological or chemical attack. Only the federal government can ultimately insure property and other damage from a major terrorist attack, Buffett said.
The 71-year-old Buffett and vice chairman Charlie Munger met with the news media the day after they spent six hours answering questions from some of the more than 10,000 Berkshire shareholders gathered for the annual meeting.
"Therefore I'm going to buy an island and sit drinking Margarita's all day. Succumbing to the family curse."
(PRAVDA)
2002-04-26
A parrot that was taught to use bad language by Sir Winston Churchill himself is the oldest learned bird in Great Britain, and probably in the whole of the world. In any case, the owner of the bird says so. The owner of the parrot, Charlie Peter Oram is sure, the bird is 103 years old at least. The bird’s background is connected with the name of Britain’s legendary prime minister Winston Churchill, who had bought the parrot in approximately 1937. The prime minister was famous for his wonderful sense of humor, and that is why he trained the bird in a special manner. He taught the parrot to use British foul language, the bird was rather clever and started repeating words rather quickly. After Winston Churchill the parrot, Charlie, had several successive owners, and finally appeared in the Surrey county with today’s owner Peter Oram. Gardener Leonard Small is very much attached to the bird. He says, every day the parrot gets more and more quarrelsome, he is not inclined now to talk a lot. The gardener explains it with the bird’s old age, that is traditionally accompanied with different illnesses.
Earlier it was believed, cockatoo Cokky was the oldest in Britain, its age was 80 years by the moment of the tragic death. But now we see that Winston Churchill’s parrot is the oldest one. To tell the truth, Charlie does not look any more so much grand, as in its young age. Part of its feathers already fell out, but the parrot will be always really the best and most beautiful for the owner and the gardener. It is officially believed, Charlie was born in 1899, he had two owners before Winston Churchill. But it was the British Prime Minister who taught its to use bad language.
What is especially interesting, the parrot even mimics Churchill’s voice at that.
"Whose a pretty boy, then, even when you're sodding drunk?"
All thru the night.
Latin American Weekly Report, 1 Oct 01
And if China got its hands on these mini neutron bombs, it could very well export them to nations like Irak that are hostile to the US – as China already has done with non-nuclear weapons and technology.
Sam Cohen, The Wall Street Journal (15 May 1996)
Introduction
In the spring of 2001 Armando Frontado (cf. www.aipenet.com) penned a piece which may prove to be prophetic. In “The Venezuelan Taliban” (AIPE 3 May 01) Frontado totted up the destruction practiced by the Taliban – the destruction of statues to include the world’s greatest (53 m) Buddha and so on – on coming to power and compared these with the practices of the avowed Maoist president of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez. The piece is of considerable intrinsic interest, but the inferences which may be extrapolated from it may be of even more interest.
For by September 2001 the Taliban and the ChiComs were involved with bin Laden’s WTC (World Trade Center)-Pentagon outrage, the Chinese perhaps only through the Bush Doctrine, “if not for us, you are against us.” Perhaps, however, the “Declaration of Peking” (Wkly 12.10), with its pledge to build the neutron reactor, might bring these various terrorist elements even closer together. Nor can the lord of hemispheric terror, Fidel Ruz Castro, be left out of the mix.
As LANS pointed out immediately after the WTC outrage, Ruz Castro and bin Laden hunkered down in their respective holes only to emerge again a few days later with protestations of “innocence,” Ruz Castro’s mouthpiece, Granma, disappearing from the internet during the same period. All of which may be only an amusing sidelight, but it could be significant. And in the midst of all these comings and goings, and while Daniel Ortega, the ML (Marxist Leninist) boss of the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front), was high-tailing it out of Spain for fear of being jailed as a terrorist (DNN 19 Sep 01), Cuban MINREX (Foreign Relations Ministry) spokeswoman Aymeé Hernández was telling the press (EFE 21 Sep 01) that Cuba and the United States were exchanging information on terrorism.
Ruz Castro
There are three possible explanations of this report:
(1) Ms. Hernández was lying.
(2) The US is pulling another of those maneuvers which have backfired on it in the past. (The classic error made by the Eisenhower Administration with regard to Ruz Castro and by J. E. Carter with regard to Nicaragua are examples.)
(3) The US and Cuba are behaving as the report alleges.
Ena Curnow (DlA 19 Sep 01) has recently reviewed Ruz Castro’s troop contributions to his terrorist allies in Algeria, Syria, FPSE (Peoples Front for the Spanish Sahara), his alliances with Khadafy, Hussein, the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization). If nothing else – and Ruz Castro’s professed hatred of the US and Israel is “something else” – it would be uncharacteristic in the extreme for this Cuban terrorist to furnish information to the US on his brother terrorist bin Laden.
As was discussed in Spcl 12.8, Ruz Castro’s right hand and devoted admirer, the avowed Maoist Chávez, took leave of his “friend Vladimir” Putin with “I take leave of you, brother, and the decision is irrevocable: to march together and for always” (El Nacional (Caracas) 18 May 01). Nothing quite as descriptive as this has come to light with respect to Ruz Castro and bin Laden. But in the Ruz Castro-Khomeini meeting in Iran earlier this year as described by LANS, the Iranian and Cuban bosses declared that “Iran and Cuba conclude that together they can overthrow the US” (IPS (Iranian Press Service) 10 May 01). While no such sentiments appear to have been quoted from an embracing bin Laden and Ruz Castro, the lineup of terrorist representatives reported by a young Afghan and quoted by Gutiérrez-Boronat (DlA 21 Sep 01) included the Cuban dictator’s people.
One remark is certainly in order: Were the Cuban ruler so inclined, he could almost certainly furnish considerable intel on bin Laden and Al-Queda. With which attention will be turned to the neutron bomb, a perfect weapon for these terrorists.
Gordon Thomas
Gordon Thomas (www.gordonthomas.ie) states that he was born “on the floor of a house” in a Wales cemetery, a fact – if it is a fact – that he apparently considers important. LANS has recently received his “The Suitcases of Osama” from various sources. From this – which also effectively appears at his website – LANS gets the impression that he is not really versed in nuclear theory although quite capable of writing down what someone who is so versed tells him. In what LANS has seen of his work he appears to either accept or behave as if he accepts the disinformation with which the “establishment” – whatever this may be – dismisses by ignoration, or worse, the Neutron Bomb.
The Thomas article, Los Maletines de Osama (The Suitcases of Osama), appeared in the Crónico supplement of the Spanish newspaper El Mundo (No.310, 23 Sep 01). It is not precisely the same as the material which he has posted at his website but appears to contain the same data. Certain numbers may be taken from his work for convenience, data which appears to be amply supported by other sources. First, however, it is necessary to introduce certain caveats with respect to this work.
(a) Mr. Thomas is either (1) unaware of the existence of the suitcase neutron bomb,1 (2) has accepted the PC (politically correct) disinformation to the effect that it does not exist or (3) is simply uninterested. The general subject area of the neutron bomb. Red Mercury and related will be discussed below. He does, however, accept the possible U235 suitcase bomb which would appear of less interest to such as Ruz Castro and bin Laden.
(b) He has allegedly authored a tome entitled The Mental Tortures of the CIA. This should perhaps be indicative of his mindset whether or not a defensible treatment. The reader should be referred to what appears to be a similar treatment of “CIA torture” in a DO (disinformation operation) – whether the New York Times author, Le Moyne, knew it or not – which has been described on pp.255ff of YRBK98. This might be worth the attention of some truth-seeking good soul.
(c) Victor Ostravsky is apparently an ex, and possibly a rogue,2 agent of the Israeli Mossad intel organization. Therefore, using information supplied by Ostravsky – that an “atomic offensive”(?) by bin Laden has gone from “the possible to the very probable” -- with no supporting data is therefore dubious.
(d) Thomas uses the “ex” GRU agent, Lunev, as a reliable witness. Perhaps he may be, but, then again, perhaps the Soviet Analyst description of him as quite something else again (Wkly 12.9) may have some validity. Whatever Thomas’ motivation, Lunev’s reliability or otherwise probably does not affect anything other than the number of suitcase bombs (300) claimed to have disappeared into the stockpiles of bin Laden and other terrorists.
In sum then, there should be considerable caution exercised in assessing the number of bombs in the hands of bin Laden and extreme caution about the type of these weapons. Taking our lead from the Father of the neutron bomb, our good friend Sam Cohen, we shall accept his educated opinion that the weapon-of-choice of the terrorists is the Suitcase Neutron Bomb.
Fission and Fusion Processes
A review of such processes occupied us in Wkly 12.10. This is summarized below.
The number of protons (positively charged elementary particles) in the nucleus of an atom determines what the atom is, i.e., 92 protons means an atom of uranium (U92), the number of neutrons (neutrally charged elementary particles) determines the weight (isotope) of the atom. The neutron is, of course, not a stable particle in the free state so that, left to its own devices for about 17 minutes, it will decay as follows:
N => P + e + nu
where “nu” is a photon or light particle of a particular frequency or color, the frequency and hence the energy being enough to balance out the (rest) mass sum of that for the proton, that for the electron and that for the neutron, “h” being Planck’s constant. The U isotope of immediate interest has 143 neutrons, its weight 92+143=235 (235U92). For un-ionized – and hence neutrally charged – U, there are 92 electrons in the charge cloud about the nucleus, these ~1/2000 the mass of the neutron or proton.
The neutrons have a mass slightly larger than the protons. One can very roughly determine the binding energy of a nucleus, that is, a measure of the nuclear forces holding the nucleus together, by subtracting the nuclear mass from the sum of its nucleon masses. Then the binding energy would be this mass difference multiplied by the square of the velocity of light, c. In a fissile or fission process – such as occurs in a uranium or plutonium “bomb” – the nucleus is split, the energy released therefore the difference between the sum of the two nuclear masses after the split and the mass before the split. One way in which this may happen is:
235U92 + N => 134Xe54 + 100Sr38 + 2N,
where Xe is xenon, Sr strontium and N represents a free neutron.
[No attempt will be made to discuss the fission process which has been developed over the years to decrease the substantial weight of the Hiroshima bomb to about that of the neutron suitcase.]
The reverse occurs in a fusion process such as that which could occur from various possible combinations of 2H1 (deuterium) and 3H1 (tritium) nuclei. Here the energy released will be approximated by the difference between the sum of the masses of the two original nuclei and that of the resulting nucleus. A familiar example of this is provided by the following:
2H1 + 3H1 => 4He2 + N
where He is helium. Once again, the principle is the same as that for neutron decay.
The Mini Neutron Bomb
It would appear appropriate to appeal to the Father of the neutron bomb for a description of its “mini” species (pp.444ff, Shame5).
“Specifically…(it) is an extremely small pure-fusion bomb, roughly the size of a baseball…(it) uses an equal mixture of the two heavy forms of hydrogen -- 2H and 3H. If non-nuclear means can be developed to compress and heat…(a) fraction of a gram of this mixture to a degree where fusion of these H nuclei takes place at an efficient level…here is…a mini-neutron bomb…(with) yield as low as .001 or…lower of the fission-fusion bombs developed and stockpiled (…then destroyed) by the US;3 …”clean” because of the total absence of radioactivity…from…fusion reactions…(the products of which) are neutrons4…The triggering material…(is) Red Mercury…
Red Mercury
(With a) red mercury pure-fusion mini-neutron bomb…blast damage, say for a White House attack, would be minimal…no serious physical damage inside…The human carnage would be horrendous…fallout would be composed of certain elements in the soil which, like sodium and iron,…would be rendered radioactive through neutron absorption. Finally, to face up to the national accusation that the country had been lied to all along about this threat, unquestionably would be the undoing of the administration…we should be far more concerned about nuclear terrorism than we now are. We should be terrified!
Pp. 454ff, Sam Cohen, SHAME5
For Sam Cohen’s discussion of the US Government’s “Nuclear Terrorism Cover-up” (Journal of Civil Defence 28, Fall 1995), cf. the TACDA website (www.tacda.org/jcd/1995/issue4/280402.html). For a rational discussion of certain facets of the subject, cf. Michael Miller’s website (www.quackgrasspress.com/roots/ddp95.html), and for what remains inexplicable USIA (US Information Agency) disinformation, cf. (intellit.muskingum.edu/intellsite/Russia_folder/pew_era/sect_13b.htm). Continuing with p.445ff of Shame:
“The triggering material…red mercury is a…non-exploding high explosive…(belonging to a) class of so-called ‘ballotechnic’ explosives which apparently Los Alamos has been investigating…in nuclear weapon research. Red Mercury produces vastly more energy per pound than conventional explosives but does not explode in the conventional sense (with)…smoke and…a blast wave…while blowing apart…(upon detonation) it becomes extremely hot…(allowing) pressures and temperatures to be built up that are capable of igniting the heavy hydrogen and producing a pure-fusion…bomb….Originally…an oxide (HgSbO2)…(with) mercury (Hg) and antimony (Sb). Today…in Russia…produced by mixing special nuclear materials in very small amounts into the ordinary compound…and then bombarding it with a particle accelerator beam…the new substance, in which the mercury and antimony now act as one atom is highly compressed and ready for forming into a trigger for the fusion explosion.”
Returning to the WTC Tragedy
As Cohen pointed out (WSJ 15 May 96), “The new approach…(uses) explosives (about 100 pounds) to convert chemical energy into…(an) electrical pulse…(which) produce(s) a…powerful magnetic field that…compresses a mixture of deuterium and tritium…to produce… (a) fusion explosion.”
And the author also brings up a point which should be of particular interest on and after 11 September 2001, “the prospect of ‘mini’ neutron bombs…which could be an ideal terrorist weapon directed against the US.” With which we have come full circle:
“And if China got its hands on these mini neutron bombs, it could very well export them to nations like Iran that are hostile to the US – as China has done with non-nuclear weapons and technology.”
Have the Chi-Coms done as much with the Taliban Government of Afghanistan? Or Osama bin Laden? Perhaps the promised improvement in US intel operations, together with the resurrection of HUMINT (human intel), to which the US is apparently committed, will give us the answer to this question and to analogous questions relating to other terrorist regimes, some considerably closer to home. Or can we expect the US Government to “classify out of existence” this vital information as it attempted to do with Red Mercury?
Obviously this has nothing to do with unknown source of mercury poisonings at Ground Zero. Who needs facts?
http://www.financialsense.com/stormwatch/geo/analysis.htm
by J. R. Nyquist - March 26, 2002
On Thursday, March 21, WorldNetDaily posted an article from STRATFOR, a well-connected private intelligence firm. The title of the article was "Crisis looming between U.S., Russia."
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26920
STRATFOR's article deals with CIA Director George Tenet's March 19 testimony before the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee. According to Tenet, Russia is hardly a reliable partner in the "war against terror." Instead, Russia is "the first choice of proliferant states seeking the most advanced technology and training," said Tenet.
What the CIA director could not say, and perhaps what makes President George W. Bush so desperately eager to wipe out the regime of Saddam Hussein, is that Russia may have given red mercury fusion technology to Saddam. According to one of my sources, Iraq possesses "s-megaton" micro-nuclear warheads. These are softball-sized two-megaton fusion bombs triggered by an irradiated and compressed compound of mercury antimony oxide. This device doubles the nuclear yield with a hundredfold reduction of weight. Using heavy hydrogen instead of uranium or plutonium to fuel its explosive reaction, this hand-held nuclear weapon cannot be detected by U.S. sensors.
It should be acknowledged that CIA Director Tenet singled out Russia for a reason. Only Russia has compression technology in advance of America's. Only Russia has worked long and hard to develop a perfect fusion bomb (the U.S. having abandoned its own effort decades ago). And now American intelligence has evidence of something dire, something they don't want to tell us. According to STRATFOR, "A severe crisis between the two sides [America and Russia] may now be forming." As STRATFOR further points out, "Now the director of the CIA has named Russia as the key source of WMD proliferation."
Perhaps we are now in a position to understand what Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, meant when he said last fall that America would soon be destroyed. He did not say America would be crippled, or that America would be defeated. He said America would disappear. When a suspect in the Danny Pearl kidnapping and murder case was being escorted by guards in Pakistan a couple of weeks ago, he reportedly shouted to the press, "Sell your dollars! Soon America will be gone."
What does Al Qaeda know that we don't?
CIA Director Tenet was very clear when he spoke to the U.S. Senate committee last week. He holds Russia responsible for giving advanced mass destruction technology to Iraq. And Tenet evidently believes that Iraq is allied to Al Qaeda. As STRATFOR explained, "Tenet delivered a blunt message to Putin: The United States believes that WMD proliferation is official Russian policy." The Bush administration was offering a stern warning to Moscow. It must halt its technology transfers to rogue regimes or suffer the consequences. And what would those consequences be? STRATFOR claims that President Putin "faces the distinct possibility of attacks on Russian weapons facilities and the
potential elimination of his country's nuclear capability."
This statement deserves further elaboration. But who dares to elaborate? Is America actually contemplating a nuclear strike on the Russian nuclear arsenal? Only a very desperate crisis would trigger such unthinkable verbiage out of our bloodless bean counters. In fact, if STRATFOR's report is correct, the United States is holding Russia directly responsible for Saddam Hussien's future actions. And this should tell us, at the very least, that Saddam Hussein is a much more terrible threat than the general public has been led to believe. So terrible is the threat, that U.S. officials find it necessary to openly threaten Russia in order to reestablish the balance of terror in the wake of Moscow's secret connivance with Iraq.
The revelations of yet another respected intelligence firm, DEBKA File, dovetails with STRATFOR's information. According to DEBKA, the White House is seriously considering tactical nuclear strikes against Iraq. This drastic approach can only be explained - once again - by a dire, immediate and frightening Iraqi potential. If not for this, U.S. leaders would hardly expend precious political and diplomatically capital by pushing so aggressively for the eradication of Saddam's regime in Baghdad. According to intelligence sources close to DEBKA, [See article.] "The White House is considering the use of tactical nuclear weapons and planning the break-up of Iraq . in a broad military campaign set now for April."
And why the hurry?
Surely, only a very grave threat would inspire such urgency in U.S. policy-makers. DEBKA confirms that the reason for the U.S. urgency has to do with Iraq's possession of nuclear warheads, though DEBKA does not confirm that these are "s-megaton" micro nuclear devices. Why the U.S. would be concerned with large, more cumbersome and detectable weapons is a question that readers will have to sort for themselves. According to DEBKA, the main reason for a nuclear blitzkrieg against Iraq in April would be to "locate nuclear devices believed to be in the possession of Saddam Hussein." The idea would then be to destroy the weapons before they could be used to trigger a nuclear or biological holocaust. Judging by the tempo of U.S. moves, Iraq's nuclear capability will probably become effective some time after April 25. That is why, even though U.S. military authorities confess that we are unready to attack Iraq, an attack must go forward nonetheless. U.S. officials are also said to be planning nuclear strikes that would eliminate the top Iraqi leadership, opening the way for the negotiated surrender of individual Iraqi divisions and the creation of a Kurdish state in the north.
DEBKA further alleges that Vice President Richard Cheney received intelligence during his recent Middle East trip that Iraq had already transferred nuclear weapons to Al Qaeda, along with weaponized smallpox. Cheney was supposedly told that some of these munitions may have been smuggled into the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia. Many will dismiss the claims of DEBKA, but according to Dr. Robert Morey, an Islam expert who predicted the Sept. 11 attacks, three small nuclear devices have been smuggled into the United States and are being held in reserve for future use. Speaking with the Assist News Service (ANS), Dr. Morey said: "I have Middle Eastern friends throughout the U.S. who continually feed me information as to what the terrorists are up to."
[See article.]
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26891
Then comes the most curious and frightening story of them all, which may tie everything into one neat package. This story comes out of Canada and involves a U.S. citizen who has been granted political asylum by Ottawa in accordance with international law. The U.S. citizen in question is Delmart Edward Vreeland. [See article.] http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1011567751906&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pagepath=News/News.
The United States government says that Vreeland is a petty criminal. But Vreeland identifies himself as a lieutenant with the Office of Naval Intelligence who defected to Canada in December 2000 after retrieving documents from Moscow. One of these documents, a communiqué from K. Hussaine of Iraq to V. Putin of Russia, discusses "the initial phase of our planned assault against the United States in September of 2001 and after." Because of these shocking revelations, Vreeland maintains
that he cannot return to the United States because the Russian mafia would assassinate him and because an important American official would assure Vreeland's death or imprisonment upon his return. The Russian document, in fact, refers to "our official in America" who can "assure" the desired results if security should be compromised. The document does not name the official in question, but Vreeland believes it is someone with great influence.
I interviewed Mr. Vreeland on Monday and reviewed a key document he allegedly retrieved from Moscow. The communiqué from K. Hussaine to V. Putin (referred to above) is dated June 13, 2000, and was used by Vreeland to successfully predict the Sept. 11 attack in a letter to Canadian prison authorities. The document, which names the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a nuclear power plant as the initial targets of Sept. 11, curiously describes these as "diversionary strikes" attributed to the work of "our brothers." The real attack, says the Iraqi official, will involve the use of "new s-megaton mini satellite [guided] rocket[s]." This is a weapon that would be smuggled into the United States, and better resembles a small robot aircraft than a missile. The striking power of this satellite guided toy rocket is listed as two megatons. The document says, "The shock wave from the air burst of our two megaton mini combined with its own reflection from the ground will form a blast wave of such power that everything will be destroyed . within 8 to 13 U.S. miles of ground zero." The document also refers to a top secret Russian stealth satellite termination system (called S.S.S.T.). According to Vreeland, this is a stealth orbital platform armed with clusters of electromagnetic pulse bombs capable of knocking out global communications and frying U.S. nuclear warheads leaving the Western Hemisphere.
If Vreeland's information is reliable, we might have a handle on why the United States is threatening Russia with nuclear strikes. Like a trapped animal the U.S. realizes the mistake it has made. Disarming after our alleged Cold War victory was an error. Now the U.S. must make terrible threats and take drastic action to restore the nuclear balance. To do this the United States must hold Russia directly responsible for Russian-supported and Iraqi-directed nuclear terrorism against the American homeland. By doing this, and by mopping up Iraq, the United States might reestablish that same "balance of terror" that kept the peace during the Cold War.
Readers may ask, "Is red mercury fact or fiction?"
U.S. officials have sometimes ridiculed red mercury as a hoax. But not former Russian Atomic Energy Minister Viktor Mikhailov, who once spoke of a new kind of bomb that could devastate "foreign territory" while carrying no risk of retaliation. During a Pravda interview almost a decade ago, Mikhailov described the existence of "little bombs" that "could appear by the year 2000." In 1993 General Y. Negin said that Russia had developed a special nuclear weapon, "in which a
doubling of yield is achieved with a hundredfold reduction of weight compared to existing weapons." American scientist Sam Cohen, inventor of the neutron bomb, pointed out in 1995 that such an increase in nuclear efficiency would only be possible if the Russians had developed a red mercury device.
Today the Russian Defense Ministry says red mercury doesn't exist. Western officials treat the subject dismissively. After all, Russian smugglers have created fake samples of red mercury, which have conveniently fallen into the hands of Western authorities. But Russian sources, derided as "questionable," continue to report that red mercury - first produced in 1965 at a nuclear research center outside Moscow - is currently being mass-produced at six secret sites in the Urals at a rate of 150 pounds per year. United States officials would never admit that Russia had developed such a technology. Such an admission, after a decade of smug denials, would indicate incompetence and dereliction of duty in high places. It would indicate that U.S. strategic thinking has been blind, deaf and dumb. As any nuclear strategist might tell you: the development in Russia of a micro-nuclear fusion bomb would completely change the strategic nuclear balance. Undetectable from space, easy to deliver, such a device could not be tracked or counted by "national technical means." In addition, it would be the ultimate terrorist weapon.
Did Russia give Iraq red mercury fusion technology?
Last week CIA Director George Tenet pointed his finger directly at Russia for a reason. The United States now seeks the annihilation of Saddam Hussein for a reason. Mullah Omar and the killers of Danny Pearl say that America will soon be gone - perhaps with reason.
I saw the trailer for the "Sum of all fears". Lets hope it stays a movie.
Cheryl's Daily Diatribe:
April 3, 2002
(unknownnews.net)
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Bush and Sharon are colluding to force the Middle East into a massive, all-out war as a way to stay in power. But Bush plans to have the last laugh. By encouraging Sharon to escalating excesses, Bush hopes to bait Arabs everywhere — including Iraq — into taking aggressive action, even all-out war. This would of course give Bush the pretext he's sought for launching an attack on Iraq and embroiling America in a war guaranteed to last through election day 2004. But the other part of Bush's plan is just as vicious. By encouraging the bloodthirsty egomaniac Sharon, he may succeed in destroying Israel without ever lifting a finger himself.
It seems insane that Sharon has staked his country's security on an alliance with Bush — a man who describes himself as a fundamentalist Christian (which by definition means anti-Semitic), whose mentor Billy Graham was blatantly anti-Semitic, whose family actively traded with the Nazis in WWII and who has himself made anti-Semitic comments. This is like getting into bed with a rattlesnake and assuming you won't get bitten.
But, there is another dimension to the Middle East insanity very, very few know about: the unholy alliance between the Christian right and their Jewish counterparts, the Zionists. While sane people around the world view the Middle East conflict as "mere" political wrangling with religious undertones, the rightwing Christians and Zionists see the conflict as a prelude to the final chapter in the fulfillment of Biblical scriptures - at least as interpreted by paranoid schizophrenics with religious delusions such as Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and their Rabbinical counterparts in Israel and America . These people welcome the current bloodbath with "rapturously" open arms — it means the "final Chapter" is imminent, at the conclusion of which the faithful will ascend to heaven and the rest of us heathens will die a horrible death. (These people are such great human beings, eh?).
I did not know about this wacked out movement until very recently. I thought this type was confined to small, relatively powerless cults such as the Jim Jones or Hale-Bopp folks. But it seems that the rightwing Judeo-Christian "coalition" is not only just as whacked out as these cults, it is far, far larger and has friends in very high political places — including, it is very likely, Bush himself and most certainly John Ashcroft. Ashcroft is a Pentecostal, and the Pentecostals are the most rabidly fixated on the "coming rapture" and the significance of events in the Middle East.
First, I will give you some background, which was provided to me by a very reliable source.
Cheryl,My source also included the following excerpt:
The reason why the Christian right has been funneling money into the West Bank is because they are trying to force the Rapture.
According to Evangelical Christian beliefs, the Jews will rebuild the Temple Mount. When that happens the Lord will take all Born Again Christians up into heaven with him where they will live at his right hand for ever and ever Amen.
But the Jews will not rebuild the Temple Mount because they are all impure from having stepped upon the earth which has dead people buried in it. In order for them to be pure, they must get a pure red heifer that was born in Israel and burn it. The ashes will be mixed with water and this will be used to purify the builders and priests of the temple.
Reverend Clyde Lott, an Evangelical cattle breeder, has been working with American-Born Rabbi Richman and West Bank settlers to genetically create a perfect red cow. The West Bank is currently populated with Palestinian Muslims who are sworn to protect the Al Aqsa Mosque which must be destroyed because it currently sits exactly where they intend to build the Temple Mount. They also need a male who has taken his bar mitzvah (he would be at least 13 years old) who has been raised "in a bubble" never touching the earth or anything that has become ritually unclean.
According to the Jews, the Messiah will come once the temple is built.
According to the Christians, the Jews will almost all die once the Temple is built and an antichrist immediately moves into it. According to the Muslims, both the Christians and the Jews will die violent and bloody deaths if they attempt to destroy the Al Aqsa Mosque.
No, I am not hallucinating!
We are about to see the biggest mass suicide ever.
Furthermore, if you listen to the Christians, there also has to be a war with Persia around this same time.
["According to Clyde Lott, the intent of many Evangelical Christians who are helping Israel today is to speed along the time when they will be raptured into Heaven, leaving behind a world in chaos and flames. "It's very sad, but I would say the interest in the Christian world is to see the Temple rebuilt from the Antichrist perspective, for the rapture of the Church, and that's a very selfish point of view," Lott says, "The very people who are advocating this are the ones that are very Semitic in their feelings". Although Evangelical theology forecasts the destruction of the Jews in the Last Days, Lott believes that the Jews are God's Chosen People and that the Bible clearly states that God favors those who help Israel."Now that you have digested at least some of this, consider Bush's actions for the past several months. Without even needing to invoke a conspiracy theory, his behavior suddenly makes sense — in a bizarro world way. Thus you have his constant use of the words "evildoers" and his passage of judgment on other nations as "evil," his obsession with attacking Iraq and, if he had his way, also Iran (the modern-day counterparts to "Persia" — at least close enough for government work!), his willingness to use nuclear weaponry (after all, Armageddon is part of the plan), his creation of a shadow government, his seemingly inexplicable refusal to make any effort to restrain Sharon, his surrounding himself with fundies, regardless of their qualifications (only the "pure" can participate in the "glory" of the final hours!), his determination to knock down the wall between church and state, his encouragement of Ashcroft's prayer meetings in the Justice Building, etc.
Most Israelis understand the subtext of this alliance, but they are loathe to disclaim it. "Basically, we're a doormat for them to get to their own eschatological culmination," Rabbi Richman says, "It's a pretty scary thing, because the whole rapture thing that is popular in some Evangelical circles, which calls for a fulfillment of the hard times for Jacob, is essentially an invitation to genocide."
And yet, knowing this Rabbi Richman and the others happily accept the support of those who would destroy them."]
So, simply put, we may well have a pack of religious nutcases running the U.S. government as well as in control of Israel. Is it any wonder that the situation in the Middle East has reached the current level of insanity? Sharon has intentionally provoked the current showdown, exhibiting a flagrant lack of concern for human life, be it Jewish, Muslim, or Christian. Yes there are Palestinian suicide bombers, but, as R. D. Laing once said, some forms of insanity are in fact just sane reactions to an insane situation.
I have no doubt that, with Bush and Sharon at the helm, the insanity will get much, much worse before it gets better — which it never will as long as these two madmen remain in power.
Meanwhile, as these extremists use the "Holy Land" as a playground for acting out their delusions, the Palestinians are paying the heaviest price: Here are journal entries from those trapped in Ramallah.
MAY 04, 16:07 ET
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (AP) — A Department of Energy plant once used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons is expected to be back in operation Monday after a bomb threat triggered an evacuation.
No bomb was found at the 1,500-acre site known as K-25, or the East Tennessee Technology Park, after the federal agency learned of the threat just before 8 a.m. Friday.
Current work at the site involves converting the plant for private use, and cleaning up contaminated areas.
Security police and essential personnel were allowed to stay but about 1,000 workers were evacuated and others were turned away as they reported to work, DOE spokesman Steven Wyatt said.
``We feel like we've taken appropriate steps to check the facilities, and we feel that it's safe to go back to normal operations,'' Wyatt said.
The threat reportedly was made by phone to an emergency responder in Roane County. Wyatt declined to give details.
SEE ALSO:Sabotaging Spent Nuclear Fuel Pools - Catastrophe In Waiting
Investigative reporter Christopher Simpson says in BLOWBACK that after World War II, Nazi émigrés were
given CIA subsidies to build a far-right-wing power base in the U.S. These Nazis assumed prominent positions
in the Republican Party's "ethnic outreach committees." Simpson documents the fact that these Nazis did not
come to America as individuals but as part of organized groups with fascist political agendas. The Nazi agenda
did not die along with Adolf Hitler. It moved to America (or a part of it did) and joined the far right of the
Republican Party.
Simpson shows how the State Department and the CIA put high-ranking Nazis on the intelligence payroll "for
their expertise in propaganda and psychological warfare," among other purposes. The most important Nazi
employed by the U.S. was Reinhard Gehlen, Hitler's most senior eastern front military intelligence officer. After
Germany's defeat became certain, Gehlen offered the U.S. certain concessions in exchange for his own
protection. Gehlen promoted hyped up cold war propaganda on behalf of the political right in this country, and
helped shape U.S. perceptions of the cold war.
Journalist Russ Bellant (OLD NAZIS, THE NEW RIGHT, AND THE REPUBLICAN PARTY) shows that
Laszlo Pasztor, a convicted Nazi war collaborator, built the Republican émigré network. Pasztor, who served as
adviser to Republican Paul Weyrich, belonged to the Hungarian Arrow Cross, a group that helped liquidate
Hungary's Jews. Pasztor was founding chairman of the Republican Heritage Groups Council.
Two months before the November 1988 presidential election, a small newspaper, Washington Jewish Week,
disclosed that a coalition for the Bush campaign included a number of outspoken Nazis and anti-Semites. The
article prompted six leaders of Bush's coalition to resign.
According to Russ Bellant, Nazi collaborators involved in the Republican Party included:
1.Radi Slavoff, GOP Heritage Council's executive director, and head of "Bulgarians for Bush." Slavoff was a
member of a Bulgarian fascist group, and he put together an event in Washington honoring Holocaust
denier, Austin App.
2.Florian Galdau, director of GOP outreach efforts among Romanians, and head of "Romanians for Bush."
Galdau was once an Iron Guard recruiter, and he defended convicted Nazi war criminal Valerian Trifa.
3.Nicholas Nazarenko, leader of a Cossack GOP ethnic unit. Nazarenko was an ex-Waffen SS officer.
4.Method Balco, GOP activist. Balco organized yearly memorials for a Nazi puppet regime.
5.Walter Melianovich, head of the GOP's Byelorussian unit. Melianovich worked closely with many Nazi
groups.
6.Bohdan Fedorak, leader of "Ukrainians for Bush." Fedorak headed a Nazi group involved in anti-Jewish
wartime pogroms.
The Philadelphia Inquirer ran an article on the Bush team's inclusion of Nazis (David Lee Preston, "Fired Bush
backer one of several with possible Nazi links," September 10, 1988.) The newspaper also ran an investigative
series on Nazi members of the Bush coalition. The article confirmed that the Bush team included members
listed by Russ Bellant.
Journalist Martin A. Lee, has written for The Nation, Rolling Stone, The San Francisco Chronicle, and other
publications. In THE BEAST REAWAKENS, Lee confirms that during both the Reagan and Bush years, the
Republican Party's ethnic outreach arm recruited members from the Nazi émigré network.
Lee says that the Republican Party's ethnic outreach division had an outspoken hatred of President Jimmy
Carter's Office of Special Investigations (OSI), an organization dedicated to tracking down and prosecuting Nazi
war collaborators who entered this country illegally. Former Republican Pat Buchanan attacked Carter's OSI
after it deported a few suspected Nazi war criminals.
According to Lee, public relations man Harold Keith Thompson was principal U.S. point man for the postwar
Nazi support network known as die Spinne, or the Spider. In the late 40s and early 50s, Thompson worked as
the chief North American representative for the remaining National Socialist German Worker's Party and the
SS. Lee writes that the wealthy Thompson gave generously to Republican candidates Senator Jesse Helms and
would-be senator Oliver North. Thompson's money gained him membership in the GOP's Presidential Legion
of Merit. Lee says Thompson also "received numerous thank-you letters from the Republican National
Committee." Those letters are now in the Hoover Institute Special Collections Library.
Christopher Simpson writes in BLOWBACK that in 1983, Ronald Reagan presented a Medal of Freedom, the
country's highest civilian honor, to CIA émigré program consultant James Burnham. Burnham was a
psychological warfare consultant who promoted something called "liberationism." Just before the 1952 election,
the CIA worked up a multimillion-dollar public relations campaign aimed at selling Americans on expanding
cold war activities in Europe. Part of the guiding theory (given the name "liberationism") was the idea that
certain Nazi leaders from World War II should be brought in as "freedom fighters" against the USSR.
Reagan said that Burnham's ideas on liberation "profoundly affected the way America views itself and the
world," adding, "I owe [Burnham] a personal debt, because throughout the years of traveling on the
mashed-potato circuit I have quoted [him] widely." Reagan may not have known Burnham's theories were
based on his work on projects that enlisted many Nazi collaborators, but it seems that Reagan's CIA Director
Casey or former CIA Director, Vice President George Bush, would have informed him.
At a May 9, 1984 press conference, Simon Wiesenthal said, "Nazi criminals were the principal beneficiaries of
the Cold War." The cold war mentality, hyped by Reinhard Gehlen and other Nazis, became the shelter for tens
of thousands of Nazi criminals. Helping the far right in this country to promote cold war hysteria became the
Nazi war criminals "reason for being." As Christopher Simpson says, the cold war became those criminals'
means "to avoid responsibility for the murders they had committed."
Journalist Seymour Hersh says Christopher Simpson's BLOWBACK is "the ultimate book about the worst
kind of cold war thinking, in which some of our most respected statesmen made shameful decisions that they
mistakenly believed to be justified." To this day, says Simpson, the U.S. intelligence agencies hide the scope of
their post-World War II collaboration with Nazi criminals.
Are Republicans like George H. W. Bush, Oliver North, and Jesse Helms, aware they have been assisted by
Nazi collaborators? Bush once worked for the CIA and should have known about the nature of the Nazis in his
'88 campaign. No doubt he knows the history of Nazi/CIA collaboration. Whether or not Bush knew of the
fascists' involvement in his campaign, the Republican Party should have done a far better screening job. One
thing is certain: The intelligence agencies know the scope and extent of Nazi involvement with the political
right in this country. It is a shame they keep it hidden from the majority of the American people.
LONDON, May 5 (Reuters) - British scientists hope to exhume the body of a young woman who died in the 1918 influenza pandemic to examine the virus that claimed up to 40 million lives worldwide, the Sunday Times said.
The newspaper said a team from St Bartholomew's hospital in London believes the virus could still exist within the lead-lined coffin of Phyllis Burn, an army major's daughter who died from the disease at the age of 20.
The scientists believe the unusual conditions of her burial may have preserved Burn's body and could aid the extraction of a sample of the deadly virus. As well as being buried in a lead-lined coffin, Burn was interred within a brick vault.
"We do not know if this grave will produce the material we need. It is a scientific endeavour that has a good change of producing information with the potential to save many lives," John Oxford, a professor of virology who is heading the team, told the paper.
Any exhumation would need to be carried out in strictly controlled circumstances to ensure there was no chance of the virus escaping. The genetic information obtained from a sample might, scientists hope, help prevent future outbreaks.
The paper said the team identified Burn as one of only 10 victims of the disease buried in lead-lined coffins, after analysing thousands of records.
They are trying to trace her descendants to obtain permission to exhume her body. Failing that, the team might apply to the Home Office for approval.
The 1918 pandemic killed between 20 and 40 million people worldwide, most of them young adults.
Milder genetic strains of influenza are commonplace but are constantly mutating. Scientists say they could again develop into forms as potentially lethal as the 1918 strain.
(scotmans)
5/6/02
GEORGE Galloway, the outspoken Labour MP, is consulting his lawyers after Hollywood star John Malkovich allegedly said he would like to shoot him.
Malkovich - star of movies including Dangerous Liaisons and The Killing Fields - is reported to have said that Mr Galloway, the Glasgow Kelvin MP, was one of two people he would most like to kill.
The MP yesterday expressed astonishment that the actor should have such animosity against him - or indeed should ever have heard of him.
The unexpected attack came as Malkovich, who is in the UK filming Johnny English with Rowan Atkinson and Natalie Imbruglia, addressed students at a Cambridge Union Society debate on Wednesday.
He was asked by one student who he would most like to fight to the death, and replied "I’d rather just shoot them," before naming Mr Galloway and the Independent newspaper’s Middle East correspondent, Robert Fisk. Union Society spokesman Luke Layfield said last night: "Someone asked him why he hated George Galloway and what his problem was. He said he was an idiot and he didn’t know. But then he was a bit more serious and he said people shouldn’t summarise thousands of years of history in just a few paragraphs because they are angry about something. He said ‘It’s dangerous; very dangerous indeed.’
"It would be fair to say you can infer from what he said that he was talking about the way George Galloway and Robert Fisk report on the Israel and Palestinian conflict and perhaps that they are not the most neutral of reports and come out with the Palestinian side."
Mr Layfield added: "He lives in France and he said he always reads the British press and he said he doesn’t like what George Galloway or Robert Fisk write but that he always reads it."
Michael Lynas, president of the Cambridge Union Society, said the comments were only a small part of the hour and a half debate, which was attended by 750 people, stressing that they were not a serious death threat but a "lighthearted" remark.
Mr Galloway assumed that his outspoken criticism of US policy in the Middle East, Afghanistan and Iraq was behind the outburst.
He said: "In the current climate of terrorism and violence and so on, if it was a joke it is not very funny and if it wasn’t a joke, he will be hearing from my lawyers. We can have a high noon at the Old Bailey if he likes.
"His comments are especially dangerous because in a couple of days’ time, I will be in the Palestinian Authority visiting President Arafat and there are a lot of bullets flying around there."
In response to the comments, Simon Kelner, editor-in-chief of the Independent, said: "I am treating the remarks with the contempt they deserve."
MICHEL CHOSSUDOVSKY
(towardfreedom.com)
The important debate on global warming proceeding under UN auspices provides but a partial picture of climate change. In addition to the devastating impacts of greenhouse gas emissions on the ozone layer, the world's climate can now be modified by a new generation of sophisticated "non-lethal weapons." In fact, both the US and Russia have developed capabilities to manipulate the world's weather.
In the US, the technology is being perfected under the High-frequency Active Aural Research Program (HAARP) as part of "Star Wars," otherwise known as the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). Recent scientific evidence suggests that HAARP is fully operational and has the ability to potentially trigger floods, droughts, hurricanes, and earthquakes.
While there is no evidence that this deadly technology has been used yet, surely the UN should be addressing the issue of "environmental warfare" alongside the debate on the climatic impacts of greenhouse gases. From a military standpoint, HAARP is a weapon of mass destruction. Potentially, it constitutes an instrument of conquest capable of selectively destabilizing the agricultural and ecological systems of entire regions.
Owning the Weather
Despite a vast body of scientific knowledge, the issue of deliberate climatic manipulations for military use has never been explicitly part of the UN agenda on climate change. Neither the official delegations nor the environmental action groups participating in the November 2000 Hague Conference on Climate Change (CO6) raised the broad issue of "weather warfare" or "environmental modification techniques" (ENMOD) as relevant to an understanding of climate change.
The clash between official negotiators, environmentalists, and US business lobbies has centered on Washington's outright refusal to abide by commitments on carbon dioxide reduction targets under the 1997 Kyoto protocol. The protocol calls for nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by an average of 5.2 percent to become effective between 2008 and 2012. (For details, go to www.globalwarming.net/gw11.html.) Yet, the impacts of military technologies on the world's climate aren't an object of discussion or concern. Narrowly confined to greenhouse gases, the ongoing debate on climate change serves Washington's strategic and defense objectives.
World-renowned scientist Dr. Rosalie Bertell confirms that "US military scientists are working on weather systems as a potential weapon." As The Times of London reported on November 23, 2000, "The methods include the enhancing of storms and the diverting of vapor rivers in the Earth's atmosphere to produce targeted droughts or floods."
In the 1970s, former national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski predicted in his book Between Two Ages, "Technology will make available, to the leaders of major nations, techniques for conducting secret warfare, of which only a bare minimum of the security forces need be appraised ... . Techniques of weather modification could be employed to produce prolonged periods of drought or storm."
Marc Filterman, a former French military officer, has outlined several types of "unconventional weapons" using radio frequencies. According to a 1999 report in Intelligence Newsletter, he refers directly to "weather war," indicating that the US and the Soviet Union had already "mastered the know-how needed to unleash sudden climate changes (hurricanes, drought) in the early 1980s." These technologies make it "possible to trigger atmospheric disturbances by using Extremely Low Frequency (ELF) radar."
A simulation study of future defense "scenarios," described in a report by the Air University of the US Air Force, calls for "US aerospace forces to Ôown the weather' by capitalizing on emerging technologies and focusing development of those technologies to war-fighting applications. From enhancing friendly operations or disrupting those of the enemy via small-scale tailoring of natural weather patterns to complete dominance of global communications and counterspace control, weather-modification offers the war fighter a wide range of possible options to defeat or coerce an adversary. In the US, weather modification will likely become a part of national security policy with both domestic and international applications. Our government will pursue such a policy, depending on its interests, at various levels."
Bombarding the Atmosphere
Based in Gokoma, Alaska, and jointly managed by the US Air Force and Navy, HAARP is part of a new generation of sophisticated weaponry under the SDI. Operated by the Air Force Research Laboratory's Space Vehicles Directorate, it constitutes a system of powerful antennas capable of creating "controlled local modifications of the ionosphere."
In The Military's Pandora's Box, Dr. Nicholas Begich, a scientist actively involved in the campaign against HAARP, describes it as "a super-powerful radiowave-beaming technology that lifts areas of the ionosphere (upper layer of the atmosphere) by focusing a beam and heating those areas. Electromagnetic waves then bounce back onto earth and penetrate everything - living and dead."
Bertell depicts HAARP as "a gigantic heater that can cause major disruption in the ionosphere, creating not just holes, but long incisions in the protective layer that keeps deadly radiation from bombarding the planet."
Although presented as a program of scientific and academic research, Begich notes that US military documents suggest HAARP's main objective is to "exploit the ionosphere for Department of Defense purposes." Without explicitly referring to the program, the Air University study points to the use of "induced ionospheric modifications" as a means of altering weather patterns as well as disrupting enemy communications and radar.
According to Bertell, HAARP is part of an integrated weapons system with potentially devastating environmental consequences. "It is related to fifty years of intensive and increasingly destructive programs to understand and control the upper atmosphere," she notes. "It would be rash not to associate HAARP with the space laboratory construction, which is separately being planned by the United States. HAARP is an integral part of a long history of space research and development of a deliberate military nature."
The military implications of combining these projects are alarming. The ability of the HAARP/Spacelab/rocket combination to deliver very large amounts of energy, comparable to a nuclear bomb, anywhere on earth via laser and particle beams, is frightening. The project, adds Bertell, is likely to be "sold" to the public as a space shield against incoming weapons, or, for the more gullible, a device for repairing the ozone layer.
In addition to weather manipulation, HAARP has a number of related uses. According to Begich, "HAARP could contribute to climate change by intensively bombarding the atmosphere with high-frequency rays. Returning low-frequency waves at high intensity could also affect people's brains, and effects on tectonic movements cannot be ruled out."
More generally, it has the ability to modify the world's electro-magnetic field. As Don Herskovitz explained in the August 1993 issue of the Journal of Electronic Defense, it's part of an arsenal of "electronic weapons" which US military researchers consider a "gentler and kinder warfare." According to Herskovitz, "electronic warfare" is defined by the US Department of Defense as "military action involving the use of electromagnetic energy."
Avoiding the Issues
According to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) signed at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, "States have, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and the principles of international law, the responsibility to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage to the environment of other States or of areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction." In addition, an international convention ratified by the UN General Assembly in 1977 bans "military or other hostile use of environmental modification techniques having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects."
Both the US and the Soviet Union were signatories to the convention, which defines "environmental modification techniques" as referring to any technique for changing - through the deliberate manipulation of natural processes - "the dynamics, composition or structure of the earth, including its biota, lithosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere or of outer space." Yet, the UN, disregarding the 1977 environmental modification convention as well as its own charter, has decided to exclude climatic changes resulting from military programs from its agenda.
Responding to a report of Maj Britt Theorin, Swedish member of the European Parliament and a longtime peace advocate, the parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defense Policy held public hearings on the HAARP program in February 1998. The committee's subsequent Motion for Resolution, submitted in January 1999, "considers HAARP by virtue of its far-reaching impact on the environment to be a global concern and calls for its legal, ecological and ethical implications to be examined by an international independent body; [the Committee] regrets the repeated refusal of the United States Administration to give evidence to the public hearing into the environmental and public risks [of] the HAARP program."
The committee's request to draw up a "Green Paper" on "the environmental impacts of military activities," however, was casually dismissed on the grounds that the European Commission lacks the required jurisdiction to delve into "the links between environment and defense." In short, Brussels was anxious to avoid a showdown with Washington.
Fully operational
HAARP is part of the weapons arsenal of the New World Order under SDI. From military command points in the US, entire national economies could potentially be destabilized through climatic manipulations. More important, the latter can be implemented without the knowledge of the enemy, at minimal cost, and without engaging military personnel and equipment as in a conventional war.
To advance US economic and strategic interests, for example, it could be used to selectively modify climate in different parts of the world, resulting in the destabilization of agricultural and ecological systems. It's also worth noting that the US Department of Defense has allocated substantial resources to the development of intelligence and monitoring systems on weather changes.
While there's no concrete evidence that HAARP has been used, scientific findings suggest that it's fully operational. If so, it could potentially be applied by the US military to selectively modify the climate of an "unfriendly nation" or "rogue state" with a view to destabilizing its national economy.
Agricultural systems in both developed and developing countries are already in crisis as a result of New World Order policies such as market deregulation and commodity dumping. Amply documented, IMF and World Bank "economic medicine" imposed on the Third World and the countries of the former Soviet bloc has largely contributed to the destabilization of domestic agriculture. In turn, the provisions of the World Trade Organization have supported the interests of a handful of Western agri-biotech conglomerates in their quest to impose genetically modified seeds on farmers throughout the world.
In that context, climatic manipulations under the HAARP program (whether accidental or deliberate) would inevitably exacerbate these changes by weakening national economies, destroying infrastructure, and potentially triggering the bankruptcy of farmers over vast areas. Surely, national governments and the UN should address the possible consequences of this and other "non-lethal weapons" on climate change.
Michel Chossudovsky teaches economics at the University of Ottawa and is the author of The Globalization of Poverty
May 6, 2002
(Source: BBC)
Two British flyers plan to build the largest balloon ever and fly it to a new altitude record this summer. Colin Prescot and Andy Elson, will attempt to set a new world balloon altitude record in July.
They are aiming to reach an altitude of 132,000 feet in the largest helium balloon ever constructed. Their QinetiQ 1 balloon will be 400 times the size of a typical hot-air balloon and as tall as the Empire State Building.
To assist them in their attempt, Russian space suit manufacturer Zvezda, has been advising them and building their suits. The Russian spacesuits are tailored for the complicated environments the mission will encounter including sun and shade, dramatic changes in temperature and the need for flexibility.
The ascent will be made with an open flight deck and their suits will have to protect them from the elements. The whole trip is expected to last 12 hours.
The spacesuits make the mission possible, by supplying pure oxygen to breathe and maintaining a constant pressure. The crew will remain seated all the time. The base of the platform includes crumple zones to absorb the impact of a normal or emergency landing, with Andy and Colin protected above.
Above about 40,000 feet a pressurized suit is essential. At that altitude breathing 100% oxygen is no longer sufficient to support life, because the partial pressure in the lungs is low enough that the body cannot absorb enough of the gas to maintain its functions. An individual would quickly suffer from hypoxia and ultimately die.
At about 63,000 feet, the ambient air pressure is so low, theoretically blood will boil. Prescot and Elson plan to go almost twice that high.
Dr. Richard Crowther, of QinetiQ, told BBC News Online: "The environment that Andy and Colin will encounter will be similar in terms of atmosphere, temperature and pressure to the surface of Mars."
military intelligence and the mysteries of Ancient Egypt.
(by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince)
The Stargate Conspiracy exposes the most insidious, disturbing - and successful - mass manipulation of our times. Designed to bring us, hearts, minds and souls under the total control of the conspirators, this sinister programme has ruthlessly exploiting our New Age cravings for signs and wonders - even hijacking the predicted return of ancient gods.
The Conspiracy...
Its central focus is the belief that the gods of the ancient world were extraterrestrials who created and civilised the human race, that they're back - and that, communicating through special chosen ones, they are actively directing the way we think.
However, The Stargate Conspiracy reveals that this romantic and exciting scenario was in fact the brainchild of the West's most powerful intellectual agencies. Designed to become a new religion for the 21st century, its real purpose is political - to make us easier to control.
Centred on the search for lost secrets of the pyramid builders, this extraordinary true story reveals the links between US scientific intelligence agencies, Mars and ancient Egypt. For almost 50 years, like Frankenstein's monster, this conspiracy has been put together from cultish - but astonishingly powerful - belief systems, culminating in the emergence of a new fundamentalism that is gathering strength by feeding on Millennium fever.
Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince reveal the secret agenda that unites apparently independent authors and researchers - including top names with millions of readers worldwide - and which is targeted to all of us. The Stargate Conspiracy reveals that even the genuine mysteries of the gods themselves have been hijacked by powerful cabals - which include top industrialists, politicians, scientists and intelligence agencies such as MI5 and the CIA - in order to fulfill their secret agenda. At the heart of this conspiracy is the belief that the ancient Egyptian gods were - and are - extra terrestrial beings, that certain key people are in contact with them, and that they are about to return through the 'stargate' between our world and theirs.
Are we prepared for the imminent return of the gods? And will we be expected unquestioningly to accept the conspirators as our spokesmen? Or is this an exercise in mass manipulation designed to make us support the conspirators? As they calculatedly whip up Millennium fever, triumphantly persuading us that they alone know how to talk to the gods, this book serves as a serious warning to mankind.
The Main Points:
*Over the last few years, the public has come to accept specific ideas about the 'message' of ancient Egypt, largely due to the works of certain high-profile authors. But we demonstrate that many of the principles of this 'New Egyptology' are not only based on false-premises, but have also been used by others as part of a secret long-term agenda.
*We reveal the shadowy presence of US government agencies behind the current interest in the Giza plateau.
*An essential part of this plot is the alleged link between ancient Egypt and a lost civilisation on Mars, based on the discovery of supposedly artificial features on that planet. We show that this view is seriously flawed, and that the intelligence agencies are actively encouraging the promotion of a meaningful Egypt-Mars connection.
*We show that key people in the promotion of the 'message' of Egypt and Mars are involved in a cultish cabal who believes they are in direct contact with extraterrestrial intelligences from Sirius who claim to be the gods of ancient Egypt. This group, which has existed for almost fifty years, has included many famous names, multimillionaires and cutting-edge scientists. It has also, disturbingly, had a profound influence on the decision-making of certain world leaders...
*The Stargate Conspiracy reveals that this group was in fact cynically and deliberately manipulated from the first by the CIA - and that this programme is ongoing.
*We trace the inspiration for the conspiracy back to the ideology of certain extreme right-wing occult movements of the 19th and 20th centuries.
*We conclude that the conspirators are deliberately harnessing the most profound and cherished beliefs of today's society - from fundamentalist Christianity and the 'message' of ancient civilisations to the alien abduction scenario - to create a new, more widely acceptable religion for the post-Millennial West. We reveal that, underlying the apparently acceptable tenets of this religion is an insidious right-wing ideology., the true danger lurking inside the Trojan Horse of its New Age image.
*However, even though the manipulators have abused and hijacked the ancient Egyptian mysteries for their own ends, that does not mean that there are no such mysteries.
We reveal the ground-breaking research that provides a plausible answer to the most enduring questions about the ancient Egyptians' achievements and beliefs - and, explosively, uncover the true nature of the gods themselves... "
"This second generation of Star Wars characters all sound like Keanu Reeves delivering a soliloquy from Hamlet. Alas, poor Star Wars, I knew it well."
color=#cc0000>Coneheads
color=#cc0000>Fatheads