Western European News Digest
Italian Weekly Features LaRouche on 9/11 Comm'n and Cheney
The latest issue of Rinascità, the official weekly of the Party of Italian Communists (PdCI), devoted its entire three-page foreign news section to two articles by Paolo Raimondi, president of the LaRouche-associated Movimento Solidarietà, on the staff report from the 9/11 Commission. The main article, under the title "The Sept. 11 Commission, the Watergate of Cheney," reports the staff findings from the Commission, several New York Times articles, and Cheney's subsequent hysteria, and then identifies Lyndon LaRouche as the initiator of the anti-Cheney campaign, starting with the exposure of the role of Leo Strauss, student of Martin Heidegger and "Nazi Crown Jurist" Carl Schmitt, in creating the ideology of the neo-cons around Cheney and others.
The article also reports LaRouche's analysis, that the Bush-Cheney insistence that Iran and al-Qaeda had "contacts" may become dangerous for them, because it may put on the table the stories of past contacts between neo-con intelligence networks with Osama bin Laden, with Sheikh Rahman in Sudan, and of Donald Rumsfeld's role in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War, etc. The third page reports on the press conference given by the "Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change," opposing the war, with the EIR's questions and the relevant answers.
Blair's 'New Imperialism' Guru
Cambridge University Professor Corelli Barnet said in discussion with EIR June 29 that "Robert Cooper has very considerable influence over British Prime Minister Tony Blair, and represents a vast danger, with his idea of re-making the world, according to a 'new imperialism' blueprint."
"Cooper's influence is absolutely malign," Barnett stressed. "He's the guru who has inspired Blair. I have seen him on television, and he's one of these pompous, intellectually arrogant, and self-righteous types."
Barnett thought it likely, that the French would block Cooper's design, for "imperial expansion" of the European Union.
As for Blair, he said that Blair is "in considerable trouble, he's trying to put the issue of Iraq to bed, but he won't succeed. The problems faced by the neo-cons in the U.S., may only make things yet more difficult for Blair."
Barnet added: "The handover of power in Iraq is obviously phony, it's an effort to cover up for the fact that, in recent months, there has been a massive political and military defeat for Bush and the neo-cons," Barnett stressed. "Cheney's entire 2002-2003 policy, of avoiding the United Nations route, is being reversed. The United States has to turn back to the UN and 'old Europe,' in the form of NATO. But the French are ensuring that no real substance will be given to NATO's role in Iraq, so there is no resolution of transatlantic differences, and the deep suspicions remain."
Cheney Soon To Be Out of Work?
A well-informed continental European source raised the possibility of Vice President Dick Cheney's near-term departure, saying that there is a definite fin de regne (end of the kingdom) atmosphere in and around the Bush Administration, adding that he fully concurred, that a "Super-Watergate" process is now taking shape in the United States.
He affirmed: "Cheney has become too nervous, and too abusive, with what he did in the Senate last week. The Bush Administration is now, as I see it, in a fin de regne situation. In other words, it's end game. For the first time, I see a real possibility that we will soon see a new Number Two. It is now clear that Cheney has become counterproductive. There will likely be efforts to bring in a respectable Republican, to replace Cheney. The only question is, who would accept to serve under Bush?"
The source added, that a perception in Europe, that Bush is in deep trouble back home, was one factor, in ensuring that the past days' U.S.-European Union and NATO summits would achieve nothing of real content. "It all amounts to a softening of form, but nothing in terms of substance. There is an agreement to end the public bickering, but no movement occurred on substantial issues. The supposed role of NATO in Iraq amounts to nothing beyond training Iraqi troops, which is very nice, but does little to deal with the mess inside Iraq."
Blair-Brown Feud Exposed in New Biography
Ten Downing Street has tried to smooth over the row that broke out June 28, over the memoirs of Derek Scott, scheduled to be released in the fall, however, Scott has said that despite intense pressure, he refuses to edit out matters which Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown finds objectionable.
The book says that the "poison" from the big fights between Prime Minister tony Blair and chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown has "seeped into almost every office and corridor in Whitehall and Westminster and regularly blunted the progress made by the government." Blair is firing Brown supporters, and Brown is keeping secret key budget issues. Blair had considered kicking Brown out of the Treasury after the 2001 elections, but finally did not do so because of the "success" of Labour economic policy. As things get worse, with the Iraq disaster and the looming housing price bubble crisis, the infighting will get much worse.
UK Senior Clergy Condemn 'Enormity' of Prisoner Abuse
In a private letter, to Prime Minister Tony Blair, leaked to The Times, and reported on BBC June 30, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, Dr. Rowan Williams and Dr. David Hope, warned Blair that, in the difficult times ahead in Iraq, "the credibility of coalition partners in advocating respect for the law and the peaceful resolution of disputes will, we fear, be undermined unless the necessary moral authority is clearly demonstrated at every level...."
The letter continued: "It is clear that the apparent breach of international law in relation to the treatment of Iraqi detainees has been deeply damaging. The appearance of double standards inevitably diminishes the credibility of Western governments with the people of Iraq and of the Islamic world more generally.
"More fundamentally still, there is a wider risk to our own integrity if we no longer experience a sense of moral shock at the enormity of what appears to have been inflicted on those who were in the custody of western security forces."
The letter was written after the annual meeting of the 114 bishops of the Church of England earlier in June, where Iraq and Israel-Palestine were discussed. The bishops wanted, the letter said, to "put on record" to Blair what they discussed.
Western nations must be "tenacious in our commitment to the Geneva Convention and other relevant international agreements," the letter said.
New Study Shows Poverty Worsening in Britain
A study by Sheffield University, using census data from 1991 and 2001, found a growing split between the south, which is basically "greater London," and the post-industrial north, the Telegraph reported June 30.
The reason for this national split is the wild expansion of the financial sector in London and the South over the past 10 years. Now, 1.7 million more people work in banking and finance than 10 years ago. But overall in Britain, more households became poorer over this decade, from 21% to 24%. Skilled trade workers, especially in the north, suffered the biggest decline in work of any sector: the loss of 500,000 jobs! Most northern big cities have lost population, from 3% in Birmingham to 10% in Manchester. Employment in energy, water, agriculture, mining, forestry and fishing have all fallen. "The UK no longer manufactures for the rest of the world, but is one of the world's key bankers and that sector is growing rapidly," says the report.
Report co-author Prof. Daniel Dorling said that Britain is being "split in half.... To the south is the metropolis of Greater London, to the north and west is the 'archipelago of the provinces'city islands that appear to be slowly sinking demographically, socially and economically.... [The UK] is a kingdom united only by history, increasingly divided by its geography."
Despite its wealth, London also has extreme poverty, Dorling said, "probably the biggest concentration of the poorest in western Europe."
German Machine-Tool Output Shrinks; China Now Biggest Consumer
The German association of machine-tool producers, VDW issued June 29 its report for 2003, including key figures for the worldwide machine-tool sector. As German capital investments in general are shrinking, domestic consumption of machine tools plunged to 5.55 billion euro last year, a dramatic 22% decline from two years earlier. Due to relatively stable exports, the German machine tool production "only" fell by 14% within two years, reaching 8.83 billion euro in 2003.
One important aspect concerning the worldwide machine-tool sector, emphasized by the VDW, is the rapidly increasing role of China. For German machine-tool exporters, China has now, for the first time, become the leading trading partner. From January to April 2004, German machine-tool exports to China were again 70% higher than during the same period one year ago.
Domestic consumption of machine toolsa key measure for efforts to enhance industrial productivityhas slumped in the last two years in the entire G-7 world. In the U.S., machine-tool consumption between 2001 and 2003 crashed from 6.3 to 3.3 billion euros; in Japan from 6.3 to 4.5 billion euros; in Germany from 5.9 to 3.9 billion euros (all figures excluding parts and accessories). The Italian economy is now consuming almost as many machine tools per year (down to 2.9 from 3.4 billion euros) as the much larger U.S. economy. However at the same time, machine-tool demand is rising rapidly in China, to the effect that China has become the largest consumer of machine tools in the world (up from 5.3 to 5.8 billion euros).
Saxony's SPD Desperate To Boost Election Results
The Social Democratic Party of Saxony is desperately maneuvering to prevent dropping below 10% in September state elections. Saxony's Social Democrats are in a state of shock and despair after the disastrous June 13 European Parliament elections. The SPD there is uncertain it can keep the meagre 10% of the vote it got in the last elections.
The party faction around Thomas Jurk, chairman of the SPD state parliamentary group, staged a coup against state party chairwoman Constanze Krehl, at the SPD's convention on June 27, where she not only failed to get her candidates good spots on the SPD September election slate, but also failed to get more than 54% approval by the delegates. Krehl announced her resignation on June 28, and will most likely be replaced by Jurk, who got 84% approval for the post of vice chairman, at the Sunday convention.
But the reshuffle may be too late for a party that has failed to come up with a program and a message to voters, and which continues to refuse to come up with a program and a message: Opinion polls give the Saxony SPD 8%, even less, of the vote statewide, for the September elections.
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