Bulletin N° 866

“Hearts of the World”

https://youtu.be/1INgb1d0IFs

A 1918 American silent World War I propaganda film written, produced and directed by D. W. Griffith, whose stature and reputation for dramatic filmmaking attracted the British government to contact him in an effort to change the American public's neutral stance regarding the war.

Subject : The Capitalist Conspiracy, Part 3: The Topology of Crisis Formations for Guaranteed Capitalist Investments & The Flourishing “Anti-Terrorist” Market.

November 10, 2019

Grenoble, France

Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,

Puppeteers and ventriloquists have an advantage over the rest of us in that they are masters of illusion. The culture heroes of capitalism gain from this advantage, as well. And under the spell of their hegemony, we, the ordinary people, are doomed to repeat and play out the script that has been handed to us by the masters.

· How do we gain control over our lives in this context?

· By changing the context, of course!

Many years ago, I received an email from the late peace activist William Blum in which he included a short essay by Finnish journalist Per Fagereng, describing the conditions of a behavioral study that had been conducted on a colony of caged rats and commenting on the ethical implications of this laboratory experiment.

Dancing on the electric grid
by Per Fagereng

[Please see CEIMSA Bulletin N°472 @ http://www.ceimsa.org/archives/bull-472.html]

This essay illustrates the casual denial of the essential influence of specific context in developing human comprehension; even in the quest for scientific knowledge context is frequently ignored as an important factor that must contribute to our understanding. The result is cognitive dissonance: We get what we see, and it is usually a terrible distortion, often leading to unproductive interventions and illusions rather than productive knowledge.

Such is the subtext of the autobiography of German journalist Raimund Pretzel (1907-1999), whose nom de plume was Sebastian Haffner, author of Geschichte eines Deutschen. He began to write this book in 1939, while in exile in England, and it was published posthumously in 2000. The English edition, translated by his son, Oliver Pretzel, was first published in 2002, under the title, Defying Hitler: A Memoir [1914-1933].

Writing from abroad in 1939, Haffner begins the Prologue for his autobiography with a clear statement orienting the reader for what is to follow:

This is the story of a duel.

It is a duel between two very unequal adversaries: an exceedingly powerful, formidable and ruthless state and an insignificant, unknown private individual. The duel does not take place in what is commonly known as the sphere of politics; the individual is by no means a politician, still less a conspirator, or an enemy of the state. Throughout, he finds himself very much on the defensive. He only wishes to preserve what he considers his integrity, his private life and his personal honour. These are under constant attack by the Government of the country he live in, and by the most brutal, but often also clumsy, means.

With fearful menace the state demands that the individual give up his friends, abandon his lovers, renounce his beliefs and assume new, prescribed ones. He must use a new form of greeting, eat and drink in ways he does not fancy, employ his leisure in occupations he abhors, make himself available for activities he despises, and deny his past and his individuality. For all this, he must constantly express extreme enthusiasm and gratitude.

The individual is opposed to all of that, but he is ill prepared for the onslaught. He was not born a hero, still less a martyr. He is just an ordinary man with many weaknesses, having grown up in vulnerable times. He is nevertheless stubbornly antagonistic. So he enters into the duel – without enthusiasm, shrugging his shoulders but with a quiet determination not to yield. He is, of course, much weaker than his opponent, but rather more agile. You will see him duck and weave, dodge his foe and dart back, evading crushing blows by a whisker.

. . .

The state is the German Third Reich and I am the individual. Our fight may be interesting to watch, like any fight . . . , but I am not recounting it just for entertainment. There is another purpose, closer to my heart.

My private duel with the Third Reich is not an isolated encounter. Thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of such duels, in which an individual tries to defend his integrity and his personal honour against a formidable hostile state, have been fought in Germany during the last six years. Each is waged in total isolation and out of public view. Many of the duelists, greater heroes or martyrs by nature, have taken the fight further than I – as far as the concentration camp or the gallows – and may perhaps be honoured by a future monument. Others were defeated much earlier and are now silent grumblers in the ranks of SA reservists or NSV Blackwarts (block wardens).(pp.3-4)

Haffner was born into a comfortable middle-class household. His father was a civil servant in the prestigious Prussian state apparatus. He was educated to follow in his father's footsteps; then the bottom fell out during events in Berlin that led up to the Nazi seizure of power and his life became unsettled; he was facing challenges which his father had never been forced to confront. Somehow, the family held together, which allowed him to escape this inferno shortly before war broke out. He begins the description of his odyssey this way:

Even before the totalitarian state advanced on me with threats and challenges, and taught me what it meant to experience history in person, I had already lived through a fair number of ‘historical events’. All Europeans of the present generation can make that claim, and no one more so than the Germans.

Those events have naturally left their mark on me, as on all my compatriots. If one fails to appreciate this, one will not be able to understand what happened later. There is, however, an important difference between what happened before 1933 and what came afterwards. We watched the earlier events unfold. They occupied and excited us, sometimes they even killed one or other of us or ruined him; but they did not confront us with ultimate decisions of conscience. Our innermost being remained untouched. We gained experience, acquired convections, but remained basically the same people. However, no one who has, willingly or reluctantly, been caught up in the machine of the Third Reich can honestly say that of himself.

Clearly historical events have varying degrees of intensity. Some may almost fail to impinge on true reality, that is, on the central, most personal part of a person’s life. Others can wreak such havoc there that nothing is left standing. The usual way in which history is written fails to reveal this. ‘1890: Wilhelm II dismissed Bismarck.’ Certainly a key event in German history, but scarcely an event at all in the biography of any German outside its small circle of protagonists. Life went on as before. No family was torn apart, no friendship broke up, no one fled their country. Not even a rendezvous was missed or an opera performance cancelled. Those in love, whether happily or not, remained so; the poor remained poor, and the rich rich. Now compare that with ‘1933: Hindenburg send for Hitler.’ An earthquake shatters sixty-six million lives.

Official academic history has, as I said, nothing to tell us about the differences in intensity of historical occurrences. To learn about that, you must read biographies, not those of statesmen but the all too rare one of unknown individuals. There you will see that one historical event passes over the private (real) lives of people like a cloud over a lake. Nothing stirs, there is only a fleeting shadow. Another event ships up the lake as if in a thunderstorm. For a while it is scarcely recognizable. A third may, perhaps, drain t(he lake completely.

I believe history is misunderstood if this aspect is forgotten (and it usually is forgotten). So before I reach my proper theme, let me tell you my version of twenty years of German history – the history of Germany as a part of my private story. It will not take long, and it will make what follows easier to understand. (pp.6-7)

Haffner was seven years old when World War I started. His descriptions of the war years reflect the behavior of a precocious young student who was thoroughly indoctrinated by military propaganda. He memorized the names and statistics of famous military victories as they were posted daily in front of Berlin police stations. This child had every reason to believe that “his team” was winning the contest, and he was proud to belong to the winning side. When defeat became apparent - first to the housewives, then to the children – the military propaganda lost its magic. There was confusion and disappointment, which according to Haffner lead in two directions: some, like Hitler, sought an explanation for the German defeat in the idea of "betrayal", the enemy within; while others were struck with how easy it was to create a virtual reality and to convince the population with words that victory was at hand and that they all were heading for a better life. The former group committed themselves to entering politics for "revenge", so that the enemy within could be exposed and driven from their midst in preparation for the next war. The latter adopted the habit of skeptical thinking, not to be emotionally manipulated by words and symbols which were produced to secure power in the hands of a few over society.

When the hyperinflation hit Germany in 1923, Haffner was fifteen years old. He experienced the sudden inequality when some youth in his social milieu, who were but a few years older than him, came into unexpected wealth; the rest of the population reeled in abject poverty.

There was nothing really new in the devaluation of the mark. Even in 1920, the first cigarette I had secretly smoked had already cost fifty pfennigs. By the end of 1922, prices had gradually risen to between ten and a hundred times the pre-war peacetime level, and the dollar stood at about five hundred marks. This, however, had happened gradually. Wages, salaries, and prices in general had risen at the same pace. It was a bit inconvenient to work with the large numbers, but not overly difficult. Many people still spoke of it as a ‘rise in prices’. There were more exciting things to think about.

But the mark now went on the rampage. Soon after the beginning of the ‘Ruhr war’ [early rebellion against the French and Belgian military invasion of the industrial Ruhr River Valley that began in 1923; the military occupation ended 1925], the dollar shot to 20,000 marks, rested there for a time, jumped to 40,000, paused again and then, with small periodic fluctuations, coursed through the ten thousands and then the hundred thousands. No one quite knew how it happened. Rubbing our eyes, we followed its progress like some astonishing natural phenomenon. It became the topic of the day. Then, suddenly, looking around, we discovered that this phenomenon had devastated the fabric of our daily lives.

Anyone who had savings in a bank, bonds or ‘gilts’ [low-risk government bonds], saw their value disappear overnight. Soon it did not matter whether it was a penny put away for a rainy day or a vast fortune. Everything was obliterated. Many people quickly moved their investments only to find that it made no difference. Very soon it became clear that something had happened that forced everyone to forget about their savings and attend to a far more urgent matter.

The cost of living had begun to spiral out of control. Traders followed hard on the heels of the dollar. A pound of potatoes which yesterday had cost fifty thousad marks now cost a hundred thousand. The salary of sixty-five thousand marks brought home the previous Friday was no longer sufficient to buy a packet of cigarettes on Tuesday.

What was to be done? Casting around, people found a life-raft: ‘shares’. They were the only form of investment which kept pace – not all the time, and not all shares, yet on the whole they managed to keep up. So everyone dealt in shares. Every minor official, every employee, every shift-worker became a shareholder. Day-to-day purchases were paid for by selling shares. On wage days there was a general stampede to the banks, and share prices shot up like rockets. The banks were bloated with wealth. Obscure new ones sprouted up like mushrooms and did a roaring trade. Every day the entire population studied the stock-market listings. Sometimes some shares collapsed and thousands of people hurtled towards the abyss. In every shop, every factory, every school, share tips were whispered in one’s ear.

The old and unworldly had the worst of it. Many were driven to begging, many to suicide. The young and quick-witted did well. Overnight they became free, rich and independent. It was a situation in which mental inertia and reliance on past experience was punished by starvation and death, but rapid appraisal of new situations and speed of reaction was rewarded with sudden, vast riches. The twenty-one-year-old bank director appeared on the scene, and also the ‘sixth-former’ [the student in Britain between 16 and 18 years old, in his final two years of school, before entering the university] who earned his living from the stock-market tips of his slightly older friends. He wore Oscar Wilde ties, organized champagne parties, and supported his embarrassed father.

Amid all the misery, despair and poverty there was an air of light-headed youthfulness, licentiousness and a carnival atmosphere. No, for once, the young had money and the old did not. Moreover, its nature had changed. Its value lasted only a few hours. It was spent as never before or since; and not on the things old people spend their money on.

Bars and nightclubs opened in large numbers. Young couples whirled about the streets of the amusement quarters. It was like a Hollywood movie. Everyone was hectically, feverishly searching for love and seizing it without a second thought. Indeed, even love had assumed an inflationary character.

Unromantic love was the fashion: carefree, restless, light-hearted promiscuity. Typically, love affairs followed an extremely rapid course, without detours. The young who learned to love in those years eschewed romance and embraced cynicism. I myself and those of my age were not among them. At fifteen or sixteen we were a few years too young. In later years when we had to entertain our girlfriends with twenty-odd marks’ pocket money, we often secretly envied the older boys who had had their chance at this time. We only caught a glimpse through the keyhole, just enough to preserve a whiff of the perfume of the time forever in our nostrils. To us, it was thrilling to be taken by chance to a wild party; to experience a precocious, exhausting abandon and a slight hangover next day form too many cocktails; to listen to the older boys with their worn faces showing the traces of their dissolute nights; to experience the sudden transporting kiss of a girl in daring makeup . . .

There was another side to this picture. There were beggars everywhere and many reports of suicides in the papers. The poster columns were full of police ‘Wanted’ notices for burglars. Robbery and burglary occurred on a grand scale. Once I saw an old woman – perhaps I should say an old lady – seated on a bench in a park looking strangely blank and stiff. A little crowed gathered round her. ‘Dead,’ said someone. ‘Of starvation,’ said another. It did not surprise me particularly. At home, we also often went hungry.

Indeed, my father was one of those who did not, or did not wish to, understand the times, just as he had already refused to understand the war. He entrenched himself behind the maxim: ‘A Prussian official does not speculate’, and bought no shares. At the time I regarded that as extraordinarily narrow-minded and out of character, for he was one of the cleverest men I have known. Today I understand him better. In retrospect, I can sympathize with the disgust with which he rejected the ‘monstrous scandal’ and with the impatient contempt that lay behind the attitude that ‘what ought not to be, cannot be’. Alas, the practical result of such high-mindedness could degenerate into farce, and the farce would have turned to tragedy if it had not been for my mother, who adapted to the situation in her own way.

This is how the family of a high Prussian official lived from day to day. On the 31^st or 1^st of the month my father would receive his monthly salary, on which we depended for our survival. Bank balances and securities had long since become worthless. What the salary was worth was difficult to estimate; and its value change from month to month. One month a hindered million marks could be quite a substantial sum; a little while later five hundred milliards would be small change. In any case my father would first try to purchase a monthly pass for the underground as quickly as possible. That would at least enable him to get to his office and back, even though the underground involved considerable detours and waste of time . Then cheques would be written out for the rent and school fees, and in the afternoon the whole family went to the hairdresser’s . What was left was handed to my mother. Next day the entire family except for my father, but including the maid, would get up at four or five in the morning and go to the wholesale market by taxi. There, in a giant shopping spree, an Oberregierungsrat’s monthly salary would be spent on non-perishable foodstuffs in an hour. Giant cheeses, whole hams, stacks of tinned food and hundredweights of potatoes were piles into out taxi. If there was not enough room, the maid, with one of us to help, would get hold of a hand-cart. At about eight o’clock, before school began, we would return home, more or less provisioned for a month’s siege. And that was it. There was no more money for the rest of the month. A friendly baker gave us bread on credit. Otherwise we lived on potatoes, smoked or tinned food and soup cubes. Now and then there might be an unexpended supplementary payment, but it was quite common for us to be as poverty-stricken as the poorest of the poor for four weeks, not even able to afford a train ride or a newspaper. Putting aside money for such purposes would have been quite senseless. Within a few days the whole month’s salary would not have paid for a single tram ride. I cannot say what would have happened if some misfortune like a serious illness had befallen us.(pp.46-50)

. . .

In August 1923 the dollar reached a million. We read it with a slight gasp, as if it were the announcement of some spectacular record. A fortnight later, that had become insignificant. For, as if it had drawn new energy at the million mark, the dollar increased its pace ten-fold, and began to mount by a hundred million and milliards [by British measurement, thousands of millions] at a time. In September, a million marks no longer had any practical value, and a milliard [a thousand million] became the unit of payment. At the end of October, it was a billion [by British measurement, a million million]. By then terrible things had happened. The Reichsbank stopped printing notes. Its notes – 10 million? 100 million? – had not kept up with events. The dollar and price levels in general had anticipated them. There was no longer any usable currency. For some days trade came to a standstill, and in the poorer parts of the city the people resorted to force and plundered the groceries. The atmosphere became revolutionary once again.

. . .

Then something really unexpected did happen. The incredible fairy story began to circulate that there would soon be stable money again, and a little later, it materialized. Small, ugly, grey-green notes with ‘One Rentenmark’ written on them. When you offered them in payment for the first time, you waited in suspense to see what would happen. Nothing did. They were actually accepted, and you were handed your goods – goods worth a billion marks. The same thing happened the next day and the day after. Incredible.

The dollar stopped climbing, so did shares. And when one converted them into Rentenmarks, they were reduced to nothing, like everything else. So no one was left with anything. But wages and salaries were paid out in Rentenmarks, and some time later, wonder upon wonder, small change also appeared, solid bright coins. You could jingle them in your pockets and they even kept their value. On Thursday, you could still buy something for the money received on the previous Friday. The world was, after all, full of surprises.

A few weeks earlier, [Gustav] Stresemann had become Chancellor. Politics became much quieter. No one spoke any more of the decay of the Reich. Grumbling, the leaders returned to their hibernation. Many members deserted. One scarcely heard of any more missing persons. The saviours disappeared from the cities. Politics seemed to consist solely of a dispute among the parties as to who had discovered the Rentenmark. The nationalists said it was Helfferich, a Conservative deputy and former minister of the Kaiser. The Left hotly contradicted this: it was , they claimed a stalwart democrat and staunch republican, a certain Dr Schacht. [The Rentenmark was backed by the land used for agriculture and business. This land was mortgaged to support the new currency to the tune of 3.2 billion Goldmarks, based on the 1913 wealth charge which helped fund the war effort from 1914 to 1918. The Act creating the Rentenmark backed the currency by means of twice yearly payments, due in April and October, payable for five years. The exchange rate with the old mark was one to one trillion (10¹²) and with the US dollar, 4.2 to one.] This was a time after the Flood. Everything had been lost but the waters were receding. The older generation did not yet dare to harp upon the value of experience. [The emergency law of October 13 1923 gave the government the power the to issue decrees on financial and economic matters. [The Act creating the Rentenmark backed the currency by means of twice yearly payments on property, due in April and October, payable for five years. Although the Rentenmark was not initially legal tender, it was accepted by the population and its value was relatively stable. The Act prohibited the recently privatised Reichsbank from continuing to discount bills and the inflation of the Papiermark immediately stopped.] The young were a bit put out. Twenty-one-year-old bank directors began to look around for clerking jobs again, and ‘sixth-formers’ had to adjust to having twenty marks’ pocket-money. Of course, a few ‘victims of stabilisation’ committed suicide, but many more people peered timidly out of their holes and asked themselves if life was possible once more.

There was a feeling of ‘the morning after’ in the air, but also of relief. At Christmas, the whole of Berlin became a vast fair. Everything cost ten pfennigs, and everyone bought rattles, marzipan animals and other such things just to show that one could really buy something for ten pfennigs again, and perhaps also to forget the past year, indeed the past ten years, feel like a child once more.

All the shops had notices: ‘Peacetime prices’. For the first time since the war, it really felt like peace.(pp.51-55)

Chancellor Gustav Stresmann was assassinated on October 3, 1929, while walking in his Berlin neighborhood, and the German mark was soon returned to the gold standard, which was dominated by the US dollar. The Reichsmark became the new legal tender on August 30, 1924, equal in value to the Rentenmark. It was a return to a gold-backed currency. The last Rentenmarks were valid until 1948. The period of hyperinflation was brought to an end with strong government control over the privately owned, for-profit banks.

So it was. The ‘Stresemann era’ – the only genuine period of peace that my generation in Germany has experienced – had begun: a period of six years, from 1924 to 1929, during which Stresemann directed German policy from the foreign office. (p.56)

The micro-history of an ordinary German bourgeois Protestant Prussian who is caught up in the militarized industrial culture of early 20^th-century Europe is the story of individual survival in moments of catastrophic turmoil. Toward the end of his memoir, Haffner suggests some failures in German character structure, as compared to the English and the French, who enjoyed private activities like gardening, taking care of a pet, or simply appreciated excellent foods and wines. As for the Germans, on the other hand, he writes:

It is clear that there is something demonic, deeply dangerous, in this widely praised, harmless male comradeship. The Nazis knew what they were doing when they made it the normal way of life of an entire nation. And the Germans, with their lack of talent for individual life and happiness, were so dreadfully ready to submit to it, so willing and eager to exchange the delicate, hard-to-reach fruits of freedom for the juicy, swelling, close-at-hand intoxication of general, undiscriminating, vulgar comradeship.

It is said that the Germans are subjugated. That is only half true. They are also something else, something worse, for which they is no word: they are ‘comraded’, a dreadfully dangerous condition. They are under a spell. They live a drugged life in a dream world. They are terribly happy, but terribly demeaned; so self-satisfied, but so boundlessly loathsome, so proud and yet so despicable and inhuman. They think they are scaling high mountains, when in reality they are crawling through a swamp. As long as the spell lasts, there is almost no antidote.(p.236)

While personal testimonies such as this provide important information of subjective experiences and sometimes telling biases, it is important to keep in mind the central importance of “context”, a perspective without which very little can be comprehended beyond fleeting impressions and fashionable generalizations. Without the macro-history of cause and effect, which sets the stage for this massive social destruction, we find ourselves groping in the dark for any orientation as to where we are actually located in an event – each of us knows what is happening to him/herself (at least in moments of lucidity, we do) but our individual responses mostly are ineffectual, and sometimes they serve as a liability to our general well being, only worsening our collective situation. What is the context that has made us behave in a certain manner? This understanding is what Marx referred to a “class consciousness”: to know as much as you can about the class nature of the system that is controlling you and to speak about it to others living in a situation similar to your own, whether they are conscious of it or not.

The remarkable history of the capitalist competition described and analyzed by Gerry Docherty and Jim Macgregor in their book, Hidden History, The Secret Origins of the First World War (2013), is useful for identifying the habits of thought and practices of members of the ruling class which prepare them to compete against one another, and to eventually dominate society ruthlessly for both their private profit and for long-term access to these benefits – all at an unbelievably high cost to humanity. Without knowledge of this greater context - of historical events beyond our everyday experiences - we remain clueless, having no access to the Gestalt, a complete picture of our situation, of what makes us tick . . . .

The cultural hegemony of the ruling class is described here as a conspiracy of political elites, who have institutional support but go beyond the stated mission of their institutions, using deceit and demagogy to achieve an unsuspected consolidation of destructive power. This the authors call unapologetically “a conspiracy”.

Rhodes’ secret society grew steadily and became ever more sophisticated in the first decade of the twentieth century. Its aim of bringing the entire world under British influence remained paramount, and Milner’s Round Table associates travelled the globe to spread the gospel of the Empire. The great financiers and merchant bankers centered in the City, the financial and banking district of London, shared the vision of a single world power based on English ruling-class values. In his ‘Confession of Faith’, Rhodes had written of bringing the whole uncivilized world under British rule, and the ‘recovery’ of the United States to make the ‘Anglo-Saxon race but one Empire’, by which he meant a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant America working in tandem with like minds in England. Clearly the United States could not be ‘recovered’ by force of arms, so wealthy elites in America with a similar mindset would have to share in the control.

Rhodes Scholarships favoured American students with one hundred allocated there, two for each of the fifty states and territories, whereas a total of sixty were made available for the entire British Empire. The ‘best talents’ from the ‘best families’ were to be nurtured at Oxford University and imbued with an appreciation of ‘Englishness’ and the importance of the ‘retention of the unity of the Empire’. Rhodes recognized the opportunities on offer to those who possessed great wealth to control politics and governments, and his ambition was driven by an understanding that the markets could be used to ‘achieve political ends’. The world was entering an era of financial capitalism where wealthy investment bankers, the ‘money power’, were able to dominate both business and government if they had the concerted will to do so. This new money power seeped into the British Establishment and joined the aristocratic landowning families who had ruled Britain for centuries. Together, they formed the heart of the Secret Elite.

From 1870 onwards, London was the centre of Britain’s greatest export: money. Vast quantities of savings and earnings were gathered and invested at considerable profit through the international merchant banks of Rothschild, Baring, Lazard, and Morgan in the City. There, influence and investments crossed national boundaries and raised funds for governments and companies across the entire world. The great investment houses made billions, their political allies and agents grew wealthy, and the nascent British middle class was desperate to buy into a share of their success. Edward VII, both as king and earlier as Prince of Wales, swapped friendship and honours for the generous patronage of the Rothschilds, Cassel, and other Jewish banking families like the Montagus, Hirschs and Sassoons, and in so doing blew away much of the stigma of anti-Jewish bigotry inside British ‘society’. The Bank of England was completely in the hands of these powerful financiers, and the relationship went unchallenged.

The Secret Elite appreciated America’s vast potential and adjusted the concept of British race supremacy to Anglo-Saxon supremacy. Rhodes’s dream had only to be slightly modified. The world was to be united through the English-speaking nations in a federal structure based around Britain. Like Rhodes, Alfred Milner believed that this goal should be pursued by a secret political and economic elite influencing ‘journalistic, educational and propaganda agencies’ behind the scenes.

The flow of money into the United States during the nineteenth century advanced industrial development to the immense benefit of the millionaires it created: Rockefeller, Carnegie, Morgan,Vanderbilt and their associates. The Rothschilds represented British interests, either directly through front companies or indirectly through agencies that they controlled. Railroads, steel, shipbuilding, contraction, oil and finance blossomed in an often cut-throat environment, though that was more apparent than real. These small groups of massively rich individuals on both sides of the Atlantic knew one another well and the Secret Elite in London initiated a very select and secretive dining club, the Pilgrims, that brought them together on a regular basis.(pp.210-211)

. . .

Within a short period of time they created an American version of what Carroll Quigley termed the triple front penetration of politics, the press and education. The Pilgrims Society brought together American money and British aristocracy, royalty, presidents and diplomatic representatives. It was indeed a special relationship.

Of all the American banking establishments, none was more Anglo centric than the J.P. Morgan bank, itself deeply involved with the Pilgrims. In the complex world of investment banking, the Morgan empire owed everything to a Massachusetts-born American, George Peabody, who set up a banking firm in London in 1835 to deal with American railroad securities. He later recruited a fellow American Junius Morgan, father of J. P. Morgan, as a partner in the venture, but they faced ruin when a run on the banks in 1857 almost bankrupted the company. Though rivals were keen to drive the firm out of business, a massive £800,000 loan from the Bank of England, which would have a current equivalence of half a billion pounds, saw them emerge with enhanced reputation. Nathaniel Rothschild had developed a close relationship with George Peabody, and he in turn proved to be a loyal and grateful friend. The crisis claimed four banks, yet Peaody, Morgan abnd Company was saved. Why? Who initiated the rescue? The Rothschilds held immense sway in the Bank of England and the most likely answer is that they intervened to save the firm. Peabody retiree in 1864, and Junius Morgan inherited a strong bank with powerful links to Rothschild.

The question to be asked is what the Rothschilds had to gain by such acts of generosity? Their rescue packages for failing banks or companies always came at a price. Once saved, the concern would be allowed to continue trading under its old name, and usually with its previous owners and directors, but henceforth it would act as a front company for the Rothschild dynasty. It would move securities, trade on stock markets, front deals and buy up other companies under the old retained name, and few would know that the Rothschilds were the real purchasing power behind them. When Baring Bank faced similar collapse in 1890, Nathaniel Rosthschild headed the emergency committee of the Bank of England. He not only donated £500,000 directly but through his cousin, Baron de Rothschild, persuaded the Bank of France to contribute £3 million in gold to stave off the crisis. There can be no doubt that by the early twentieth century numerous major banks, including J.P. Morgan and Barings, and armament firms, were beholden to or fronts for the Rothschilds.

. . .

It was the perfect front. J. P. Morgan, who posed as an upright Protestant guardian of capitalism, who could trace his family roots to pre-Revolutionary times, acted in the interests of the London Rothschilds and shielded their American profits from the poison of anti-Semitism. In 1895, the Rothschilds secretly replenished the US gold reserves through J. P. Morgan and raised him to the premier league of international banking. In turn, his gratitude was extended to another Rothschild favourite and one of the most powerful men in England, Alfred Milner. In 1901, Morgan offered Milner a then massive income of $100,000 per annum to become a partner in the London branch of J. P. Morgan, but Milner was not to be distracted from the vital business of the Boer War. J. P. Morgan became the Empire loyalist at the heart of the American Establishment. (pp.212-214)

Well before the turn of the 20^th century, write the authors of Hidden History, major international bankers planned to consolidate their grip on America by setting up a central bank that, like the European central banks, would be privately owned, for-profit enterprises completely independent of government restrictions.

Official Rothschild biographers would have us believe that Rothschild interest in America was limited and that the American Civil War led to ‘a permanent decline in the Rothschilds’ transatlantic influence’. All our evidence points in the opposite direction. Their associates, agents and front companies permeated American finance and industry. Their influence was literally everywhere.

. . .

The problem facing the money power was that banks and bankers were not popular with the ordinary citizens in the United States, and there was widespread public antipathy towards a central bank. The Secret Elite’s solution was to deliberately create a banking crisis that would frighten the populace into accepting banking reforms.(p.216-217)

The Knickerbrocker Bank served this purpose and J.P. Morgan proceeded to manufacture a national banking crisis in 1907.

Having caused the crash, Morgan took personal charge of reversing it, though he was neither elected nor appointed to the task. In so doing, he assumed the mantle of savior of the American banking system. With the government’s approval, Morgan browbeat bankers and Trust company presidents into contributing to the rescue package. Rothschild hailed Morgan as ‘a man of wonderful resources. His latest action fills one with admiration and respect for him. It was a vote of approval from the boss of bosses to one of his trusted lieutenants.

The panic of 1907 ran like a true Rothschild scam, orchestrated by Morgan to ‘prove’ the absolute necessity of a central bank. Something had to be done. The Senate was warned: ‘we may not always have Pierpont Morgan with us to meet the banking crisis’. Thereafter, the establishment of a central bank was presented as the solution to avert future financial crises.(pp.217-218)

Did a Secret Elite really conspire to control the world through a concentration of financial power? How does such a theory fair in the broad daylight of examination? Is it another simplistic fantasy that falls apart under examination, or can it be substantially supported by facts, despite the systematic and massive destruction of documents in archives around the world following the First World War? [See pp. 357-361, for a description of the future US persident Herbert Hoover’s role in removing documentary evidence of the Secret Elite's complex machinations since the Boer War of 1899-1902 in precipitating the First World War (1914-1918), to crush German imperial competition.]

According to the late Georgetown University Professor, Carroll Quigley, these international bankers sought,

nothing less than to create a world system of monetary control in private hands, able to dominate the political system of each country and thus the economy of the world as a whole.(p.219)

What we see in this period before the First World War is a consolidation of private, for-profit international banking interests, as had never existed before.

Contrary to widespread belief, the Bank of England was not a public institution but was operated and controlled by bankers such as the Rothschilds and brooked no semblance of political interference. In France, there was a more complex system of seniority and stability, where a number of traditional banking families were considered part of an elite Haute Banque that in turn controlled the Bank of France. Two dominant private French banking firms, Rothschild and Mirabaud, were more powerful than all the others put together. In Germany, the Reichsbank was a private institution with the power to print money but was much more directly under the control of the government than either the Bank of England or the Bank of France. The money power in New York wanted the same control that the bankers in England and France enjoyed: namely, freedom from government interference, the right to print money, control of rates of interest and to stay safely anonymous behind an executive appointed by themselves.(p.219)

The manufactured economic depression of 1907 was one tactic to achieve this goal. After the crisis and J.P. Morgan’s “heroic” efforts to save the American economy, the next step was to establish a private, for-profit central bank in the U.S. to watch over the US fiscal system and prevent future depressions. The US population was skeptical of such an arrangement, and in the presidential election of 1912, Republican incumbent William Taft was opposed to the creation of a Central Bank. The machinations of the Secret Elite came immediately into play to dump Taft.

Rarely has there ever been such a concerted and focused effort to remove a Republican president from office and replace him with a Democrat Party-puppet. Sponsored by Cleveland H. Dodge, director of Rockefeller’s National City Bank, and a friend of both Rockefeller and Morgan; Woodrow Wilson was thrust into the presidential race in 1912. The money power opened a campaign office for him at 42 Broadway, and over two-thirds of his campaign funds came directly from Wall Street. Wilson lied about his politics during the campaign and betrayed the Democratic heritage of Presidents Jefferson and Jackson by courting the bankers and representing their interests. His public utterances were a masterclass in hypocrisy. He campaigned in 1912 under the banner of ‘New Freedom’ and opposition to monopoly powers, yet within a year had given the banks exactly that.

No matter the extent of financial backing, Wilson could never have defeated a popular president like Taft without devious tactics crafted by his political puppet-masters. Clear favourite for a second term in office, Taft’s chance of success was seriously undermined when another Republican, former president Theodore Roosevelt, entered the race. Financed by Morgan’s associates in Wall Street, Roosevelt created a third force, the ‘Bull-Moose’ Party, from thin air and effectively split the Republican vote. While the Morgan team were destroying Taft’s chance of victory, Paul Warburg and Jacob Schiff completed the pincer movement by backing Wilson and ensuring his election. Wilson won with 42 per cent of the votes cast, Roosevelt took 27 per cent while Taft could only muster 23 per cent. The remainder went to the socialist candidate Eugene Debs. The Republicans were also routed in the Senate elections, where the Democrats emerges with a clear majority.

Not only did the money power put their man in the White House, they also gave him a minder, Edward Mandell House, a ‘British-trained political operative’. Woodrow Wilson was president of the united States but this shadowy figure stood by his side, controlling his every move.(pp.221-222)

On December 23 1913, the infamous Glass-Owen Bill, which was a slightly modified version of the Aldrich Bill that had been rejected by a Republican majority under President Taft two years earlier, was passed by the Senate. As planned by the Secret Elite at their Jekyll Island meeting, off the coast of Georgia - a secret meeting organized by Senator Nelson Aldrich (Republican from Rhode Island), to begin on the evening of November 22, 1910, with a guest list that included Abram Piatt Andrew, assistant secretary of the Treasury; Henry P. Davison, a business partner of Morgan's; Charles D. Norton, president of the First National Bank of New York; Benjamin Strong, another Morgan friend and the head of Bankers Trust; Frank A. Vanderlip, president of the National City Bank; and Paul M. Warburg, a partner in Kuhn, Loeb & Co. and a German citizen. The 1913 Bill that was passed by the Democrat majority in the Senate and signed into law by President Wilson provided for:

the establishment of Federal Reserve banks, for furnishing an elastic currency, affording measures of rediscounting commercial paper, and to establish a more effective banking system in the United States and for other purposes.(p.222)

The method and the purpose of the creation of the US Central Bank is described as follows by Docherty and Macgregor:

The bill was rushed through the Senate on Tuesday night before Christmas 1913, signed quickly by the compliant President Wilson, and legally in place as an act of Congress before the morning newspapers hit the streets. Most importantly, by clever sleight-of-hand political maneuvering, it was precisely the opposite of what the public had been promised.

What impact did this have on the well-coordinated Secret Elite plans for war? What did it matter if the richest economy in the world gifted control of its money supply to its major private bankers? Wars require to be financed and cost immense sums of money. In Britain, France, Russia and Germany the national coffers were almost bare. Outrageous spending on armaments and growing indebtedness had left virtually every treasury in Europe dangerously close to empty. A new source of funding was required, a supply of money that could expand in line with the demand of desperate nations willing to pay handsomely for massive loans. Now that was something that a US central bank, unfettered by government control, responding to unlimited demand, could do. The Federal Reserve Act was passed in December 1913, and the seven-man board took office on 10 August 1914 . . . . (p.223)

The authors then sum up this portion of their of their exposé:

Consider the last two chapters [chapters 16 & 17] and ponder this significance. By February 1913, two major powers , the United States and France, had new presidents who were elected to office through the machinations of the Secret Elite. Woodrow Wilson had been elevated to the presidency of America by the money power in the United States. Raymond Poincaré’s election was likewise paid for by bribery and corruption funded through bankers and financiers in London and Paris. The Secret Elite had positioned key players in the governments of Britain, France, Russia and the Unites States. Politics, money and power were the pillars on which the Anglo-Saxon elite would destroy Germany and take control of the world.(pp.223-224)

The 21 + items below contain contemporary articles and essays that serve to illustrate the context of our lives today. Both the ruling classes and the oppressed have been made to feel an urgency by the series of crises we are now witnessing. Never has it been of more paramount importance to understand the specific class interests at play, and to decide which side we are on in this theater of the macabre. For this, we need access to reliable information which today is a scarce commodity. Nevertheless, public discussions relating the particular to the general can only strengthen our relationships with one another, a real necessity in the hard times ahead.

Sincerely,

Francis Feeley

---

Professeur honoraire de l'Université Grenoble-Alpes
Ancien Directeur des Researches
Université de Paris-Nanterre
Director of The Center for the Advanced Study
of American Institutions and Social Movements
(CEIMSA-in-Exile)
The University of California-San Diego
http://www.ceimsa.org

a.

Fed Secretly Bailing Out Banking System AGAIN!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRQecD-Gopg&feature=youtu.be

with Jimmy Dore

+

The Fed's monetary juice has tied directly to the rise in stocks

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/07/the-feds-monetary-juice-has-tied-directly-to-the-rise-in-stocks.html

by Jeff Cox

+

‘Sawing off the branch it’s sitting on’:

US has itself to blame for dollar collapse – Keiser Report

https://www.rt.com/business/472295-us-dollar-russia-china-gold/

+

A ‘growing club’ of ‘very powerful countries’ is steering away

from using the dollar

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52472.htm

by Eustance Huang

+

Nobody Gets Liberated Until the Defeat of the Plutocrats – Black Agenda Report

https://www.blackagendareport.com/nobody-gets-liberated-until-defeat-plutocrats

by Glenn Ford

===========

b.

Vigil to Free Julian Assange & Chelsea Manning, NYC

https://mailchi.mp/cff69a2fc24f/thus-nov-7-vigil-to-free-julian-assange-and-chelsea-manning?e=0e90ee3dff

+

Julian Assange spying: UK blocks Spanish judge from questioning Julian Assange over spying allegations

https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/10/23/inenglish/1571817241_796975.html

+

JOHN PILGER: Did This Happen in the Home of the Magna Carta?

https://consortiumnews.com/2019/10/25/john-pilger-did-this-happen-in-the-home-of-the-magna-carta/

+

Australian Greens member demands party leader defend Julian Assange - World Socialist Web Site

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/11/07/lett-n07.html

+

Chris Williamson MP- “Julian Assange's Persecution is of INTERNATIONAL IMPORTANCE!”

https://youtu.be/34Q62f3bqy0

+

Exclusive: Gov’t official reveals why Assange was jailed

https://youtu.be/jHVP33Myzmw

+

Assange 'may die in jail', father warns

https://news.yahoo.com/assange-may-die-jail-father-warns-165954491.html?guccounter=1

+

News From Underground

From: Mark Crispin Miller
Sent: Saturday, 14 July, 2018
Subject: [MCM] How "our free press" is really state-controlled (as is the so-called "left"): MCM on the plight of Julian Assange

I did this half-hour interview with Cass Fairbanks on Saturday, July 7, 2018:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j09Vk8qth1Y

And here are links to all last weekend's interviews with Julian's defenders:

PART ONE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHdOmRVwnAM

INTERVIEW #1         6:12 - 50:25        Ross Cameron (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #2    1:03:05 - 1:51:00     Graham Elwood (Host: Cassandra Fairbanks)
INTERVIEW #3    1:53:50 - 2:58:37     Kim Dotcom (Host: Cassandra Fairbanks)
INTERVIEW #4    3:19:46 - 3:49:44     Mark Crispin Miller (Host: Cassandra Fairbanks)
INTERVIEW #5    3:57:35 - 4:55:26     Daniel Ellsberg (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #6    5:00:55 - 5:52:09     Tim Black (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #7    5:56:08 - 6:49:24     Mark Sleboda (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #8    7:05:30 - 7:52:20     Peter Van Buren (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #9    7:56:15 - 8:49:30     Niko House (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #10  8:55:46 - 9:54:00     Scott Horton (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #11  9:58:00 - 10:53:25   David Swanson (Host: Suzie Dawson)

PART TWO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQkYoyP6fwE

INTERVIEW #12       4:06 - 56:10       Ray McGovern (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #13  1:06:35 - 1:59:25    Dmitry Babich (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #14  2:06:26 - 2:54:15    Lee Stranahan (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #15  3:01:26 - 3:57:14    H.A. Goodman (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #16  3:57:23 - 4:50:32    Caitlin Johnstone (Host: Suzie Dawson)

PART THREE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHvNmrcowHU

INTERVIEW #17      40:55 - 1:30:35         Felicity Ruby (Host: Tim Foley)
INTERVIEW #18   1:34:04 - 2:32:46         Dame Cathy Vogan (Host: Tim Foley)
INTERVIEW #19   2:36:45 - 3:41:45         Slavoj Zizek (Host: Tim Foley)
INTERVIEW #20   3:44:45 - 4:20:56         Craig Murray (Host: Tim Foley)
INTERVIEW #21   4:38:44 - 5:34:32         Simon Floth (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #22   5:37:30 - 6:26:30         Bill Binney (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #23   6:35:22 - 7:30:20         Ciaron O’Reilly (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)

PART FOUR: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWtGnaRHBa0

INTERVIEW #24      17:30 - 1:11:33         Ron Placone (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #25   1:16:08 - 2:08:45         Kevin Zeese (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #26   2:13:30 - 3:09:50         Cynthia McKinney (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #27   3:14:46 - 4:09:35         George Galloway (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #28   4:23:05 - 5:11:33         Jamarl Thomas (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #29   5:17:15 - 5:47:07         Cassandra Fairbanks (Host: Elizabeth Lea Vos)
INTERVIEW #30   5:55:38 - 6:18:13         Alistair Thompson (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #31   6:40:04 - 7:11:53         Cian Westmoreland (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #32:  7:20:55 - 8:17:05         Chris Hedges (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #33   8:26:44 - 9:12:47         Mehdi Taileb (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #34   9:20:00 - 10:22:54       Vivian Kubrick (Host: Suzie Dawson)
INTERVIEW #35 10:22:55 - 11:13:23       Father Dave (Host: Suzie Dawson) 

===========

c.

Suicide Has Been Deadlier Than Combat for the Military

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/01/opinion/military-suicides.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_191102?campaign_id=2&instance_id=13524&segment_id=18459&user_id=c033ace0cafd4e382df6ea2372e519e5&regi_id=301006721102

by Carol Giacomo

The Pentagon has made strides in helping those in need, but the rate of deaths is rising.

+

EU should fear the jihadists it’s backing in Syria, not refugees – Assad to RT

https://subscribe.rt.com/preview/1diDFJ

In an exclusive interview with RT’s Afshin Rattansi, Syrian President Bashar Assad said it’s hypocrisy for European nations to fear that Ankara will send refugees to Europe, but continue to sponsor terrorism in Syria.

+

We are experiencing brain death of NATO, Macron warns Europe

https://www.rt.com/news/472835-macron-nato-brain-dead/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Email

===========

d.

From: Lindsay Meiman - 350.org [mailto:350@350.org]
Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2019
Subject: Rex Tillerson just testified in court

350.org

Francis,

Just now, at the New York County Supreme Court, former Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson spewed more deception claiming Exxon executives took the risks of climate change seriously, yet, in the same breath, denied the need to keep fossil fuels in the ground.

This comes during the second week of the People of NY v. ExxonMobil trial, where state Attorney General Letitia James -- both the first woman and the first Black NY attorney general -- has brought Exxon to court for lying to its shareholders about the dangers of climate change and using two sets of books accounting climate-related risks.

Absurdly, during his tenure at Exxon, Rex had a secret alias: Wayne Tracker. Tillerson used his Wayne Tracker pseudonym to communicate all things related to climate change. He then left his Exxon post to serve as Trump’s Secretary of State before getting the boot from the increasingly oily and corrupt administration. This guy is as shady as it gets.

Over 50 of us showed up on the trial’s opening day to bring a loud and clear message:
#ExxonKnew and it’s time to #MakeThemPay.
Photo: Erik Larson, Bloomberg

Here in New York, and around the world, we’re hustling to make sure it’s people like Rex Tillerson -- not our communities -- who pay for the care and repair that comes with climate chaos.

The NY v. Exxon case is historic but the fight to hold fossil fuel billionaires accountable doesn’t end with the outcomes of this trial. It’s going to take all of us, using every tool we have -- from litigation and lawsuits to Congressional sit-ins and local organizing, and beyond -- to make sure the likes of Exxon and Rex Tillerson pay for their lies and destruction.

As we commemorate the seventh anniversary of Superstorm Sandy, and wildfires rage through California and the West, my resolve to hold the likes of Exxon accountable is only getting stronger.

To keep fighting this fight we need support from people like you who oppose the greed and destruction of ExxonMobil and the fossil fuel billionaires like Rex Tillerson. Can you contribute to this work today?

In solidarity, 
Lindsay
_____________________

References:
Inside Climate News, Exxon and Oil Sands Go on Trial in New York Climate Fraud Case, 17 October 2019.
The Guardian, Rex Tillerson used email alias at Exxon to discuss climate, says New York AG, 14 March 2017.
LA Times, What Exxon knew about the Earth's melting Arctic, 9 October 2015.

---

350.org is building a global climate movement. You can connect with us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and text 350 to 83224 to get important mobile action alerts. Become a sustaining donor to keep this movement strong and growing. Looking for other ways to get involved? Check out our map to see if there's a local 350 group or event near you.

+

From: Mark Crispin Miller
Sent: Saturday, November 02, 2019
Subject: [MCM] Extinction Rebellion activists [sic] were paid over $500 per week to "shut down" Britain

News From Underground

According to the documents reported by the Daily Mail, George Soros was the bagman for this 

"protest," as he was for the US coup in Ukraine five years ago.

This confirms that Extinction Rebellion—which is thrilling countless liberals and progressives

(including several of my friends)—is just so much "green" astroturf, like Greta Thunberg's "movement."

MCM

Extinction Rebellion Climate Activists Paid Over $500 Per Week

by George Soros to ‘Shut Down’ Britain

https://needtoknow.news/2019/10/extinction-rebellion-climate-activists-paid-over-500-per-week-by-george-soros-to-shut-down-britain/

In the past week, over 1,300 arrests were made involving members of the Extinction Rebellion, a climate-change-alarmist group

that is critical of the West and has blocked roads and shut down a London airport. George Soros is among the high-profile donors

to this group. The Mail on Sunday revealed documents showing that activists have been paid over $88,000 during a four-month

span and more than $253,000 since the founding of the group. Extinction Rebellion’s finances have come under scrutiny as the

group has paid no taxes on the money it has paid to its activist members. [These so-called activists are paid actors. You don’t have

to pay people to support a cause in which they truly believe. It’s all political theater, folks.] -GEG

+

French yellow vests hold national assembly to debate

'future of the movement'

https://www.thelocal.fr/20191102/french-yellow-vests-hold-national-assembly-to-debate-future-of-the-movement

+

Macron crisis: Key yellow vest figures demand Macron meeting ahead of Nov 17 anniversary

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1197346/macron-news-france-protests-yellow-vest-protest-emmanuel-macron

+

"Europe in decline, here’s why"

https://youtu.be/bjCfgyZJW8A

with Richard Wolff

===========

e.

Trump Reveals Plans for Nationwide Crackdown,

More Militarized Police

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trump-reveals-plans-for-nationwide-crackdown-and-more-militarized-police/

+

Max Blumenthal's Arrest Exposes the Limits of Press Freedom

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/max-blumenthals-arrest-exposes-the-limits-of-press-freedom/

+

Youth suicide rate skyrockets in the US:

A symptom of a rotting social order

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/10/24/suic-o24.html

===========

f.

From: Medea Benjamin, CODEPINK [mailto:info@codepink.org]
Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2019
Subject: Stop Creating More Baghdadis

Dear francis,

Over the weekend the news broke that Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed in a US raid in Syria. The US might be good at killing terrorists, but we are even better at creating them. The US invasion of Iraq led to the creation of ISIS. The ongoing presence of US troops in the Middle East, including the killing of civilians, creates a desire for revenge. So does US support for repressive regimes like Saudi Arabia.

Right now, we have a chance, in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) to send a clear message to Donald Trump that we are serious about ending war. In crafting its version of the NDAA, the House passed amendments to stop the war in Yemen, prevent a war with Iran, block weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, and repeal the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) against Iraq. But Republicans in the Senate plan to pull out all of these provisions and instead pass a “skinny” NDAA with billions to the Pentagon and nothing to address our reckless and destructive foreign policy. Send a message now to Congress telling them they must ensure amendments #339, #270, #419, #473, and #35 are included in the final NDAA.

It should come as no surprise to you that when Donald Trump says he wants to “end the endless wars,” he is lying. Trump vetoes congressional bills to end US support for the war in Yemen because he wants to keep selling weapons to the Saudis. In May 2018, he pulled out of the landmark Iran nuclear deal, placing the US on the brink of another disastrous Middle East war. He continues to increase the enormous Pentagon budget. And he just announced that US troops will now stay in Syria — not to protect the Kurds but to protect the oil fields. He even announced his interest in making a deal with ExxonMobil to extract the oil.

It’s time for Congress to lay down the law. The House has voiced its opposition to passing a “skinny” NDAA and yesterday Senator Jack Reed, the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, tweeted his support for NDAA amendments to end the war in Yemen. But we are far from being in the clear — word is that the Democrats will likely capitulate. That would mean a whopping $750 billion to the Pentagon with no accountability for all the death and destruction the US continues to cause.

The House-passed version of the NDAA is a clear and unequivocal rejection of unconstitutional and endless wars. Because the NDAA is “must-pass” legislation, it is one of the few places that we can have success at changing US foreign policy. If Congress passes the “skinny” NDAA, it will let Trump continue his reckless and destructive foreign policies. Take action now to tell Congress to follow the will of the people and prevent this from happening.

Towards peace,
Ann, Ariel, Caroline, Carley, Clara, Cody, Emily, Jodie, Leonardo, Maya, Mark, Medea, Megan, Michelle, Nancy, Paki, Rose, Teri, Tighe, and Zena

===========

g.

Footage leaked of Israeli officer shooting Palestinian in the back

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/03/footage-leaked-of-israeli-officer-shooting-palestinian-in-the-back

+

From: GAZA PALESTINE [mailto:anahona366@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, October 27, 2019
Subject: The life of a Palestinian young man is worth a little money .... Mohammed lost his left eye and may lose his second eye if he did not go out for treatment in a hospital outside Palestine ... If you can I am sorry for this mail dear

Hello dear

Mohammed from the Gaza Strip was injured 5 months ago with a gas bomb in his left eye and led to a large laceration in the face and loss of the eye.

So far, Mohammed has found no support for many doctors inside the Gaza Strip, and on the day of his condition is getting worse because his other eye was affected by this injury. Because of the seriousness of the place of injury

Mohammed's only solution is treatment outside of Palestine. He is from a very poor family and cannot collect the cost of traveling abroad. We tried to get an invitation from a hospital outside the Gaza Strip.

But Mohammed cannot reach the hospital because he cannot collect the cost of travel and other papers

The cost of this is more than $ 500

$ 250 cost his passports and his companions take care of him out

Visa entry

Some other papers do not know the details

Mohammed will stay for two weeks in this hospital for two surgeries to maintain his eye and he needs food and drink

I hope that if you would like to help Mohammed Al Habeel from Gaza support him via the following link if you can

I am very sorry for this letter but the life of a young man is at stake because of a little money

If you want support you can via the following link

https://gogetfunding.com/gazapsps/

+

From: GAZA PALESTINE [mailto:anahona366@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, November 03, 2019
Subject: On this day we need humanity and compassion ... We are at the peak of suffering and fatigue ... Support us as much as you can.

Today, we returned to work in the eastern Gaza Strip.

Where the Israeli occupation forces opened fire towards the youth and children participating in the marches of peaceful return and began to suffer multiple injuries . Some of these injuries are serious.

But what is happening now is the craziest at three o'clock in the morning and we are now subjected to a very heavy bombardment All residents of the Gaza Strip are not asleep because of the force of the sound of the rocket and aircraft and the latest bombing targeted a house in the city of Khan Younis and wounding 3 people, two of them very serious injuries due to shrapnel The house came out of the rockets fired by the Israeli occupation forces.

I send this and I and my children are now crying because of the intensity of this bombing and I cannot what to do we need to stand with us and support us because we need you I do not know how it will pass tonight or will this end soon.

The Israeli prime minister has ordered the start of an offensive in the Gaza Strip and the army has already started bombing the Gaza Strip with more than 40 rockets so far.

I also received the martyrdom of Ahmed al-Shahri from the east of Khan Younis and the injury of two others.

We need your support and support to complete our work and start a new business.

I hope that there will be no war on the Gaza Strip because the situation is unlikely to happen in the Gaza Strip.

This will lead to humanitarian disasters and exacerbate crises.

I hope you can support us through this link

https://gogetfunding.com/gazapsps/

+

Twitter suspends accounts of Palestinian Quds News Network

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/twitter-suspends-accounts-palestinian-quds-news-network-191102203755062.html

+

From: Cat McGuire [mailto:cat@catmcguire.com]
Sent: Thursday, October 31, 2019
Subject: Vaccine-Injured Palestinian Child Needs Help

My friend, Katie, organized a GoFundMe campaign for a Vaccine-Injured Palestinian Child Who Needs Help.

Before launching, the site got wiped out by GoFundMe because the word Palestine was flagged. Katie has to now have all the donation money go to her which she then sends to the family via Western Union -- instead of people being able to send their donations directly to the Palestinian family.

I had created the original campaign for Katie, so I rebuilt the page, and it seems GoFundMe has harnessed their algorithm bots because contributions are now coming in. 

But who knows what will happen if the vaxxer thought police get wind of the campaign.  All to say, please give generously now while it's still possible. 

Thanks, Cat

+

News

Israel

'Sickening hypocrisy': Critics slam Israeli army Twitter post

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/hypocrisy-critics-slam-israeli-army-twitter-post-191109162240458.html

===========

h.

Black Agenda Report

Amerikaners: The Afrkaners’ First Cousins

https://www.blackagendareport.com/amerikaners-afrkaners-first-cousins

+

Believe Absolutely Nothing the US Government and Media Say About…Anything | Black Agenda Report

https://www.blackagendareport.com/believe-absolutely-nothing-us-government-and-media-say-aboutanything

===========

i.

From: Jim O'Brien via H-PAD
Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2019
Subject: [H-PAD] H-PAD Notes 10/30/19: Links to recent articles of interest

Links to Recent Articles of Interest 

"The Center Does Not Hold: Jill Lepore's Awkward Embrace of the Nation"

By Daniel Immerwahr, The Nation, posted October 29

A review-essay on Jill Lepore's US history book These Truths. The author teaches history at Northwestern University and is the author of How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States (2019). 

"US Militarism, Having Provoked ISIL into Being, Kills Cult Leader Baghdadi"

By Juan Cole, Informed Comment blog, posted October 28

The author teaches Middle East history at the University of Michigan. 

"What Can Historians Do? An Update from Historians for Peace and Democracy"

By Margaret Power and Kevin Young, History News Network, posted October 27 

On recent activities of H-PAD especially the formation of new working groups whose missions are described in the article. The authors teach history at the Illinois Institute of Technology and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, respectively.

"What the Dismantling of the Berlin Wall Means 30 Years Later"

By James Carroll, TomDispatch.com, posted October 27

Inspired by the events of November 9, 1989. "If idealistic hope could triumph once, it can so triumph again, no matter what the die-hard realists of out moment may believe." The author is the author of twenty books, including a Vietnam War memoir that won the National Book Award. 

"America's Syria Debacle Is Not Trump's Alone"

By Trita Parsi and Stephen Wertheim, Foreign Policy, posted October 18

"By going along with the myth that the president is pulling out of the Middle East, his critics are helping make America's wars there worse." The authors are affiliated with the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

"Democrats Have No Answer for Trump's Antiwar Posture"

By Danny Sjursen, TruthDig.org, posted October 17

The author is a retired major in the US Army and a former history instructor at West Point.

"Condemning Trump on Syria? It's Buffet Outrage"

By Stephen Kinzer, Boston Globe, posted October 17

(The link is to Ray McGovern's website because access to the Globe's site requires a subscription.) The article provides historical background on relations between the US, Syrian Kurds, and the Syrian government.

"American 'Freedom Man' Is Made of Straw"

By Andrew J. Bacevich, The American Conservative, posted October 16

"Bret Stephens' foolish caricature of America only nurses our delusions about 'the good' we've done in the world." The author is an emeritus professor of history and international relations at Boston University. 

"Celebrating Indigenous People's Day Should Mean Honoring Migrants' Rights"

By Liz Ellis, Washington Post, posted October 14

The author teaches history at New York University and is a citizen of the Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma.

Thanks to Rusti Eisenberg and an anonymous reader for suggesting some of the articles in the above list. Suggestions can be sent to jimobrien48@gmail.com.

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j.

From: Security Info
Sent: Monday, October 28, 2019
Subject: IMPORTANT!

Cari All,

Two days after the 102nd anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution, I wrote this

(for me, usual) Arcane, but its message is not simply sincere on my part but

truly important for you all.

Comradely Love,

Jack

THE “ANOTHER VIEW OF STALIN” ARCANE

1.

Because the Revolutionary Poets Brigade

of San Francisco (RPB/SF) has voted to

no longer publish with Amazon for the cruel

inhumane way it treats its workers, instead

uses Lulu.com to print its Kallatumba Press

publication of

A World Without Wars:

Overthrowing Capitalism

with poets from every continent on earth,

happening to write Lulu to ask when our

book was due, I saw they’d also printed

a book entitled Another View of Stalin, by

a Belgian named Ludo Martens. Curious,

I ordered a copy to read on the plane to

China, but which book arrived after I’d

left, so its pages weren’t read until a month

later when I returned to open them. I read

from the Foreword: “That a famous Soviet

dissident, living now in ’reunited’ Germany,

a man who in his youth was so fanatically

anti-Stalin that he planned a terrorist attack

against him, who filled entire books with

vehement denunciations of Stalin’s political

line in every possible way, that such a man

would, in his old age, pay homage to Stalin

is remarkable”, written in anonymity on the

very first page of this extraordinary book.

2.

Hey, worker, yes, you, on the job or in

a homeless doorway, and you with the

legalized shit you roll, smoke and roll

around in; you with your awareness of

racial inequity, of rent injustice, of the

sellouts of Unions to the Corporations,

of poets with egos and endless blah,

you don’t suppose you’re going to get

away with some prosy Arcane, do you?

Listen, after more than 40 years working

in the Communist movement, never did

I realize, until I read Ludo’s book, I knew

really virtually nothing specifically of the

the greatest revolution in human history

and the forces that feared, detested and

after 72 years, succeeded in ending the

Soviet Union, whose people had been

able to annihilate hitlerian Nazism.

I know you think it all unnecessary now: in

today’s world, each one carries a computer

in his/her pocket or bag; it’s technology that

is ruling a crippled world on fascist struts,

where every single individual is at liberty to

be in its double-entendre cell, living a life

of whoremoans, in a cornyography of porn,

with self-shoulder-pats for having dropped

some coins on corners of begging hands.

I’ll say it straight: the book by Ludo Martens

is the most important book of revolutionary

thinking in this generation and, reading it, I

can promise you that you will be irresistibly

transformed in your understanding of what

the communist movement is, in a way that

amazes you with a depth in your perception

that you’d never counted on or realized in

the past. And, since the book’s written after

the fall of the Soviet Union, it’s all the more

important that today, with recent emerging

of the malicious fascisms ever latent in the

capitalist system, the two parties playing a

game in which, finally, only capitalism wins,

Another View of Stalin is an urgent read for

both strengthening the Resistance now and

growing everywhere the working-class truth,

not the bourgeoise lie, that’s liberty’s depth.

3.

Never have I written an Arcane that’s a call

to buy a book. Until now. Remember the title:

Another View of Stalin. Name of its author is

Ludo Martens. Go to Lulu. com and order it.

The $9.00 price for this priceless work will,

in a very short time, be so redeemed by the

transformation of your human consciousness,

when I say, “May a thousand Revolutionaries

be reborn!” I’m sure I can count you as one.

+

Opinion -I don't blame the Lebanese rioters setting Beirut alight – they are hungry, poor and furious

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52443.htm

by Robert Fisk

On the corniche seafront where I live almost every apartment block is empty. These buildings are owned as investments by Iraqis and Saudis, while the poor of the Beqaa Valley live in shacks

I thought the days when I kicked burning tyres off roads had ended. I used to clear the road in Belfast in 1972. Then, often, I did the same in Beirut.

But there I was yesterday, as my faithful driver Selim waited patiently for me to shake hands with the local militiaman and explain why I wanted to get to Damour (about 12 miles south of Beirut) and wave my little Lebanese press card in his face, slowly using my best brown shoes to push his burning tyres off the highway.

They were hot. Just to look at the flames made my eyes hurt.

That’s what burning tyres are supposed to do, of course. And the Lebanese drivers, backed up behind us like rabbits, turned round and went home.

Well, we got through. And drove and drove and drove, and laughed that we had done so. But this was a very serious matter. The army stayed away; the police advised motorists to go home. Law and order – you remember those old words? – were less important than the lawful right of way. But, for several hours, Selim and I exercised our own right of way.

For the most part, the men lighting these fires belonged to the Amal Movement, the Shia group controlled by Nabih Berri, the speaker of the Lebanese parliament. Or so they told me, and I did not argue about it.

===========

k.

The Next Syrian Refugee Crisis Will Break Europe's Back

https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/24/syrian-refugee-crisis-europe-greece-turkey-balkans/

+

Nord Stream 2: “Is Russia cutting off Eastern Europe's gas supply?”

https://youtu.be/eyll4pFDYyA

===========

l.

COMMUNIQUE DE L’Union Syndicale de la Psychiatrie (USP) du 31 octobre 2019

Arrachons l'hôpital public des mains de l'infamie! Le 14 novembre : tous en grève !

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Arrachons+l'hôpital+public+des+mains+de+l'infamie+!+Le+14+novembre+%3A+tous+en+grève

===========

m.

Montpellier : Débat sur les États-Unis et leur président,

mardi 5 novembre

https://lemouvement.info/2019/11/02/montpellier-debat-sur-les-etats-unis-et-leur-president-mardi-5-novembre/

+

à écouter en français sur la plateforme SYBEL

https://sybel.co/fr/

C'est gratuit! Il faut juste créer un compte avec un email et un mot de passe.

Un nouvel épisode par jour pendant une semaine!

La version anglaise sort dans quelques semaines....

===========

n.

Prof. Richard Wolff: Can "Accountable" Capitalism Exist?

https://youtu.be/INIplfZYeg0

===========

o.

From: The National Security Archive [mailto:nsarchiv@gwu.edu]
Sent: Monday, November 04, 2019
Subject: 1979 Iran Hostage Crisis Recalled

1979 Iran Hostage Crisis Recalled

Tehran Embassy Takeover Launched 444-Day Saga with Long-Standing Implications for Iran, United States, and Global Politics

Documents Show Brzezinski Proposed Considering Replacement of Khomeini or Even Direct Intervention, but Carter Declined

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 689

View the posting

Washington D.C., November 4, 2019 – On November 4, 1979, a group calling itself the Students Following the Line of the Imam stormed the gates of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, seized control of the compound, and took several dozen American diplomats, Marine guards, and others hostage. Thus began a 444-day ordeal that shocked the world, fundamentally altered the political scene in Iran, and cemented negative perceptions in the West of the country’s Islamic leadership. 

Forty years later, the Iran hostage crisis is still critical to understanding the bitter nature of relations between Iran and the United States.  It instantly formed a core part of the American narrative about the Islamic Republic as a regime willing to flout international law and universal moral principles, a view that has colored much of U.S. policymaking ever since. 

Today, the National Security Archive is posting a small sampling of declassified records that recall that pivotal episode. They include a memo from National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski to President Carter suggesting several hardline actions including replacing Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as Iran's leader and even overt intervention (see Document 07).  Carter was not prepared to take up any of these options but they indicate the level of alarm created by events in Tehran. 

The documents are part of the soon-to-be-published U.S. Policy toward Iran: From the Revolution to the JCPOA, 1978-2015, a collection of almost 2,000 documents that is the latest in the “Digital National Security Archive” series through the academic publisher ProQuest

Check out today's posting at the National Security Archive

Read Unredacted, the Archive blog

---

THE NATIONAL SECURITY ARCHIVE is an independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. The Archive collects and publishes declassified documents acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A tax-exempt public charity, the Archive receives no U.S. government funding; its budget is supported by publication royalties and donations from foundations and individuals.

PRIVACY NOTICE The National Security Archive does not and will never share the names or e-mail addresses of its subscribers with any other organization. Once a year, we will write you and ask for your financial support. We may also ask you for your ideas for Freedom of Information requests, documentation projects, or other issues that the Archive should take on. We would welcome your input, and any information you care to share with us about your special interests. But we do not sell or rent any information about subscribers to any other party.

National Security Archive, Suite 701
Gelman Library
The George Washington University
2130 H Street, NW
Washington, D.C., 20037
Phone: 202/994-7000<
Fax: 202/994-7005
nsarchiv@gwu.edu

+

Iraqi protesters attack Iran consulate in Karbala

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/iraqi-protesters-attack-iran-consulate-karbala-191103232545555.html

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p.

News From Underground

From: newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com [mailto:newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Mark Crispin Miller
Sent: Monday, November 04, 2019
Subject: [MCM] US military's "light footprint" in Africa comprises 34 bases across the continent

U.S. MILITARY SAYS IT HAS A “LIGHT FOOTPRINT” IN AFRICA. THESE DOCUMENTS SHOW A VAST NETWORK OF BASES

https://theintercept.com/2018/12/01/u-s-military-says-it-has-a-light-footprint-in-africa-these-documents-show-a-vast-network-of-bases

by Nick Turse

December 1 2018, 7:00 a.m.

THE U.S. MILITARY has long insisted that it maintains a “light footprint” in Africa, and there have been reports of proposed drawdowns

 in special operations forces and closures of outposts on the continent, due to a 2017 ambush in Niger and an increasing focus on rivals like China and Russia. But through it all, U.S. Africa Command has fallen short of providing concrete information about its bases on the continent, leaving in question the true scope of the American presence there.

Documents obtained from AFRICOM by The Intercept, via the Freedom of Information Act, however, offer a unique window onto the sprawling network of U.S. military outposts in Africa, including previously undisclosed or unconfirmed sites in hotspots like Libya, Niger, and Somalia.  The Pentagon has also told The Intercept that troop reductions in Africa will be modest and phased-in over several years and that no outposts are expected to close as a result of the personnel cuts.

According to a 2018 briefing by AFRICOM science adviser Peter E. Teil, the military’s constellation of bases includes 34 sites scattered across the continent, with high concentrations in the north and west as well as the Horn of Africa. These regions, not surprisingly, have also seen numerous U.S. drone attacks and low-profile commando raids in recent years. For example, Libya — the site of drone and commando missions, but for which President Donald Trump said he saw no U.S. military role just last year — is nonetheless home to three previously undisclosed outposts. 

===========

q.

RT NEWSLETTER

https://subscribe.rt.com/preview/AqCAQ5

(November 7, 2019)

+

RT NEWSLETTER

https://subscribe.rt.com/preview/1diDFJ

(November 9, 2019)

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r.

California Is Living in the US's Dystopian Future

https://truthout.org/articles/california-is-living-in-the-uss-dystopian-future/

+

California Fires - The Death Agendas  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=152&v=guAN0Mdza6k

Nov. 4, 2019

(video, 58min)

===========

s.

From: GAZA PALESTINE [mailto:anahona366@gmail.com]

Sent: Saturday, November 09, 2019

Subject: We are tired of work ... We are about to collapse ..... We need legendary support at this great time ..... I hope you do not ignore this ... A matter of life and death

Today, we returned to work in the eastern Gaza Strip.

Where the Israeli occupation forces opened fire towards the youth and children participating in the marches of peaceful return and began to suffer multiple injuries .. Some of these injuries are serious

But what is happening now is the craziest at three o'clock in the morning and we are now subjected to a very heavy bombardment All residents of the Gaza Strip are not asleep because of the force of the sound of the rocket and aircraft and the latest bombing targeted a house in the city of Khan Younis and wounding 3 people, two of them very serious injuries due to shrapnel The house came out of the rockets fired by the Israeli occupation forces

I send this and I and my children are now crying because of the intensity of this bombing and I can not what to do we need to stand with us and support us because we need you I do not know how it will pass tonight or will this end soon

The Israeli prime minister has ordered the start of an offensive in the Gaza Strip and the army has already started bombing the Gaza Strip with more than 40 rockets so far

I also received the martyrdom of Ahmed al-Shahri from the east of Khan Younis and the injury of two others

We need your support and support to complete our work and start a new business

I hope that there will be no war on the Gaza Strip because the situation is unlikely to happen in the Gaza Strip

This will lead to humanitarian disasters and exacerbate crises

I hope you can support us through this link

https://gogetfunding.com/gazapsps/

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t.

'US creates monsters':

Trump talk of war on Mexico cartels echoes past failures
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/10/mexico-war-drug-cartels-us-help-trump
by Jo Tuckman

===========

u.

Do you need more drums of war?

https://renegadeinc.com/do-you-need-more-drums-of-war/