Sunday, May 26, 2019

840 Terroristen zijn bedacht en gemaakt door Israel, als proxy leger voor israel. Dank aan Want to know Guido J.


Sibel Edmonds vertelt dat Richard Perle al in de jaren 80  Amerikaans geld naar Centraal Azie sluisde om daar moslim-schooltjes te stichten. 

Daar is een stikje voor gestoken toen het werd ontdekt.  Perle is er voor gestraft. 
Maar enkele jaren later deed het 'American-Turkish Council'  precies hetzelfde:  Van elke 1 miljard $ die als teun naar Turkije en zijn buurlanden werd gestuurd, ging 33 % naar de schooltjes. En dààr ging het de Neocons om:  fundamentalistisch godsdienst onderwijs op touw zetten in veelal bergachtige  regio's waar de jongemannen van nature graag vechten, om die jihadisten later in te zetten tegen de moslimlanden die Israel graag kapot gemaakt ziet worden. 

Fetullah Gülen  heeft waarschijnlijk een rol in die zaak gespeeld. 
Saudi Arabië speelt ook een grote rol in die zaak. 
Maar het idee en de productie komt uit het brein van de 'Price of Darkness' Richard Perle, als je het mij vraagt. 

Gülen en KSA zijn assets, mogelijk zelfs unwitting assets. ( Nuttige idioten: mensen die denken dat ze iets goeds doen, maar intussen hun eigen wereld vernietigen.) 

Bij toeval ontdekte ik een oud artikel van Guido J , van de website Want to know. ARTIKEL

Dat artikel vind U hieronder,  onder de foto van Al Baghdadi. 

Hij vertelt eenzelfde verhaal, maar heeft veel meer onderbouwing. Ook in de reacties vind ik goede links. 

Op dit blog wil ik dat alles bijeen brengen, als een soort naslagwerk. 


Eerst een reeks links  uit de comments bij Wanttoknow: 

UN reveals Israeli links with Syrian rebels
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.630359


http://www.wanttoknow.nl/hoofdartikelen/ook-last-van-cognitieve-dissonantie/







Ex-CIA-agent: ‘ISIS/IS opgericht en bewapend door VS…!



Robin Cook Al QaedaWij vragen ons weleens af, waarom burgers en de MainStreamMedia VANUIT EEN NEUTRAAL STANDPUNT, niet normaal naar de hele rotzooi rondom IS/ISIS/ISIL of hoe je het ook wilt noemen, durven kijken.. Is het het sprookje van ‘de nieuwe kleren van de keizer’, waarbij niemand zijn mond opendoet, als de keizer in zijn blote kont door het stadje loopt, in de veronderstelling dat hij een unieke, dure en fijngeweven mantel aan heeft, tótdat.. Totdat een klein jongetje over het dorpsplein roept, dat de keizer in zijn blote gat loopt..  Ja dan, pas dan, wordt de goegemeente wakker en ziet de realiteit..
Hebben wij behoefte aan zo’n roepend jongetje, dat simpel met z’n beentjes op de grond staat en de waarheid vertelt, of schreeuwt.. Waar blijven mensen die werkelijk durven benoemen, waar de essentie ligt van deze verdeel-en-heers-politiek ACHTER dit IS/ISIS-kleed..? Er zijn bewijzen genoeg van dit scenario, daar ligt het niet aan. Maar je moet wel willen en vooral DURVEN kijken, en je waarheid-van-het-moment ter discussie durven stellen. Anders blijf je in de vage droomsfeer van de leugen-die-als-waarheid wordt verkocht..!
ISIS-leider-Al-Baghdadi-Mccain
In het geval van de strapatzen van dit moment, is het met name senator John McCain die telkens opduikt in gebieden, waar later de rotzooi begint. Hij was er in februari vorig jaar, in Kiev, vlak voor de bloedige opstand, die ‘het Westen’ in staat stelde de marionet Poroshenko te laten verkiezen. Hij was er ook in Syrië, bij de ‘geboorte’ van ISIS/IS of ISIL, hoe je het ook wil noemen.
De vraag is, waar het die laatste betreft, IS of ISIS, waar de leider van deze club in de wereldpers blijft, met bijvoorbeeld video-boodschappen zoals die andere ‘fake’: Osama Bin Laden van de Al Quaida-organisatie. Maar deze leider van ISIS is inmiddels herkend van foto’s die tijdens het overleg van McCain in Syrië zijn gemaakt.
Het 'goede werk' van John McCain, achter al die fijne 'volksopstanden', lijkt uiterst waardevol. Voor de VS dan. En uiterst opzichtig...
Het ‘goede werk’ van John McCain, achter al die fijne ‘volksopstanden’, lijkt uiterst waardevol. Voor de VS dan. En uiterst opzichtig…

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Ex-CIA-agent: ‘ISIS/IS opgericht en bewapend door VS’…!

2015 © WantToKnow.nl/.be
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En opnieuw komt het verhaal naar buiten; voor de zoveelste keer. Nu uit weer andere hoek; want ditmaal is het voormalig CIA-huurling Steven Kelley die heeft verklaard dat IS/ISIS/ISIL of hoe je het ook wilt noemen, een door de CIA gefabriceerde terroristische club is, die ook nog eens wordt gefinancierd door de CIA, rechtstreeks vanuit de VS…!  Niet dat deze man nu wat nieuws zegt, want velen wéten dat het hele IS/ISIS-verhaaltje van A t/m Z in scene is gezet. Nee, die mensen zijn geen ‘complotdenkers’, die het de slapenden moeilijk maken om niet-wakker te worden..
Isis fighters, pictured on a militant website verified by AP.‘ISIS’ moest ineens ‘IS’ worden, weet jij waarom..? In de volle afkorting komen we de woorden ‘Islamic State, Independent Syriah’ voor. Terwijl, vlak na de mislukte ‘opstandelingen-oorlog’ tegen Syrië, ‘IS’ ineens nog maar bleek te bestaan: ‘Islamic State’.. Ja, en daar zijn we tegen aan het vechten, overal in de wereld.. Maar de VS vocht toch mee, tégen Syrië, bewapende toch simpelweg deze troepen..?
En nu horen we dáár NIETS meer over in actualiteitsprogramma’s of het ‘nieuws.. ‘IS’ is kennelijk nu een zelfstandige, grote-boze-wolf geworden, die met hulp van de CIA achter de schermen, haar spel speelt, van moord en verderfenis, zogenaamd in naam van de Islam..!
De hieronder geplaatste video-boodschap van Steven Kelley laat wat dat betreft aan duidelijkheid niets meer te wensen over: 

 “Dit is een compleet gefabriceerde vijand”

“De financiering vindt volledig plaats via de VS en haar bondgenoten. En voor die mensen die geloven dat dit een vijand is die aangevallen dient te worden in Syrië en Irak, het is een FARÇE..! Omdat het kennelijk iets is dat we zelf gecreëerd hebben, dat we controleren en waarbij het nu pas legitiem is geworden om deze groep ‘aan te vallen”, aldus Kelley. Hij maakte zijn opmerkingen op het moment dat Obama onder druk staat om het Congres om steun te vragen om de ISIS-aftakking te bewapenen, die vanuit Irak aanvallen uitvoert op Syrië.. Begrijp jij het nog..?
Het Pentagon heeft al meer dan 100 luchtaanvallen laten uitvoeren op ‘posities van ISIL’ in noord-Irak, nadat Obama zijn toestemming gaf voor het gebruik van geweld tegen deze ‘terrrrrorrristengroep’, begin vorige maand. Het Witte Huis laat ook nog eens weten, dat het feitelijk geen akkoord nodig heeft van de Senaat, doordat de aanvallen tegen ISIL/ISIS of hoe het dan ook heet, bedoeld zijn om Amerikaanse belangen en mensenlevens in Arabisch gebied aan te vallen.. Via woordvoerder Josh Earnest liet Obama al weten dat de VS niet zal aarzelen ‘om haar autoriteit te gebruiken’ om Amerikanen in veiligheid te houden. Maar Obama ‘is van plan wel met het Congres te coördineren en het te raadplegen.”.
Steven Kelley zegt hierop: “Als je naar de wortel van het probleem wil, en deze organisatie wilt elimineren, dan is het eerste wat je moet doen, de financiering van deze groep stoppen en degenen op non-actief stellen die verantwoordelijk zijn voor het creëren van deze groep”…

En zo wordt wederom bevestigd, dat de Zionistische krachten achter de regering in de VS, in staat zijn, wereldwijd rotzooi te trappen, om haar verdeel-en-heers-politiek uit te voeren. De Islam in een kwaad daglicht te zetten, de sympathie naar Israël te contiuëren etc. etc. Dat dit te koste gaat van vele, vele mensenlevens, inclusief de opgehitste jonge strijders,  de ‘Jihadisten’, lijkt van geen enkel belang om het grotere doel te halen..! Werelddominantie en onderdrukking. Eerst was het het sprookje van Osama Bin Laden, die met een laptop op schoot, vanaf zijn ezeltje de grootste krijgsmacht in de wereld in de maling nam, en de aanslagen van 9/11 gepleegd zou hebben, en nu is het de Joodse Elliot Shimon, eh.. Al Baghdadi, die de ‘nietsontziende leider’ is van een nieuwe groep ‘Terrrrrrrorrrrrristen’… Time to wake up..
al baghdadiDeze informatie komt uit alle hoeken en gaten.Ook voormalig NSA- en CIA-agent Edward Snowden heeft onthuld dat de leider van IS, Islamitische Staat in Irak en Syrië, Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, getraind is door Israel, evenals verschillende Iranese bronnen dit melden. Precies zoals Robin Cook, voormalig minister van Buitenlandse Zaken van Engeland het zei over Al Quaida, zo spreekt Snowden over de terroristische organisatie IS/ISIS als ‘product’ van de Amerikaanse (CIA) en Britse (MI5) spionagediensten. Een dergelijk organisatie trekt vervolgens alle extramisten (zoals jonge Jihad-strijders) naar zich toe uit de hele wereld, voor een strategie die het ‘wespennest’ wordt genoemd.
De ‘wespennest’-strategie bestaat er dus uit om álle belangrijke bedreigingen naar één plek te ‘lokken’, teneinde in staat te zijn deze personen en zaken in kaart te brengen, en daarbij tevens de stabiliteit van de Arabische landen te ondermijnen. Snowden als oud-NSA-medewerker onthulde dat de ISIS-kalif,  Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi een intensieve militaire training heeft gehad van de Israelische geheime dienst ‘Mossad’. Naast deze militaire training heeft hij volgens Snowden ook communicatietrainingen gehad, zoals spreken in het openbaar, teneinde de ‘terroristen’ uit alle hoeken van de wereld aan te trekken.
Ook de Tjetjeens president Kadirov verklaarde in het openbaar dat Al-Baghdadi zijn masker zou moeten afdoen en verklaren dat hij overduidelijk een CIA-agent is..!
En dan is ee het ‘Centre for Research on Globalization’ (CRG), een onafhankelijke non-profit organisatie in Quebec, Canada. Deze focust haar werk op research en media. Zij brachten ook een artikel over deze maskerade naar buiten, daarbij benadrukkend: “Drie landen (VS, UK en Israël) hebben een terroristische organisatie gecreëerd, die in staat is alle extremisten uit de hele wereld naar één plek te lokken. Het CRG gebruikt daarvoor óók de hiervoor gebruikte terminologie: ‘de strategie van het wespennest’..! (‘Hornetsnest’).
“The only solution for the protection of the Jewish state is to create an enemy near its borders,” Snowden was reported to say.
Dan deze opgeblazen statements van auteur en Zionist Dan Raviv.
In dit filmpje van 5 augustus 1990 komt het allemaal ook netjes naar voren, bevestigd door Zionist en waarschijnlijk ver buiten zijn boekje sprekende auteur Dan Raviv. Hij spreekt ineens LET WEL IN 1990!!) over ISIS…! Israëli Secret Intelligence Service.. Kijk zelf, maar oordeel vooral zelf over de waarheidsgetrouwheid.

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Debunking de debunkers..

Vaak, wanneer een waarheid boven water komt die de powers-that-be niet uitkomt, wordt er een ‘onwaarheidscampagne’ gelanceerd via grote media. Zo ook in dit geval. Het Amerikaanse TIME-magazine schreef  op 19 juli 2014 een artikel, waarbij de authenciteit van Al Baghdadi niet werd bevestigd, maar de waarheid rondom deze persoon werd gelabeld als ‘leugens’.. Namelijk als ‘een publiciteitscampagne van de Iraanse overheid, die zelfs door Snowden zou zijn bevestigd’. (Twee vliegen in één klap dus, door ook Snowden als ‘omgekeerde leugenaar’ te portretteren.) 
Wat een toeval..!
Juist op het moment dat wij dit artikel plaatsen, blijkt ’t Telegraafje vandaag een artikel te plaatsen over uitspraken in dit kader, door de president van Soedan. Zoals je het hieronder ziet.. Het moet toch niet veel gekker worden in deze wereld. Onze wensen gaan vanaf nu nóg harder de wereld in..!
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 telegraaf al baghdadi soedan
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al qaeda israel



839 Feiten die twijfel zaaien over de holocaust door Mike Walsh

Elders heb ik het boek 'Witness to History' op dit blog staan.

Het zijn citaten  door Mike Walsh verzameld die zich totaal niet laten rijmen met ons beeld over WO 2.

I weet niet of die citaten in hun originele context  een àndere betekenis zouden hebben.  Ik weet zelfs niet of ze correct zijn weergegeven.
Maar zover ik weet is Walsh  eerder verzwegen dan verguisd.
Datdoet vermoeden dat hij waarheid schrijft.

Hieronder een wat lastig te begrijpen 'toneelstuk' : een leraar voor een klas leerlingen die hun mening niet kunnen veranderen, wat er ook aan feiten wordt aangedragen:




 Few Simple Arguments Which Cast Serious Doubt on the 'Holocaust'


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SHARES
Sit the students down and explain slowly: “According to the World Jewish Encyclopaedia there resided 2.4 million Jews in German-Occupied Europe. After the war, 3.8 million Jewish ‘holocaust survivors’ were receiving pensions from the German government. Tragically, the remaining six million were lost.”
Let us see if the students have been paying attention and now ask the class how many Jews died during World War Two.
Six million, sir!”
Okay, let’s start again: “Doctor Charles P. Larson, one of America’s leading forensic pathologists, in 1945 was assigned to the US Army’s Judge Advocate General’s department. As part of a US war crimes, investigation team Dr. Larson performed autopsies at Dachau and some twenty other camps examining more than 100 corpses on some days.
Dr. Larson confirmed that none of the autopsies he performed showed any evidence of death by poison gas. But, his conclusion was that death had occurred by typhus and starvation (as a consequence of USAAF and RAF saturation bombing).”
Testing the students to see if attention is being paid, the question is again asked and the knee-jerk Pavlov response is, “Six million, sir.”

Hollywood's answer: no gassed corpses cuz conveyor belts into fire-pits...
It is exasperating, I know, but let us persist.
“Poland has cut its estimate of the number of people killed by the Nazis in Auschwitz from four million to just over one million. According to Jewish media in Tel Aviv, “The revised figures support claims by Israeli researchers that Poland’s former (Communist) government exaggerated the number of victims.”
Deep breath: “Students; how many Jews were gassed at Auschwitz?”
The six million figures are again parroted and the lesson on truth awareness becomes a surreal experience.
You try again: “Students, Norman Finkelstein joins others, including prominent Jews, in conceding that the holocaust is a criminal deception: the prominent Jewish researcher says; “Indeed, the field of holocaust studies is replete with nonsense if not sheer fraud.”
Exasperated you repeat your earlier question and again the reply is that six million died. Yes, it is wearing, but surrender to gormlessness simply isn’t an option. With a thin smile, the straightening of your spine and your patience at low ebb, you press home your point.
“I see you have been paying attention (eyes roll). “Germany is trapped in a defensive war, not of its making. Caught in a pincer movement by three world empires, this nation, smaller than the State of Texas, is fighting for its very survival against hopeless odds.
Throughout Germany the basic necessities of life are exhausted, life is in disarray, its outnumbered near defeated armies are out of ammunition, schoolboys are conscripted to defend German cities. Yet, despite these tribulations, Germans find the time to identify three times as many Jews as are known to exist. They then transport them thousands of miles across war-torn Europe in rail cars they don’t possess. These millions are delivered to a score of camps scattered across remote areas of Germany and Poland. There they are fed, tattooed and then afterwards gassed in gas chambers that have never since been discovered. Nor have the remains of six million corpses. Students, this is what you believe?”
“Yes, sir.”
Do you give up at this point? No, let’s try another direction: “Any normal court of law requires evidence of a crime. However and bizarrely, Articles 19 and 21 of the Nuremburg Statute of Court dispensed with any requirement that evidential proof of deliberate homicide be provided. Now, tell me again, how many Jew were killed?”
“Sir, six million”
Your fingers are now drumming on your desk: “Did you know, students, 9 million of the 16 million Jews world-wide are collecting ‘reparations’. Benefits extend to children and dependents born to ‘survivors’ even though they had been born after World War Two. On registering their claim they are handed $35,000, receive $2,000 per month and receive free health care for life. Tell me again, how many Jews died?”
“Six million, sir.”
“According to the Jewish World Almanac, the Jewish world population in 1933 stood at 13,315,859. By 1938, one year before the outbreak of war, the census showed a total of 15,748,091 Jews. Residing in the Third Reich were 210,000 Jews, some refugees fleeing Polish pogroms.
In 1948, three years after the war ended, the census reveals a total of 15,753,638 Jews world-wide. In 2017 the figure is still under 16 million. Now, let’s repeat my question; how many Jews died in the holocaust?”
“Er, six million, sir!”
The aforementioned explains the power of what Hitler accused the Jews of; the power of the big lie. If a lie is big enough and it is repeated often enough the gullible will continue to believe the lie even in the total absence of proof.
Now you know why Winston Churchill remarked; “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”
Douglas Reed Could Not Understand Either
“Gentile worship of, kowtowing to, servile deference toward, and desire to be led by Jews baffles me. Their maniacal, frenzied, foaming-at-the-mouth hatred and bloodthirsty cruelty, their endless Big Lies, I don’t get the worship.” ~ Douglas Reed (1895-1976), Chief Central European correspondent for the London Times, later the author of classic Politically Incorrect and books of dissent (e.g., The Controversy of Zion).

MICHAEL WALSH is a British born Irish journalist, author, and broadcaster. His 52 books include best-selling WITNESS TO HISTORYTESTIGO DE LA HISTORIA: HISTORIA SIN CENSURA (SPANISH EDITION),  REICH AND WRONG,  THE RED BRIGANDSRANSACKING THE REICH , TROTSKY’S WHITE NEGROES, and THE ALLIED INVASION. 

838 Handelsoorlog tegen China. Tegen Japan lukte het. Robert Lighthizer is de strateeg achter Trump.

qergv3rfg1Below an article on CNN> Thank you, CNN.


The US won a trade war against Japan. But China is a whole new ball game



Hong Kong (CNN Business)As President Donald Trump lands in Japan Saturday amid a worsening trade war with China, he could well be thinking back to a previous economic spat between Washington and an Asian economic powerhouse.
In the 1980s, Japan was the big bad. Its economy was booming — the second largest in the world — and many in the United States feared they were about to be overtaken.
Articles were published warning of the "Japanning of America" or an "economic Pearl Harbor," as Japanese businesses bought US companies and landmarks. Lawmakers and commentators warned of a growing trade deficit between the two countries, and complained of Japanese firms stealing US intellectual property and taking advantage of unfair trade deals.
    In an interview with the "Morton Downey Jr. Show" in 1989, Trump himself complained that Japan had "systematically sucked the blood out of America — sucked the blood out!"
    "It's a huge problem, and it's a problem that's going to get worse," Trump said of the US-Japan trade balance. "And they're laughing at us."
    By then, however, change was already happening. And far from overtaking the United States, Japan was about to fall far behind.
    Trump calls trade war with China 'a little squabble' 01:25

    Trade war

    After President Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, the United States started pressuring Japan to open its market up to American companies and reduce the trade imbalance between the countries.
    While Japan agreed to measures including a limit on the number of cars it exported to the United States, panic over Japanese trade power grew — and lawmakers on both sides demanded action.
    In approving a bill calling for tough trade reprisals against Japan, Robert Packwood, then Republican head of the Senate's finance committee, promised to give Tokyo "an eye for an eye ... that is all they understand."
    During a 1985 finance committee hearing, Democratic Sen. Max Baucus said that: "Reagan predicted 'a future in which commerce will be king, the eagle will soar, and America will be the mightiest trading nation on Earth.' Well, commerce may be king. And eagles may be soaring. But they're not American eagles. America's trade performance has never been worse."
    That year, five countries — the United States, West Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Japan — signed the Plaza Accord, devaluing the US dollar against the Japanese yen (and the German Deutsche Mark). This was a boon for the United States, leading to an increase in exports and a lowering of its trade deficit with many Western European countries.
    Yet the Plaza Accord wasn't the end of US action against Japan. In 1987, Washington imposed 100% tariffs on $300 million worth of Japanese imports, effectively blocking them from the American market.
    Things quickly turned sour for Tokyo. As the yen increased in value, Japanese products became more and more expensive, and countries turned away from the one-time export powerhouse. Efforts by the country's central bank to keep the yen's value low sparked a stock price bubble, the collapse of which helped push the country into recession and a "lost decade."
    "Japan's export and GDP growth essentially halted in the first half of 1986," economists Joshua Felman and Daniel Leigh wrote in a report for the International Monetary Fund. They concluded that while the Plaza Accord did not cause Japan's economic downturn by itself, it did trigger a series of events — compounded by poor decisions in Tokyo — which led to the collapse.
    Why the US is making an example out of China's Huawei 01:48

    Competing lessons

    Some of Trump's first forays into politics involved railing against Japan during the 1980s and early 1990s. During that time, he started calling for the use of tariffs as a trade weapon.
    While he has not referenced the historical US-Japan relationship during the recent China conflict, Washington's success against Tokyo could influence his thinking on how to handle Beijing. One of his key advisers on trade, Robert Lighthizer ( Article about Lighthizer below this article. ) , also took part in Japan negotiations in the 1980s.
    In 2011, as Trump flirted with a presidential run, Lighthizer praised his "skepticism toward pure free-trade dogma."
    "The icon of modern conservatism, Ronald Reagan, imposed quotas on imported steel, protected Harley-Davidson from Japanese competition, restrained imports of semiconductors and automobiles, and took myriad similar steps to keep American industry strong," he wrote.
    Yet while Lighthizer and Trump may take positive lessons from the 1980s trade war, Beijing is also paying attention — and China's leaders have no intention of copying Japan's mistakes.
    In an editorial last year, China's Xinhua state news agency warned that "Japan was seriously hurt by its improper response" to the Plaza Accord and US trade pressure.
    It blamed the US for scapegoating Japan for problems in the domestic economy, adding a "strong protectionist sentiment was the direct driving force behind the Plaza Accord."
    This has been a common theme in state media coverage of the trade war -- that the US is seeking to blame Beijing for matters outside its control.
    Donald Trump in 1989. At that time, he was inveighing against Japan for taking advantage of the US on trade.

    Repeating history

    Of course 2019 is not 1985, and China is not Japan. Beijing is far stronger both economically and politically than Tokyo was in the 1980s, with Japan dependent on the United States for national security and less willing to risk Washington's ire.
    "Japan was an easy target for US bashing. After the second world war, Japan has been both politically and economically dependent on the US, resulting in limited bargaining power to counteract the US," analysts Alicia Garcia-Herrero and Kohei Iwahara wrote last week. "China is in a better position to resist US pressure."
    The risk in this instance isn't of a failure to learn from history, but that both parties could take the wrong lessons.
    Trump and Lighthizer, having cut their teeth in the battles against Tokyo, could assume that a similarly aggressive policy will prompt Beijing to bend to their demands. Chinese negotiators have already learned what happens when you push back against Trump, with trade talks collapsing this month after Beijing reportedly attempted to alter the deal at the last minute.
    The failure of those talks led to an immediate escalation in tensions, with new tariffs imposed by both sides. This could be blamed on Beijing's late changes, but equally on Washington's unwillingness to negotiate.
    At the same time, China's interpretation of the 1980s could also lead it to make missteps.
      On Thursday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said any "mutually beneficial deal must be based on mutual respect, equality and win-win outcomes." But as many observers have noted, what China's leaders regard as "win-win" often means a win on its terms, and a desire to avoid repeating Japan's mistakes could result in Beijing refusing to take a minor loss that could ultimately lead to a better overall agreement.
      Japan is currently celebrating the beginning of the Reiwa era, under a new emperor, a time to wipe the slate clean and start again. US and Chinese trade negotiators might be better off copying that lesson than those of the 1980s.

         *****************************************
      Below an article from Foreign Policy.  Thank you FP.
      You Live in Robert Lighthizer’s World Now
      Trump might look like he's flailing on trade—
      but it's all going according to his trade czar's plan,
       which has been years in the making.
      BY QUINN SLOBODIAN

      AUGUST 6, 2018, 5:46 PMeoliberalism.


      Last month, U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade representative, Robert Lighthizer, sat through two hours of grilling by Congress, fending off grievances about the Trump trade war’s effects on Alaskan salmon, Maine lobsters, and Delaware chickens. “Nobody is declaring war on Canada,” Lighthizer protested, even as he conceded that the use of Section 232 of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act to levy tariffs on steel and aluminum was premised indirectly on assessing that country as a national security threat. When pushed on whether he had this assessment vetted by the National Security Council, he demurred that doing so was the Commerce Department’s responsibility, not his own.

      Lighthizer’s performance was consumed by such efforts to smooth the ruffled feathers of his congressional inquisitors. Mostly, this involved assuring lawmakers that progress has been made in negotiations with the European Union and trade partners such as Mexico and Canada, and dispelling the impression that new tariffs on China had “stirred up a hornet’s nest of problems in other parts of the world with trusted allies,” as one congressperson put it. And yet it would be a mistake to attribute Lighthizer’s obsequious performance to a lack of self-confidence. The trial lawyer known for having a life-sized portrait of himself in his home has never lacked for the latter. And unlike most others in the Trump administration, he has known what he wants to achieve, and how, from his first day in office.

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      The indications were there in his congressional testimony, in the way Lighthizer interspersed his defensive responses with declarations about his own philosophy on trade—one that he claimed to share with Trump. This philosophy of Lighthizerism deserves far closer attention than it has received, eclipsed as it has been by the approach of the director of Trump’s National Trade Council, Peter Navarro, which is flashier but ultimately less informed by policy experience. As a decades-long denizen of Washington, Lighthizer is more grounded but also less easy to place politically. Lighthizer’s is the economic philosophy most responsible for guiding the Trump administration, and he has ensured its influence for years, perhaps decades, to come.

      Lighthizer’s work has culminated in the budding trade war with China, with the Trump administration poised, as of last week, to raise existing tariffs on Chinese products to 25 percent. But to call Lighthizer a “prophet of protectionism,” as some have, gives the false impression of an underlying drive for U.S. autarky, self-sufficiency, or withdrawal from global markets. Nothing could be further from the truth. Lighthizer speaks openly in favor of free trade, comparative advantage, and what he calls simply “economics.” “The basic philosophy that we have is that we want free trade without barriers,” Lighthizer explained to Congress at the July 26 hearing. He said that the Trump administration “wants to get to the position where the U.S. is competing with countries on a bilateral basis and on a no-barrier basis, and then let the United States, let pure economics make the decision.” (“I’ve heard of Ricardo,” Lighthizer snipped at Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), who was straining to reassemble a parable about English cloth and Portuguese wine.)

      Where Lighthizerism departs from standard free trade philosophy isn’t in its desired goals of open markets but in its commitment to using an openly politicized arsenal of weapons for achieving them. Since the formation of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade—the precursor to the World Trade Organization—in 1947, the dominant school of thought on international trade has favored multilateralism, or agreements between many nations where trade barriers sink collectively on the “most favored nation” principle. Lighthizerism scorns the multilateral approach in favor of bilateralism, or deals between two nations to lower barriers. Against the collective approach exemplified by the WTO agreement, which over 100 countries signed in Marrakech in 1994, he promotes a transactional one instead, proceeding deal by deal and case by case. “We’re not talking about a level playing field,” he said to Congress, “What we’re saying to the country is, ‘We’ll give you better access than the rest of the world, and you give us approximately an equal amount of better access.’”

      To get to the endpoint of better access and lower barriers, Lighthizer sees little shame in the use of unilateral action. Executive orders, diplomatic pressure, and legal measures like the above-mentioned Section 232 are legitimate tools for unsettling existing arrangements and pushing partners to the negotiating table. Lighthizerism is no roadmap for retrenchment but a blueprint for recapturing what is seen as a lost edge for U.S. manufacturing on the world stage. It does not herald “the end of globalization” but a more aggressive phase of it. And far from shielding producers from the discipline of competition, Lighthizerism aims to deepen it.

      We need to “make sure that market forces determine who survives and who doesn’t survive,” he explained to Congress. Paradoxical as it may seem, Lighthizerism sees trade wars as the road to freer trade. Yet even as the rhetoric cleaves closely to the end goal of open markets, Lighthizerism in practice reveals a deeper and arguably more consequential belief—that to beat what he calls the state capitalism of China in the market, the United States must emulate part of the style of its adversary and become a bit more state capitalist itself.


      President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Zenko Suzuki of Japan begin talks in the Oval Office May 7, 1981, on a range topics, including the sensitive U. S.-Japanese trade relationship. (Bettmann/Getty Images)
      Lighthizerism’s combination of sovereign action and free trade principles is no novelty. Nor is it quite the paradox it might seem. One could find its roots in the 19th century, when military expeditions opened markets for Western goods. Access to both Japan and China was achieved at the barrel of a cannon.

      A more recent—and more directly relevant—analogue is the trade conflicts of the 1980s, which served as the crucible in which Lighthizerism was formed. Lighthizer’s career in economic policy began during this period, when U.S. policymakers routinely complained of trade deficits and the undercutting of U.S. manufacturing by distant competitors, and figures such as Walter Mondale predicted a dark future of Americans left only to “sweep up around the Japanese computers.” A native of Ohio born in 1947 who attended Georgetown University at the same time as eventual President Bill Clinton, Lighthizer served as a chief counsel for the Finance Committee under Sen. Bob Dole beginning in 1978 before being appointed a deputy U.S. trade representative in 1983, when he was in his mid-30s. He served as chair of the U.S.-Japan Investment Committee and helped lead negotiations over steel imports with Japan.

      In this role, Lighthizer had a front-row seat for what the economist Jagdish Bhagwati calls the “aggressive unilateralism” used by the Reagan administration to combat new competition. The characteristic tool of this style of governing trade was Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act, which allowed the United States to take retaliatory action against nations whose trade practices it deemed unfair or discriminatory. Rather than tariffs, the favored tool was the voluntary export restraint. While the primary targets were the rising East Asian economic powers of Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea, new special Section 301 measures introduced in 1988 were also used to threaten developing countries with retaliation if they failed to respect U.S. intellectual property provisions. Even as they broke with the (always fragile) consensus around multilateralism, such unilateral acts did serve specific U.S. interests, as the target countries often agreed to voluntarily restrict their exports to the United States to the advantage of local producers.

      Bhagwati read President Ronald Reagan’s use of executive action on trade as a symptom of what he called “diminished giant syndrome,” where the United States lashed out in fear of its loss of industrial dominance. While he disapproved of the method, Bhagwati acknowledged that these actions often functioned in the interest of opening markets, because fear of being hit by the stick of unilateral action compelled smaller economies to negotiate and settle trade agreements with the United States. Bhagwati and the economist Douglas Irwin described the approach elsewhere as “the return of the reciprocitarians,” comparing it to the “fair traders” of the late 19th century in Britain who also hoped to use trade deals to open new markets. Some see the creation of the WTO itself as the product of a negotiation in which other nations were cowed by the threat of U.S. unilateralism.

      Lighthizer returned to private law practice in 1985, and it’s easy to imagine the lessons he drew from his time in public office—namely, that aggressive unilateralism worked in international economics. Japan proved a pliant opponent—and one that, not incidentally, existed under the security umbrella of the United States, complete with a permanent military presence. Ever since, Lighthizer has worked to recode the Republican legacy on trade away from the model of multilateralism, which was indeed spearheaded by Democrats such as Cordell Hull, and toward the model represented by Reagan.

      Along the way, Lighthizer’s own views have only hardened; the 1990s were an especially formative influence on Lighthizerism. In the mid-1990s, Lighthizer was the main economic advisor to Bob Dole in the run-up to his GOP presidential candidacy. Defending a challenge from their right against the staunch sovereigntist Pat Buchanan, Lighthizer and Dole supported U.S. membership in the WTO but also pushed the idea of a separate panel of U.S. judges to review adverse cases and back up the threat of a U.S. departure from the organization if it was not functioning to their pleasure. After the creation of the WTO, however, Lighthizer appeared to regret his decision. In 2000, he testified before Congress with fellow lawyer Alan Wolff that the organization’s power overreached and represented a dangerous ability to trump U.S. law while also being inadequate to correct other nation’s “unfair trading practices.” He effectively reversed his position from 1995 and sided retroactively with Buchanan against the WTO. After Trump’s inauguration, Lighthizer became the new U.S. trade representative, and Wolff became a deputy director-general of the WTO itself.

      While Trump’s trade policy is sometimes compared to that of 1930s, an era of widespread fantasies of economic autarky, it is better understood (like so much about the current president) as a flashback to the 1980s. Lighthizer has been explicit about the comparison, even years before Trump’s campaign for president. In 2011, Lighthizer praised the reality television star’s “skepticism toward pure free-trade dogma” by appealing to his former boss. “The icon of modern conservatism, Ronald Reagan,” Lighthizer noted, “imposed quotas on imported steel, protected Harley-Davidson from Japanese competition, restrained import of semiconductors and automobiles, and took myriad similar steps to keep American industry strong.” The implication was clear: It was time to use the same playbook, with China playing the role of Japan.


      Robert Lighthizer speaks with former Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.) during his confirmation hearing in the Senate Finance Committee on March 14. Lighthizer was Dole’s economic adviser during his 1996 campaign for president. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images)
      The current crystallization of Lighthizerism can be seen as an attempt to restage the fight won against Japan and lost against the WTO. Many have observed correctly that U.S. discontent with the WTO is nothing new. The Obama administration had already blocked an appointment to the Dispute Settlement Board before Trump’s arrival. Voices including European Commissioner for Trade Cecilia Malmstrom and the Chinese themselves agree that the WTO should be reformed to account for the new reality of Chinese economic might and its eyebrow-raising record on protecting intellectual property rights.

      What makes Lighthizerism distinctive is the way it frames the solution. It does not propose a remedy, as the Europeans, Canadians, and Mexicans do, in fine-tuning the multilateral rules. Rather, it suggests taking a page from the playbook of what it sees as its main adversary: Chinese state capitalism.

      Lighthizer has been a vocal critic of the conventional wisdom about the democratizing influence of global trade that reigned from the mid-1990s until about a decade ago. In a 2010 testimony before Congress, he singled out Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history” argument for special contempt and noted that “U.S. policymakers had a profound confidence in the ultimate triumph of democracy and capitalism” after the Berlin Wall’s fall. “This confidence,” he said, “which can now be seen as hubris, encouraged many U.S. policymakers to believe that China would inevitably embrace democracy and capitalism.”

      Lighthizer chided U.S. policymakers for assuming that “acceding to the WTO would cause China to become more and more Western in its behavior—almost as if it were merely a more exotic version of Canada.” The obstacle Lighthizer perceived was a cultural one. “China’s inability to comply,” he concluded, “appears to be the result of deep forces in Chinese life.”

      In his testimony, Lighthizer referred to a contemporary piece by political analyst Ian Bremmer on the rise of state capitalism. In a 2009 Foreign Affairs article, Bremmer offered a shadow timeline for what has become known as the “rise of neoliberalism” since the 1970s. In Bremmer’s telling, the oil crisis early in that decade was a breakthrough moment for a trend toward the greater influence of states with intimate connections to corporate interests, with the state-owned oil companies of OPEC being the banner case. Whereas most historians would describe the decades that followed as a period when power tipped internationally from states to markets, Bremmer sees it differently. He argues that the economies such as India, Russia, Turkey, and Brazil that rose to prominence during the transformation of the global south and the post-communist world were united by an incomplete faith in the free market or the rule of law and a tendency to blur state and private interests. The rise of sovereign wealth funds in the early 2000s only deepened the fusion of public and private authority. The most important avatar of state capitalism was China, where the Chinese Communist Party used a high level of state ownership and support of private national champions to build up a domestic market to challenge traditional manufacturing superpowers.

      The United States was the positive foil for Bremmer, the putative home of robust dedication to the rule of law and a healthy distance between public and corporate interests (the revolving door between Wall Street and Washington notwithstanding). Lighthizer appears to have taken Bremmer’s analysis very closely to heart and shares his concern that state capitalism offers an unfair edge in competition with those unwilling to emulate it. He has made regular reference to China’s state capitalism in his testimony before Congress as U.S. trade representative and emphasized its coherence. “They have a system, and their system is challenging our system,” he insisted in last month’s testimony. In September 2017, he called Chinese state capitalism “a threat to the world trading system that is unprecedented.”

      The core of the Chinese threat is the loss of the U.S. edge in technology through what Lighthizer summarized in March as “forced technology transfer; of requiring licensing at less than economic value; of state capitalism, wherein they go in and buy technology in the United States in non-economic ways; and then, finally, of cybertheft.”

      To confront the Chinese threat, the United States under Lighthizer has dusted off the toolkit from the Reagan years. A Section 301 investigation initiated in August 2017 was completed in March of this year, paving the way to the first round of tariffs at 25 percent on one set of Chinese imports and 10 percent on another. Just last month, Trump asked Lighthizer to look into more than doubling the 10 percent to 25 percent, a measure that could come into force next month. The Financial Times observes that the trade war with China is “only just beginning.”

      What is Lighthizer’s game plan? The stated intention is to “protect our technology” by using the blunt instrument of tariffs until the Chinese changes its ways. “We want to get back to even,” he told Fox News Business in June, and “try to remove some of those structural barriers while at the same time opening up China.”

      If Lighthizer’s goal is to counter the long-term vision of Made in China 2025 with a long-term plan to keep the U.S. edge in technology, he faces the crucial obstacle of time. This was highlighted in the most heated exchange of last month’s testimony, between Lighthizer and Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, one of the youngest members of the Senate. “It seems to me we’re playing chicken with China,” Schatz observed, and “among [America’s disadvantages] are that they take a 50- or 100-year view. And we, because we’re a democracy, take a ‘every two years’ view.” The differing time horizon made the strategy of using tariffs to correct structural trade imbalances futile: “Why would you stare down a non-democracy?” Schatz asked, “How we have leverage in a situation where they have unending patience and we have almost none?”

      This cut to the heart of Lighthizer’s philosophy—and it left him with no good response. He conceded the point later in the testimony when he said that the Chinese “do take a longer view, which by the way, I think is the right view. To the extent we can, we ought to be taking it. I realize we have a political system that makes it difficult, but nonetheless, the reality is an awful lot of our senior politicians do take a long view.” He added, “We’re going to have a problem with China that’s going to go on for years.”

      Lighthizer’s mild Sinophobia manifests, as such intercultural attitudes often do, as a kind of China envy. It is only the apostrophized “senior politicians” (including, one presumes, Lighthizer himself) who are able to extend their time horizon as long as the Chinese. Lighthizer’s response also raised the question of whether his own philosophy is the opposite of state capitalism or a variety of it. Imposing tariffs by executive order performs the very detour around democratic decision-making that Lighthizer sees as the core of state capitalism and that, though injuring U.S. interests, has brought China tremendous wealth.

      As a philosophy of economic governance, Lighthizerism, because it is structured around the idea of interstate competition, bends toward state capitalism. It reserves for government executives the sovereign right to decide when economic rules bind and when they do not. Democratic accountability is an impediment, from this perspective: an unfair disadvantage that the adversary does not share. A cynic might observe that Lighthizer’s flaw is taking one page from the book of state capitalism without going further and suppressing the cyclical process of democratic elections itself; this would solve Schatz’s “two years” problem and give the tariffs time to have their effect. But there is no sign that Lighthizer has any notion of going this far.

      Even failing this last step, the rise of Lighthizerism suggests a new narrative of convergence—not to the hypothesized “end of history” that he so scorns, in which democracy and capitalism are imagined to flourish together harmoniously, but rather toward a globally minded state capitalism where aspects of the democratic process are routinely short-circuited in pursuit of a competitive edge. Whether this path will be taken might depend on the next round of that very confounding process of democracy in America’s midterm elections.


      Quinn Slobodian is the author of Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism.