*** 18-Jan-16 World View -- Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran
• Reader questions about Mideast country alignments

****
**** Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran
****


Saudi's defense minister visited Pakistan's Nawaz Sharif, but failed to get his support versus Iran. (AA)

Following Saturday's announcement that sanctions against Iran
are being lifted, tensions are continuing to increase between
Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Tensions turned to hostility earlier this month when Saudi Arabia
executed 47 alleged terrorists -- 46 Sunnis and one Shia, Mohammad
Baqir Nimr al-Nimr, infuriating Iran and Shias because it implied that
Shia terrorism is equivalent to Sunni terrorism. Iranian mobs
firebombed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, and attacked the consulate in
Meshaad. This led to the severance of multiple diplomatic and
commercial ties between Iran and several Saudi allies.

With sanctions lifted, Iran is now expected to flood the already
flooded markets with additional oil. With the price of oil now well
below $30 per barrel, Iran and Saudi Arabia are accusing each other
of trying to damage the oil-producing nations.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Chief of Army Staff (COAS)
General Raheel Sharif will visit Saudi Arabia on Monday and Iran on
Tuesday on a "peace mission" to "normalize" strained relations between
the two countries.

According to a Pakistani officials:

<QUOTE>"Pakistan is deeply concerned at the recent escalation
of tensions between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic
Republic of Iran. ... The purpose of the visit is to mediate and
to end the standoff between the two countries."<END QUOTE>

Pakistan is a mostly Sunni Muslim country with very close ties
to Saudi Arabia, including mutual promises of military support
when needed. Pakistan is also thought to have promised the Saudis
to provide them with nuclear technology to match Iran's nuclear
technology.

This would seem to mean that Pakistan's one-sided alliance makes them
an unlikely mediator. However, Pakistan can point to the fact that
it's refused to provide military support to the Saudis in their proxy
war with Iran in Yemen. Pakistan has diplomatically supported the
Saudis in that war, but when called upon by the Saudis to provide
troops, they refused, angering the Saudis.

Saudi Arabia's defense minister visited Nawaz Sharif last year,
with the objective of getting Pakistan's support in the conflict
with Iran, but he failed to do so. A Pakistani official said:

<QUOTE>"Our policy is clear. We will stay neutral in the
heightening tension between the two Muslim states.

Although we condemn Iranian interference in the internal affairs
of Saudi Arabia, including its reaction to Sheikh [Nimr Baqir]
al-Nimr's execution, still we will not be part of any military
offensive against any country in the region."<END QUOTE>

From the point of Generational Dynamics, there is absolutely no chance
whatsoever to "normalize relations" or "end the standoff" between the
two countries. Daily Times (Pakistan) and Pakistan Today and AFP and Anadolu Agency (Turkey)

****
**** Reader questions about Mideast country alignments
****

Two days ago, we wrote about the trending Mideast alignments,
with "the two main world powers,
America and Russia, tilting towards the Shiite bloc of Iran, Iraq,
Syria and Hezbollah versus the Saudi-led lineup of the United Arab
Emirates, Egypt, Turkey and Pakistan," which is the alignment that
Generational Dynamics has been predicting for years. I suggested that
any analyst, politician, army general, or college professor whose job
depends on knowing what's going on in the world would do well
to study generational theory.

Readers have asked several questions:

<QUOTE>Question: You've said that Generational Dynamics has
been predicting for years that Iran would become an ally of the
United States. Now that it's happening, it appears to be Obama's
doing. Would there have been a nuclear deal if Mitt Romney had
been elected president in 2012?<END QUOTE>

Iran's rapprochement with the West is not coming from Obama, but from
the Iranian people themselves. In the article "9-Nov-15 World View -- Political crisis in Iran grows over nuclear agreement"
, I included in some excerpts from
articles in the early 2000s that I had saved in my archive. The
articles described large pro-Western protests by college students
who had grown up after the 1979 Great Islamic Revolution. The
news stories described how Iran's security forces used violence
to crush the protests.

Today, the college students in that generation are now 30-40 years
old, and have moved into positions of power. As they've grown up,
they did not change their minds and adopted the harsh hardline views
of the old geezers who survived the 1979 revolution. Instead, they're
tired of being told what to do by the revolution survivors, and they
want to rejoin the modern world. Those are the ones that bringing
about Iran's rapprochement with the West.

Every day that goes by, more and more of the revolution survivors
die off, and more and more of those college students replace them
in positions of power. This means that more and more people in
Iran

So if Romney were president, the same kind of thing would have
happened, though of course with a different scenario. For example, it
might have been a kind of "President Richard Nixon goes to China"
thing, where the news reports at the time in the early 1970s said that
only a Republican could have gone to China because Americans would
have protested too much if a Democrat had tried it. Well, in this
case it's Obama who "went to Iran," and there have been a lot of
protests, but if Romney were president, he too would not have missed
the opportunity for rapprochement with Iran, just as Nixon did with
China.

<QUOTE>Question: What about Europe? Will all the European
countries align with the U.S.?<END QUOTE>

The European Union is facing two major existential crises.
One is the financial crisis, which has raged for years, especially
in Greece, but is currently in remission. The other is
the flood of migrants and refugees coming from Asia, the Mideast
and northern Africa, numbering in the millions. This is
ongoing, and will almost certain surge again when the weather
improves in the Spring.

These two crises have exposed fault lines in Europe, even to the point
where border controls are being reimposed. But no fault lines have so
far risen to so high a level that war is threatened.

If we look at history, there's been a great deal of animosity
between England and France, with many examples since 1066. But
Britain and France were allies against Germany in World War II.

Another issue is the role of Turkey and Russia in Europe. In WW I,
Turkey was allied with Germany while Russia was allied with France.
Today, the hostility between Turkey and Russia is palpable, and
they'll certainly be fighting each other, as they have many times the
in past centuries.

So does that mean that Germany and France will follow Turkey and
Russia, and be at war with each other? It doesn't seem plausible
today, but stranger things have happened.

This question could be answered in greater detail with
resources beyond what are available to me. This would involve,
for example, research to determine changes in attitudes of
the people of each European country, on a month to month basis,
to see how they're trending, and how people are responding
to various events.

<QUOTE>Question: How does Generational Dynamics interpret the
rising tide of anti-immigration parties springing up in Europe? It
seems that the people are starting to resist, just like
here.<END QUOTE>

I've written about this subject before -- the general rise of
nationalism and xenophobia around the world in this generational
Crisis era. The survivors of World War II saw that much of what
happened had its roots in the same kind of nationalism and xenophobia,
and decided that it must never happen again. The whole "European
project" that led to the formation of the European Union was exactly
for that purpose. But it didn't work, because now the same
nationalism and xenophobia are growing again anyway. The recent
reported incidents of alleged sexual assaults by Muslim migrants are
particularly explosive, and may motivate further violence.

In yesterday's story about the Taiwan election,
I included news about a 16 year old girl was forced to
apologize for waving a Taiwanese flag. The forced apology infuriated
the Taiwanese people, and appears to have influenced the election in
favor of Taiwanese independence. This is an example of
how an incident can incite a mob to vote a certain way.

During a generational Crisis era, once the scene has been set with two
ethnic or religious groups becoming increasingly belligerent towards
each other, and start blaming each other for the world's problems, any
sort of crisis could mobilize mobs of people to violence. We've seen
intermittent examples of this in countries like Egypt and Burma, as
well a several countries in the Mideast. Throughout history, major
wars often began with exactly these kinds of increasing mob violence.


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mohammad Baqir Nimr al-Nimr,
Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, Raheel Sharif, Yemen,
China, Richard Nixon, Mitt Romney, Germany, France, Turkey, Russia

Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

*** 18-Jan-16 World View -- Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran
• Reader questions about Mideast country alignments

****
**** Pakistan tries to mediate between Saudi Arabia and Iran
****


Saudi's defense minister visited Pakistan's Nawaz Sharif, but failed to get his support versus Iran. (AA)

Following Saturday's announcement that sanctions against Iran
are being lifted, tensions are continuing to increase between
Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Tensions turned to hostility earlier this month when Saudi Arabia
executed 47 alleged terrorists -- 46 Sunnis and one Shia, Mohammad
Baqir Nimr al-Nimr, infuriating Iran and Shias because it implied that
Shia terrorism is equivalent to Sunni terrorism. Iranian mobs
firebombed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, and attacked the consulate in
Meshaad. This led to the severance of multiple diplomatic and
commercial ties between Iran and several Saudi allies.

With sanctions lifted, Iran is now expected to flood the already
flooded markets with additional oil. With the price of oil now well
below $30 per barrel, Iran and Saudi Arabia are accusing each other
of trying to damage the oil-producing nations.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Chief of Army Staff (COAS)
General Raheel Sharif will visit Saudi Arabia on Monday and Iran on
Tuesday on a "peace mission" to "normalize" strained relations between
the two countries.

According to a Pakistani officials:

<QUOTE>"Pakistan is deeply concerned at the recent escalation
of tensions between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic
Republic of Iran. ... The purpose of the visit is to mediate and
to end the standoff between the two countries."<END QUOTE>

Pakistan is a mostly Sunni Muslim country with very close ties
to Saudi Arabia, including mutual promises of military support
when needed. Pakistan is also thought to have promised the Saudis
to provide them with nuclear technology to match Iran's nuclear
technology.

This would seem to mean that Pakistan's one-sided alliance makes them
an unlikely mediator. However, Pakistan can point to the fact that
it's refused to provide military support to the Saudis in their proxy
war with Iran in Yemen. Pakistan has diplomatically supported the
Saudis in that war, but when called upon by the Saudis to provide
troops, they refused, angering the Saudis.

Saudi Arabia's defense minister visited Nawaz Sharif last year,
with the objective of getting Pakistan's support in the conflict
with Iran, but he failed to do so. A Pakistani official said:

<QUOTE>"Our policy is clear. We will stay neutral in the
heightening tension between the two Muslim states.

Although we condemn Iranian interference in the internal affairs
of Saudi Arabia, including its reaction to Sheikh [Nimr Baqir]
al-Nimr's execution, still we will not be part of any military
offensive against any country in the region."<END QUOTE>

From the point of Generational Dynamics, there is absolutely no chance
whatsoever to "normalize relations" or "end the standoff" between the
two countries. Daily Times (Pakistan) and Pakistan Today and AFP and Anadolu Agency (Turkey)

****
**** Reader questions about Mideast country alignments
****

Two days ago, we wrote about the trending Mideast alignments,
with "the two main world powers,
America and Russia, tilting towards the Shiite bloc of Iran, Iraq,
Syria and Hezbollah versus the Saudi-led lineup of the United Arab
Emirates, Egypt, Turkey and Pakistan," which is the alignment that
Generational Dynamics has been predicting for years. I suggested that
any analyst, politician, army general, or college professor whose job
depends on knowing what's going on in the world would do well
to study generational theory.

Readers have asked several questions:

<QUOTE>Question: You've said that Generational Dynamics has
been predicting for years that Iran would become an ally of the
United States. Now that it's happening, it appears to be Obama's
doing. Would there have been a nuclear deal if Mitt Romney had
been elected president in 2012?<END QUOTE>

Iran's rapprochement with the West is not coming from Obama, but from
the Iranian people themselves. In the article "9-Nov-15 World View -- Political crisis in Iran grows over nuclear agreement"
, I included in some excerpts from
articles in the early 2000s that I had saved in my archive. The
articles described large pro-Western protests by college students
who had grown up after the 1979 Great Islamic Revolution. The
news stories described how Iran's security forces used violence
to crush the protests.

Today, the college students in that generation are now 30-40 years
old, and have moved into positions of power. As they've grown up,
they did not change their minds and adopted the harsh hardline views
of the old geezers who survived the 1979 revolution. Instead, they're
tired of being told what to do by the revolution survivors, and they
want to rejoin the modern world. Those are the ones that bringing
about Iran's rapprochement with the West.

Every day that goes by, more and more of the revolution survivors
die off, and more and more of those college students replace them
in positions of power. This means that more and more people in
Iran

So if Romney were president, the same kind of thing would have
happened, though of course with a different scenario. For example, it
might have been a kind of "President Richard Nixon goes to China"
thing, where the news reports at the time in the early 1970s said that
only a Republican could have gone to China because Americans would
have protested too much if a Democrat had tried it. Well, in this
case it's Obama who "went to Iran," and there have been a lot of
protests, but if Romney were president, he too would not have missed
the opportunity for rapprochement with Iran, just as Nixon did with
China.

<QUOTE>Question: What about Europe? Will all the European
countries align with the U.S.?<END QUOTE>

The European Union is facing two major existential crises.
One is the financial crisis, which has raged for years, especially
in Greece, but is currently in remission. The other is
the flood of migrants and refugees coming from Asia, the Mideast
and northern Africa, numbering in the millions. This is
ongoing, and will almost certain surge again when the weather
improves in the Spring.

These two crises have exposed fault lines in Europe, even to the point
where border controls are being reimposed. But no fault lines have so
far risen to so high a level that war is threatened.

If we look at history, there's been a great deal of animosity
between England and France, with many examples since 1066. But
Britain and France were allies against Germany in World War II.

Another issue is the role of Turkey and Russia in Europe. In WW I,
Turkey was allied with Germany while Russia was allied with France.
Today, the hostility between Turkey and Russia is palpable, and
they'll certainly be fighting each other, as they have many times the
in past centuries.

So does that mean that Germany and France will follow Turkey and
Russia, and be at war with each other? It doesn't seem plausible
today, but stranger things have happened.

This question could be answered in greater detail with
resources beyond what are available to me. This would involve,
for example, research to determine changes in attitudes of
the people of each European country, on a month to month basis,
to see how they're trending, and how people are responding
to various events.

<QUOTE>Question: How does Generational Dynamics interpret the
rising tide of anti-immigration parties springing up in Europe? It
seems that the people are starting to resist, just like
here.<END QUOTE>

I've written about this subject before -- the general rise of
nationalism and xenophobia around the world in this generational
Crisis era. The survivors of World War II saw that much of what
happened had its roots in the same kind of nationalism and xenophobia,
and decided that it must never happen again. The whole "European
project" that led to the formation of the European Union was exactly
for that purpose. But it didn't work, because now the same
nationalism and xenophobia are growing again anyway. The recent
reported incidents of alleged sexual assaults by Muslim migrants are
particularly explosive, and may motivate further violence.

In yesterday's story about the Taiwan election,
I included news about a 16 year old girl was forced to
apologize for waving a Taiwanese flag. The forced apology infuriated
the Taiwanese people, and appears to have influenced the election in
favor of Taiwanese independence. This is an example of
how an incident can incite a mob to vote a certain way.

During a generational Crisis era, once the scene has been set with two
ethnic or religious groups becoming increasingly belligerent towards
each other, and start blaming each other for the world's problems, any
sort of crisis could mobilize mobs of people to violence. We've seen
intermittent examples of this in countries like Egypt and Burma, as
well a several countries in the Mideast. Throughout history, major
wars often began with exactly these kinds of increasing mob violence.


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mohammad Baqir Nimr al-Nimr,
Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, Raheel Sharif, Yemen,
China, Richard Nixon, Mitt Romney, Germany, France, Turkey, Russia

Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal

Pakistan is in a strange position. While Pakistan is mostly Sunni and has evolved in a direction closer to Wahabism, Pakistan is not only 16% Shia but that Shia population includes much of Pakistan's landowning class. And Pakistan needs oil (and gas for power generation) and can get it far more easily Iran by pipeline than from the Arab Gulf. Moreover, if Pakistan turns too much against Iran, Pakistan turns Iran toward India.
Which is why Pakistan is in a state of tension. Pakistan has not been growing fast enough to damp down jihadism. While the current ruling class favours Iran, Pakistan remains vulnerable to jihadism, both among it's Pushtun population and in the south of Punjab due to Tehrek-i Taleban. The Taleban takeover of Swat and it's aftermath, in which Taleban retains a strong infrastructure points up Pakistan's continuing vulnerability to Salafism.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

> Pakistan is in a strange position. While Pakistan is mostly Sunni
> and has evolved in a direction closer to Wahabism, Pakistan is not
> only 16% Shia but that Shia population includes much of Pakistan's
> landowning class. And Pakistan needs oil (and gas for power
> generation) and can get it far more easily Iran by pipeline than
> from the Arab Gulf. Moreover, if Pakistan turns too much against
> Iran, Pakistan turns Iran toward India.

> Which is why Pakistan is in a state of tension. Pakistan has not
> been growing fast enough to damp down jihadism. While the current
> ruling class favours Iran, Pakistan remains vulnerable to
> jihadism, both among it's Pushtun population and in the south of
> Punjab due to Tehrek-i Taleban. The Taleban takeover of Swat and
> it's aftermath, in which Taleban retains a strong infrastructure
> points up Pakistan's continuing vulnerability to Salafism.

That's a good analysis. How do you know so much about Pakistan?

*** 19-Jan-16 World View -- Tajikistan's bitter split with Iran tempts it to side with Saudi Arabia

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Tajikistan splits with Iran over invitation to alleged terrorist
• Tajikistan considers turning from Iran to Saudi Arabia

****
**** Tajikistan splits with Iran over invitation to alleged terrorist
****


Iran's Supreme Leader meets with alleged anti-Tajik terrorist Muhiddin Kabiri in Tehran on January 4

Tajikistan has reason to have good relations with both Iran and Saudi
Arabia. The Tajik people are of the same ethnic Persian descent as
the people of Iran, and the Tajik language is a dialect of Persian.
On the other hand, Tajikistan's people are mostly Sunni Muslims,
unlike the Shia Muslims of Iran, but like the Sunni Muslims of Saudi
Arabia.

Tajikistan and Iran have had close relations for many years. Iran
needs Tajikistan as a gateway for trade into Central Asia, and Iran
has invested millions of dollars in commercial and infrastructure
projects in Tajikistan.

However, things went awry in December, when Iran infuriated
Tajikistan's president Emomali Rahmon by inviting Muhiddin Kabiri,
leader of the Tajikistan's opposition party, the Islamic Renaissance
Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), to attend an "Islamic Unity" conference,
held in Tehran on December 27-29, 2015.

Tajikistan went through a generational crisis civil war from 1992-97.
The IRPT played an important part in the civil war, which left tens of
thousands dead and more than 1 million people displaced. There was a
peace agreement in 1997, but it left many divisions unresolved.
According to one estimate, Tajikistan's government effectively
controls only 30% of the country.

Whatever was left of the peace agreement began to unravel in April of
last year, when Gen. Gulmurod Khalimov, the head of Tajikistan's
national Special Assignment Police Unit defected to the the so-called
Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh). In May of last year, a
YouTube video of Khalimov appeared, in which he threatened:

<QUOTE>"Listen, you dogs, the president and ministers. If
only you knew how many boys, our brothers are here, waiting and
yearning to return to reestablish Sharia [Islamic] law [in
Tajikistan]. ... We are coming to you, God willing, we are coming
to you with slaughter .... Listen, you American pigs, I’ve been to
America three times, and I saw how you train fighters to kill
Muslims. God willing, I will come with this weapon to your cities,
your homes, and we will kill you."<END QUOTE>

According to a report by the Crisis Group, this spectacular defection
by Khalimov shows the growing appear of violent radical Islam, and
that the president Rahmon may no longer know who can be trusted in his
own government. According to the report:

<QUOTE>"Since the civil war’s end, Rahmon has tried to
marginalize and eliminate opponents, a tendency now gaining
momentum. In turn, his government’s draconian responses to what in
the society is not firmly under its control, such as dissent and
Islam, are creating a backlash."<END QUOTE>

According to the Norway-based human rights organization Forum 18
Rahmon is reacting to the threat from ISIS by cracking down on all
expressions of religion, including:

<QUOTE>"[A] ban on all exercise of freedom of religion or
belief without state permission; severe limitations on the numbers
of mosques permitted and activities allowed inside those mosques;
the banning of Central Asia's only legal religious-based political
party, the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), and the
arrest of its senior party figures as prisoners of conscience;
forcing imams in state-controlled mosques to preach state-dictated
sermons; forcible closure of all madrasahs (Islamic religious
schools); a ban on all public exercise of freedom of religion or
belief, apart from funerals, by people under the age of 18; and
state censorship of and bans on some religious literature and
websites."<END QUOTE>

A law was also approved banning children under 18 from attending
Friday prayers.

Rahmon is following a generational pattern that we've seen repeated in
one country after another in the years following the end of a
generational crisis civil war between two ethnic or religious groups
within the country. In Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe from the Shona tribe
conducted a massive genocide of his political enemies from the Ndebele
tribe. In Syria, Shia/Alawite president Bashar al-Assad began in 2011
committing war crimes and genocide against peacefully protesting
Sunnis. In Burundi and Sri Lanka, the leaders are just beginning on a
similar path. ( "14-Jan-16 World View -- Report: Sri Lankan government repeatedly torturing and raping Tamils"
)

It's thought that this harsh crackdown might be counterproductive, in
that it will encourage Islamist radicals. EurasiaNet and The Diplomat and Crisis Group and Daily Sabah (Turkey) and Forum 18

****
**** Tajikistan considers turning from Iran to Saudi Arabia
****

In 2015, the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT) was
declared illegal, and its leader Muhiddin Kabiri was declared a
terrorist by the government. And so, Iran's invitation to Kabiri to
attend the December "Islamic Unity" conference in Tehran. On December
29, Kabiri even met with Iran's Supreme Leader Seyed Ali Khamenei.

Some Tajik officials blame Iran for instigating the destructive civil
war that took place in Tajikistan in the 1990s. Now Tajikistan has
accused Iran of inviting "the head of a terrorist party suspected of
mounting an attempted overthrow of the government" to its conference.
A Tajik official asked:

<QUOTE>"How it is possible for the leader of a party that has
repeatedly ordered violent acts and killings to speak about unity
and Muslim brotherhood? Iran has always spoken of Tajikistan as a
brotherly nation with a shared faith and culture. How it is then
possible to welcome a terrorist?"<END QUOTE>

Another official called Kabiri a "traitor," and accused Iran of
"openly [supporting] the enemies of the Tajik nation." These claims
by Tajikistan have been discredited internationally, including by the
United States.

However, these claims are driven by the same kinds of emotions and
desire for revenge that we've described in the leadership of Zimbabwe,
Syria, Burundi and Sri Lanka.

Tajikistan's president Emomali Rahmon paid a visit on January 2-4 to
Saudi Arabia. The trip was undoubtedly planned months before the
disputes with Iran began, but with both the Saudis and Tajiks in
disputes with Iran, events gave the visit a symbolic meaning.

The meeting was presumably about combatting ISIS, and the possibility
of Tajikistan joining the Saudi-led 34-member Anti-Terrorist
Coalition, which would effectively align Tajikistan with the Saudis in
the growing tension with Iran. The Tajiks have apparently chosen not
to join the coalition, partially because Tajikistan has close
relations with Russia, and Russia opposes the Saudi coalition.

In fact, Tajikistan is depending on Russian troops to protect its long
border with Afghanistan from Islamist terror infiltrators. ( "29-Sep-15 World View -- Afghan Taliban capture of Kunduz has major repercussions for Central Asia"

Tajikistan's economy is desperately on the ropes. In the past, Iran
has invested more in Tajikistan than Saudi Arabia has. Now, the
Saudis are suggesting that they'll invest more. But the Saudi economy
is in difficulty because of the collapse of oil prices, while Iran is
at its peak in regional influence because of the nuclear accord and
because it's receiving billions of dollars in sanctions relief.

For those reasons, most observers believe that, despite the bitterly
vitriolic dispute between the two countries, Tajikistan will decide to
"follow the money," and choose Iran over Saudi Arabia. Jamestown and EurasiaNet and RFE/RL and EurasiaNet (30-Dec-2015)


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Tajikistan, Emomali Rahmon, Iran,
Muhiddin Kabiri, Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan, IRPT,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Gulmurod Khalimov, Seyed Ali Khamenei, Saudi Arabia

Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal

Originally Posted by Cynic Hero '86

> We WOULD be much better off if we ruled by fear rather than the
> cooperation of the past 25 years. Events since 9/11 in the
> Mideast, Eastern Europe and in the Pacific have shown that
> globalist cooperation just does not work. Policy should be based
> on pragmatic expediencies not boomer ideological delusions.

So we know from the "China 45% tariff" issue that Trump doesn't know
what's going on in the world, doesn't understand international trade,
is a panderer and a liar. I don't see how this translates into "ruled
by fear." It's more like "ruled by buffoon." Who's afraid of a
buffoon?

It seems to me that you'd be better off supporting Bernie Sanders. He
always says exactly what he means, and doesn't change his mind
depending on how the wind blows. Even Bill O'Reilly loves him because
"he answers every question." It seems to me that this makes him a
better choice for you than Trump.

Of course, Bernie Sanders is a total loony tune who should be locked
up before he does any more damage. But that too is another reason why
he deserves your support.

So I think you should consider switching sides.

*** 20-Jan-16 World View -- Germany's Angela Merkel under pressure to restrict migrants

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Germany's Angela Merkel under pressure to restrict migrants
• Puerto Rico's debt problem even worse than expected

****
**** Germany's Angela Merkel under pressure to restrict migrants
****


Anti-Merkel rally. Sign reads: Merkel, take your Muslims with you ... and get lost!!!' (Der Spiegel)

With her poll numbers falling and regional elections scheduled for
March, members of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU)
political party of Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel are pressuring
her to reverse her policy on migrants. According to the dissenting
deputies:

<QUOTE>"In light of the developments in recent months, we can
no longer speak of a great challenge -- we are on the verge of our
country being overwhelmed. ...

We do not want to divide the CDU parliamentary group -- we are
only asking for the law to be applied."<END QUOTE>

"The law" in this case is the European Union's Dublin asylum
regulations, which say that refugees must seek asylum in the first
member country that they land in. In that case, any refugee reaching
Germany would already have been processed in Greece or Italy, and
those not qualifying for asylum would already have been deported.

Germany has had to deal with an influx of 1.1 million migrants
in 2015, and thousands are still arriving despite the winter
weather. That volume may increase substantially when the
warm Spring weather arrives.

The recent reported incidents of hundreds of alleged sexual assaults by Muslim migrants in Cologne on New Year's Eve
have been explosive, and increased pressure on Merkel.

Merkel has suggested several solutions. She has attempted to persuade
other EU countries to take in quotas of refugees, and she has pushed
for reception centers to be built on Europe's external borders and for
Turkey to be paid to keep refugees from entering Europe. However,
none of these solutions has work.

On the other hand, the solution proposed by CDU party dissidents may
not work any better. If 5,000-10,000 migrants arrive every day in
Greece, then it will be impossible to process that many asylum
applicants, and attempts to prevent them from surging northward may
result in violence and become politically impossible.

In other words, the migration of millions of refugees from Asia, the
Mideast and Africa into Europe may be an unstoppable historic force of
nature. AFP and Der Spiegel and Gwynne Dwyer

****
**** Puerto Rico's debt problem even worse than expected
****

Puerto Rico's government issued a new report saying that the
territory's financial situation is worse than the previous estimate,
made in September of last year, and that its deficit estimate over the
next five years has widened to $16 billion from $14 billion since
September. The debt deficit has occurred due to lower than expected
tax collections. This means that Puerto Rico will not be able to
reduce its $70 billion debt load, but that in fact it will increase.
The governor has said that it's in a "death spiral."

Many officials were surprised that Puerto Rico was able to make most
of the bond payments that were due on January 4, but it did that by
delaying over $100 million in tax refunds and not paying government
suppliers. Puerto Rico faces a $923 million negative cash balance in
June just as the commonwealth and its agencies must pay $2 billion in
principal and interest July 1. The cash crunch is so bad that Puerto
Rico's prison system is no longer paying the vendor that supplies food
for inmates, and some special education instructors have stopped
getting paid.

According to Puerto Rican Secretary of State Victor Suar the welfare
of the citizens of Puerto Rico is at risk, because the government
cannot deliver proper public services:

<QUOTE>"The failure of the government to make timely payments
for the delivery and provision of essential government services is
putting at risk the health, welfare and safety of the people of
Puerto Rico. ...

Continuation of these measures is neither sustainable nor in the
interest of any stakeholder, as they will only deepen the
financial gaps that the commonwealth and its creditors will need
to resolve."<END QUOTE>

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has promised some action on Puerto
Rico by the end of March. Still, many Republican members of Congress
and some creditor groups have been leaning on Puerto Rico do more to
pay its loans without restructuring its debt. They say the island
should further cut government spending, tighten its administrative
processes and look into privatizing government property before asking
creditors to take a hit. Latin One and Bloomberg and Washington Post and Government Development Bank for Puerto Rico


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Germany, Angela Merkel,
Christian Democratic Union, CDU,
Puerto Rico, Victor Suar, Paul Ryan

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*** 21-Jan-16 World View -- Azerbaijan forced to choose between Russia and Turkey

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Azerbaijan forced to choose between Russia and Turkey
• Azerbaijan becomes the hub of the Caspian Trade Corridor, part of the new Silk Road

****
**** Azerbaijan forced to choose between Russia and Turkey
****


Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and Saudi King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud

Within the past couple of months, two major fault lines have developed
and widened in Eurasia: Russia versus Turkey and Iran versus Saudi
Arabia. These developments have forced a number of countries in the
region (and beyond) to make choices between two sides where this
hadn't been necessary before. We've written articles on the mediation
issues facing Tajikistan
and Pakistan
and various Sunni countries
and the United States
.

In addition, there's the two-year-old growing Russia versus Ukraine
fault line.

Azerbaijan is thickly involved in all of these major fault lines
because of its strategic location and because its interdependencies:

• Azerbaijanis are ethnically Turkic, and the country has very
  close relations with Turkey.
• About one-quarter to one-third of the Iranian population are
  ethnic Azerbaijanis.
• There are two million Azerbaijanis living in Russia, either as
  citizens or as guest workers.
• The Azerbaijani and Turkish languages are close, and mutually
  comprehensible. The Azerbaijanis in Iran and Russia speak an
  Azerbaijani dialect, though it's discouraged in Iran.

Azerbaijan is officially neutral in the dispute between Turkey and
Russia, but Azerbaijan has two major flash points with Russia.

First, Azerbaijan has military treaties with Turkey. Azerbaijani and
Turkish Armed Forces regularly conduct joint military exercises, and
two are planned in 2016.

Second, Azerbaijanis living in Russia are pressuring the Russian
government to abandon plans to pass a law making it illegal for any
individual to deny that Turkey committed genocide against the
Armenians in 1915. Armenia is an enemy of both Turkey and Azerbaijan.
30 leaders of Azerbaijani organizations in Russia, apparently
organized by Azerbaijan's government, demanded that that the law be
withdrawn, pointing out that the Russian government had refused to
acknowledge that the Hojali massacres in 1992 were a “genocide” of
Azerbaijanis by Armenian forces. One Russian official called the
demand a "stab in the back," because it threatened to "challenge the
law in the courts of international human rights."

People who think we're still living in the 1990s are expecting
everyone to come to their senses, and for all of these fault lines to
dissolve, so that things can return to "normal" again. But this is a
generational Crisis era, when fault lines widen rather than dissolve.
It probably won't be long before a new fault line between Russia and
Azerbaijan develops, and they start imposing sanctions on each other.
APA (Azerbeijan) and Rubin Center (Israel) and Jamestown and Regnum.ru (12-Dec - Trans)

****
**** Azerbaijan becomes the hub of the Caspian Trade Corridor, part of the new Silk Road
****


The Caspian Trade Corridor is part of the New Silk Road connecting Asia with Europe

In ancient times the Silk Road, a complex road network, was the most
favored transport route between China and Europe. In recent centuries
it lost its importance because of new developments in maritime
technologies which led to cheaper and higher-volume seaborne trade.

But with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, and the rise of China
in world trade, there has been interest in a "New Silk Road" for about
20 years.

With all the fault lines widening and sanctions being imposed in
Eurasia, a number of trade routes between Asia and Europe have been
closed, the New Silk Road concept has become more urgent, and this has
presented a kind of opportunity to Azerbaijan to become the hub of a
new collection of trade routes known as the "Caspian Trade Corridor."

China and Ukraine are important trading partners, and if China wants
to ship goods to Ukraine, they can try shipping through the India
Ocean and risk meeting pirates, or they can ship overland through Iran
or Russia, and risk being stopped by sanctions.

Even more important, 40% of the world's exported oil passes through
the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz. Some 50,000 ships go
through the Strait each year, making it a major choke point in
international trade. Even a brief blockage would have major negative
effects on the international energy markets.

For these reasons, the concept of a "Caspian Trade Corridor" has been
discussed internationally for almost twenty years, but now with
tensions growing throughout Eurasia, the discussions are becoming more
urgent, to provide alternate trading routes.

The plan is to develop infrastructure within the Caspian Sea to
effectively connect Central Asia to the Caucasus region. Goods can
travel overland from India and China through Central Asia by truck and
railway, to a port on the Caspian Sea. From there, the goods are
ferried across the Caspian Sea to a port in Azerbaijan. From there,
they can travel overland again, through Georgia, Turkey, and then into
Europe, including Ukraine.

Turkey expects to benefit greatly from the Caspian Corridor. Turkish
trucks that used to travel overland through Georgia, Russia and
Kazakhstan are now being blocked from entering Russia. However,
Turkey has yet to complete 76 kilometers of a railway that will
connect Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan. It's now considered urgent to
complete this railway line as quickly as possible.

Azerbaijan’s Port of Baku is converting Baku into a logistic hub.
Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan are building high capacity ports on the
Caspian Sea, and are investing in marine transport vessels.

Turkish officials expect the Caspian Corridor through Azerbaijan and
the Caspian Sea to actually be cheaper than existing routes, and to
give Turkey the opportunity to open new markets in Central Asia and
China. Jamestown and Euro Dialog (2014) and Daily Sabah (Istanbul) and Haldun Yavas (Istanbul, 9-Dec-2015)


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Azerbaijan, Iran, Russia, Turkey,
Caspian Trade Corridor, New Silk Road, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan,
Iran, Strait of Hormuz, Persian Gulf, Georgia,
Armenian genocide, Hojali massacres

Permanent web link to this article
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Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal

From June 29, 2007:

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

> $2.2M is a hell of a lot of money. If some ordinary person wanted
> to spend that kind of money for polonium, it would be noticed by a
> lot of people. If some private individual had spent $2.2M for
> polonium in the period prior to Litvinenko's death, there's no
> doubt in my mind that we'd know about it today.

> So in fact I DO claim that, yes, no one outside of a government
> nuclear institution could come up with that kind of money AND AND
> AND could use it to buy a lethal dose of polonium.

> So then you have to get to motivation. Who would be motivated to
> pay that kind of money and make those kinds of arrangements to
> kill Litvinenko? The obvious answer is Putin.

Originally Posted by NBC News

> Vladimir Putin Likely Approved Murder of Alexander Litvinenko:
> Inquiry

> Jan 21 2016, 5:19 am ET

> LONDON — Russian President Vladimir Putin likely personally
> approved the nuclear murder of ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko, a
> British judge ruled Thursday. ...

> After a six-month public inquiry, a British judge ruled that
> Litvinenko was murdered on the orders of Russia's FSB security
> agency — and that the action was "probably approved" by Putin.

> It is the first time British authorities have made a formal direct
> link between Russia's government and the dissident's slow
> death.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/vl...nquiry-n500996

*** 22-Jan-16 World View -- Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'
• The European Central Bank saves the stock markets for another day

****
**** Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'
****


Clown carrying sign 'Sieg Fail' to make fun of Soldiers of Odin, whose leader is a neo-Nazi

A group of clowns has taken to the streets of the town of Tampere in
Finland to make fun of a new group of anti-migrant vigilantes called
the "Soldiers of Odin," named after a war-like Norse god.

The vigilante group was formed late last year in the northern Finland
town of Kemi, near the point on the border which has become an entry
point for migrants arriving from Sweden. They wear black jackets, and
run street patrols carrying carry signs saying things like "Migrants
not welcome." Police have received complaints that they've approached
migrants, and also citizens whom they've accused of being migrants,
and harassed them and threatened them with violence.

After the recent reported incidents of hundreds of alleged sexual assaults by Muslim migrants in Cologne on New Year's Eve,
The Soldiers of Odin have spread to
other towns, and similar groups have sprung up in other countries.
Most Finns oppose them, but they've received qualified support from
the nationalist Finns Party, and they've been increasing in popularity
since the New Year's Eve incidents.

In the Finnish town of Tampere on Saturday night, the Soldiers of Odin
street patrols were met by a group of clowns calling themselves the
"LOLdiers of Odin," where LOL stands for "laughing out loud."

The vigilante group named themselves after the mythical Norse god Odin
who was highly war-like. However, Odin did not end well. At the time
of the cataclysmic Ragnarök between the giants and the gods, Odin
fought with the enormous wolf Fenrir. Fenrir killed Odin and
swallowed him. Fenrir also swallowed the earth and sun. After the
Ragnarök ended, everything was destroyed, and the world had to be
recreated. Think of it as the mythological analog to World War III.
Helsinki Times and BBC
and Helsinki Times and Daily Sabah (Turkey) and Encyclopedia Mythica

****
**** The European Central Bank saves the stock markets for another day
****

After several days of frightening plunges in markets in Asia, Europe
and North America, things settled down a bit on Thursday after Mario
Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank (ECB), suggested
that massive new quantitative easing (QE) would begin again in March,
and that there will be "no limits" to how far he will go.

There have been trillions of dollars of "printed money" in the form of
quantitative easing from central banks around the world, including the
ECB, the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve, and the Bank of Japan.
However, this tsunami of money has only ended up in the accounts of
banks and hedge funds, and it's pushed up stock markets well into
bubble territory. As these bubbles now seem to be imploding, the ECB
has promised more and more liquidity to try to keep them blown up.
The Bank of Japan is preparing to boost currency stimulus next week.

One side effect is that the US dollar continues to get stronger and
stronger. This is related to the fact that the Fed has ended its QE
program. Thus, after Draghi's announcement, the value of the euro
fell 0.3% against the dollar, while the yen fell 0.2%. Both
currencies are set for their biggest weekly drops this year.

However, these desperate attempts to keep the bubbles from imploding
may be nearing an end, according to William White, the Swiss-based
chairman of the OECD's review committee and former chief economist of
the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). According to White:

<QUOTE>"The situation is worse than it was in 2007. Our
macroeconomic ammunition to fight downturns is essentially all
used up. ...

Debts have continued to build up over the last eight years and
they have reached such levels in every part of the world that they
have become a potent cause for mischief."<END QUOTE>

According to White, combined public and private debt has surged to
all-time highs to 185% of GDP in emerging markets and to 265% of GDP
in the OECD countries, both up by 35 percentage points since the
beginning of the last financial crisis in 2007.

European banks have already admitted to $1 trillion of non-performing
loans: they are heavily exposed to emerging markets and are almost
certainly already rolling over further bad debts that have never been
disclosed.

According to White, who predicted the 2007-2008 financial crisis:

<QUOTE>"It will become obvious in the next recession that
many of these debts will never be serviced or repaid, and this
will be uncomfortable for a lot of people who think they own
assets that are worth something.

The only question is whether we are able to look reality in the
eye and face what is coming in an orderly fashion, or whether it
will be disorderly. Debt jubilees have been going on for 5,000
years, as far back as the Sumerians."<END QUOTE>

Well, if we're depending on politicians who "are able to look reality
in the eye and face what is coming in an orderly fashion," then we
should expect the worst. Bloomberg and Telegraph (London)


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Finland, Soldiers of Odin, Kemi, Sweden,
Finns Party, Odin, Fenrir, Ragnarök,
Mario Draghi, European Central Bank, ECB, Federal Reserve,
Bank of Japan, William White

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*** 23-Jan-16 World View -- China signs nuclear deals with Saudi Arabia and Iran

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• China signs nuclear deals with Saudi Arabia and Iran
• China signals support for Saudis in Yemen, and for Palestinian state

****
**** China signs nuclear deals with Saudi Arabia and Iran
****


Xi Jinping and Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud

China's president Xi Jinping has completed a visit to Saudi Arabia,
during which he and Saudi king Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud signed
several agreements, mainly in the fields of energy, culture and
industrial cooperation:

• China will invest $2.43 billion to build a nuclear
  manufacturing equipment industrial cluster. The first nuclear reactor
  is scheduled to be online in 2022, and 15 more by 2032. According to
  a Chinese official: "Nuclear power plants with a design life of more
  than 40 years cannot only provide energy security but also have the
  potential to resolve growing emissions concerns in the Middle
  East."
  
• A joint venture between Saudi's Aramco and China's Petroleum and
  Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) will undergo a $1-1.5 billion
  expansion.
  
• Plans are being drafted for a free trade agreement between China
  and the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council of Arab states, to "enable
  the Kingdom to become a hub for China to access its Middle East and
  Africa markets."

According to a Chinese spokesman,

<QUOTE>"A total of 14 agreements including memorandums of
understanding were also signed between the Kingdom and China at
the palace. ...

The signing of the agreements was witnessed by King Salman and Xi
together in a very candid and cordial atmosphere.

Major pacts inked by the two sides also include an energy
cooperation agreement and an accord to work together on the Silk
Road Economic Belt Initiative to achieve goals of development
within the framework of the initiative. ...

We hope and trust that Saudi Arabia, located at the west
crossroads of the Belt and Road, will become an important
participant of, contributor to and beneficiary of this
initiative."<END QUOTE>

As part of his Mideast trip, Xi Jinping will also visit Iran, where he
is expected to finalize a deal for two Chinese-built nuclear power
plants.

In a visit to Egypt, Xi agreed to a rail project in Egypt worth $1.1
billion, and construction projects worth $2.7 billion.

As part of the "New Silk Road," Russia is proposing a 2,000 mile
railway link between China and Iran. Bloomberg and Arab News and
China Daily and Arab News and
Tehran Times

****
**** China signals support for Saudis in Yemen, and for Palestinian state
****

China has always had a policy of "non-interference" in other
countries, largely for fear of being criticized for its own brutal
treatment of Tibetans and Uighurs, as well as for its own brutal
treatment of dissidents in Hong Kong and on the mainland.

However, that policy has apparently been completely abandoned in the
visit by China's president Xi Jinping to the Mideast.

In a joint statement, Saudi Arabia said that "Both sides stressed
support for the legitimate regime of Yemen."

The war in Yemen is viewed as a proxy war between Iran and Saudi
Arabia. Iran is supporting the Shia Houthis, who overthrew the
elected government a year ago. Saudi Arabia is supporting the
internationally elected government that was overthrown by the Houthis,
and which is living in exile in Saudi Arabia.

The joint statement seems to make it clear that China is siding with
Saudi Arabia, and against Iran. When a Chinese Foreign Ministry
spokesman was asked whether China was siding with Saudi Arabia, he
said, "(We) hope clashes in Yemen can come to an end as soon as
possible and there can be reconciliation so the country can return to
stability."

Xi Jinping also gave a speech to the Arab League in Cairo, and said:

<QUOTE>"China firmly supports the Middle East peace process
and supports the establishment of a State of Palestine enjoying
full sovereignty on the basis of the 1967 borders. We understand
the legitimate aspirations of Palestine to integrate into the
international community as a state."<END QUOTE>

Perhaps the pro-independence activists in Taiwan can use this
quote in their protests against China.

As I've been writing for almost ten years, Generational Dynamics
predicts that in the coming Clash of Civilizations world war, Russia,
India and Iran will be allies of the United States, versus our
enemies, China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries. Reuters and Quartz


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Xi Jinping, New Silk Road,
Saudi Arabia, Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud, Egypt, Iran,
Yemen, Houthis, Palestine, Taiwan

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*** 24-Jan-16 World View -- Migration crisis signals historic shifts in Europe and Mideast

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Reader comments on xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin' in Finland
• European Union said to be collapsing over migrant crisis
• Mideast borders set by Sykes-Picot and Balfour declaration under fire
• The 2016 market meltdown raises fears of financial crisis

****
**** Reader comments on xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin' in Finland
****


The 1916 Sykes-Picot agreement split the Mideast between Britain and France (Jewish Virtual Library)

My recent article "Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'"

described a vigilante group in Finland confronting migrants, harassing
them and sometimes threatening them with violence.

This article drew some reader criticisms:

<QUOTE>"Why am I classed as xenophobic in the derogatory
sense when what I want is: 1. Preservation of my Judeo/Christian
heritage and its attendant culture 2. Primacy of the English
language in this country 3. Not to have crowding so as to packed
in as an overpopulated 4th world dung heap - shades of "1984"
4. While I have sympathy for the refugees I will become one with
them if they all come "here". No country afford to pay for,
settle and provide jobs for all who wish to enter.

Every single picture I have seen of the countries of the refugees
there is a dichotomy; the small population of the very rich, a
middle class on the economic edge and vast majority in poverty. I
do not want to see that as the future in this country and I am
sure the xenophobic Europeans (my ancestors) do not want it
either."<END QUOTE>

<QUOTE>"Blaming the West is not the right answer. They've
been fighting amongst themselves for centuries, and they all
believe their way of worship to be closer to allah then all the
others. The Shiite, Sunni, and the rest are unable to get along,
and if you took the West out of it, you'd see just as much
destruction.

Muslims have been blaming everyone but themselves and always
will. They are always the victims even though their acts are
barbaric. Stoning women, beating and raping they feel justified in
doing."<END QUOTE>

<QUOTE>"The Soldiers of Odin may be the only protection women
have from the invaders."<END QUOTE>

The first problem with xenophobia is that it's un-American.

The problem with vigilantes is that they do no good. A few vigilantes
in Finland are not going to do anything to stop the flood of migrants
and refugees coming into Europe. It's like trying to stop a tsunami
with a teaspoon.

Another problem is that it makes things worse. Vigilantes will have
no effect at all on the supposed objective of "protecting women," but
what it will do is aggravate people, create further hostility, and
energize jihadists.

What you have to accept, Dear Reader, is that there are historic
changes going on, and that they can't be stopped. Today's World View
article is about those historic changes, with the migration crisis
challenging the borders of the European Union and the Mideast, while
at the same time the global economy is facing a crisis.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is a
generational Crisis era, where the rules of diplomacy and mediation
from the 1990s no longer apply. Treasure the time you have left, and
use it to prepare yourself, your family, your community and your
nation. How you do that is up to the individual, but being a
vigilante will not accomplish it.

****
**** European Union said to be collapsing over migrant crisis
****

More than one million migrants and refugees came to Europe in 2015,
mostly entering through Greece and Italy.

Remarkably, some 35,000 more arrived during the first three weeks of
2016. It had been thought that the winter weather would slow the flow
to a trickle, but it hasn't. That's almost 12,000 per week. That
suggests that there could be millions more migrants and refugees
arriving in 2016.

Already, the European Union's prized open-border Schengen Agreement,
appears to be crumbling. Several east European countries have put up
fences, and other countries have closed all their borders, instituting
border controls.

According to far left billionaire George Soros, the European Union is
on the verge of collapse:

<QUOTE>"There is plenty to be nervous about.

As she (Merkel) correctly predicted, the EU is on the verge of
collapse. The Greek crisis taught the European authorities the art
of muddling through one crisis after another. This practice is
popularly known as kicking the can down the road, although it
would be more accurate to describe it as kicking a ball uphill so
that it keeps rolling back down.

Merkel correctly foresaw the potential of the migration crisis to
destroy the European Union. What was a prediction has become the
reality. The European Union badly needs fixing. This is a fact but
it is not irreversible. And the people who can stop Merkel's dire
prediction from coming true are actually the German people.

Now it's time for Germans to decide: Do they want to accept the
responsibilities and the liabilities involved in being the
dominant power in Europe?"<END QUOTE>

French officials believe that France has been particularly affected by
the migrant crisis since the November 13 attacks in which 130 people
were killed by gunmen in a series of coordinated attacks across Paris.
It later emerged that the gunmen had arrived in Europe with the flood
of migrants entering Greece.

Following the attacks, France instituted a state of emergency,
allowing the police the power to raid homes without warrants and to
impose house arrests without first seeking judicial oversight.

France's prime minister Manuel Valls said that it would be in effect
until ISIS is defeated:

<QUOTE>"[France will be] using all means in our democracy
under the rule of law to protect the French people.

As long as the threat is there, we must use all available means.
[The state of emergency should stay in place] until we can get rid
of Daesh.

In Africa, in the Middle East, in Asia, we must eradicate –
eliminate – Daesh. It is a total and global war that we are
facing with terrorism. The war we are conducting must also be
total, global and ruthless."<END QUOTE>

The European Commission President Jean-Claude Jüncker warns
dismantling the Schengen zone and imposing new border controls would
cost £2.3bn a year in lost business. The European Council President
Donald Tusk says unless the EU makes progress in the next two months,
Schengen could fail. CNBC and France24 and Independent (London)

****
**** Mideast borders set by Sykes-Picot and Balfour declaration under fire
****

This year is the 100th anniversary of the Sykes-Picot agreement, named
after Frenchman Francois Georges-Picot and Briton Mark Sykes, signed
by Britain, France and Tsarist Russia in May 1916. The agreement was
originally kept secret because it was a betrayal of promises made to
Arabs, but it was revealed in 1917 when the Bolshevik Revolution
occurred in Russia. This was followed by the Balfour Declaration in
1917, promising the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine.

The borders set by Sykes-Picot/Balfour have remained largely intact,
with few exceptions. There was the independence of Sudan from Egypt,
and then the secession of South Sudan. North and South Yemen were
unified, as were the United Arab Emirates (UAE). There were also
changes to the Palestinian territories and Palestine, related to the
establishment of Israel.

But there are many Arabs, especially Palestinians, who blame
Sykes-Picot/Balfour as the source of all their misery. The so-called
Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) has specifically said that
Sykes-Picot is dead, but other nationalist Arab groups are calling for
its abolition, mostly for local political reasons. The Kurds have
been leading the calls for an end to Sykes-Picot, and the creation of
a Kurdistan state.

According to Oxford University historian Eugene Rogan, "The wartime
partition agreements left a legacy of imperialism, of Arab mistrust in
great power politics, and of a belief in conspiracies (for what are
secret partition agreements if not conspiracies?) that the Arab
peoples have held responsible for their misfortunes ever since."

The rise of ISIS, fueled by sectarian violence led by Syria's Bashar
al-Assad, Russia's Vladimir Putin, and Iran's Seyed Ali Khamenei, have
caused massive migrations of millions of people that are challenging
the existing borders in the Mideast. Generational Dynamics predicts a
major Mideast war between Sunnis and Shias, Israelis and Arabs, and
among different ethnic groups. At the end of that war, there will be
a major international conference that will set the new boundaries in
the Mideast, as dictated by the winners, and that will certainly be
the end of the Sykes-Picot agreement. Middle East Monitor and Atlantic Sentinel and Foreign Policy Journal and Jewish Virtual Library

****
**** The 2016 market meltdown raises fears of financial crisis
****

The first three weeks of 2016 have been the worst start of the year in
market history. There were two emergency market shutdowns in China
within the first four trading days of 2016. The Dow Jones Industrial
Average has never lost this many points within the first three weeks.
Trucking freight in the U.S. is in steep decline. Jobless claims are
beginning to surge again.

According to financial analyst Doug Noland:

<QUOTE>"The world has changed significantly – perhaps
profoundly – over recent weeks. The Shanghai Composite has dropped
17.4% over the past month (Shenzhen down 21%). Hong Kong’s Hang
Seng Index was down 8.2% over the past month, with Hang Seng
Financials sinking 11.9%. WTI crude is down 26% since December
15th. Over this period, the GSCI Commodities Index sank 12.2%. The
Mexican peso has declined almost 7% in a month, the Russian ruble
10% and the South African rand 12%. A Friday headline from the
Financial Times: “Emerging market stocks retreat to lowest since
09.”

Recent weeks point to decisive cracks at the “Core” of the
U.S. financial Bubble. The S&P500 has been hit with an 8.0%
two-week decline. Notably, favored stocks and sectors have
performed poorly. Indicative of rapidly deteriorating economic
prospects, the Dow Transports were down 10.9% to begin 2016. The
banks (KBW) sank 12.9%, with the broker/dealers (XBD) down 14.1%
y-t-d. The Nasdaq100 (NDX) fell 10%. The Biotechs were down 16.0%
in two weeks. The small cap Russell 2000 was hit 11.3%.

Bubbles tend to be varied and complex. In their most basic form, I
define a Bubble as a self-reinforcing but inevitably unsustainable
inflation. This inflation can be in a wide range of price levels –
securities and asset prices, incomes, spending, corporate profits,
investment and speculation. Such inflations are always fueled by
some type of underlying monetary expansion – typically monetary
disorder. Bubbles are always and everywhere a Credit phenomenon,
although the underlying source of monetary fuel often goes largely
unrecognized. ...

[In the 'Periphery':] At $275 billion, Chinese Credit growth
surged in December to the strongest pace since June. While growth
in new bank loans slowed (15% below estimates), equity and bond
issuance jumped. China’s total social financing expanded an
enormous $2.2 TN in 2015, down slightly from booming 2014. Such
rampant Credit growth was (barely) sufficient to sustain China’s
economic expansion. At the same time, I would argue that Chinese
stocks, global commodities and developing securities markets in
particular have been under intense pressure due to rapidly waning
confidence in the sustainability of China’s Credit Bubble.

A similar dynamic is now unfolding in U.S. and other “Core”
equities markets: Sustainability in the (U.S. and global) Credit
Bubble - the monetary fuel underpinning the boom - is suddenly in
doubt. The bulls, Fed officials and most others see the economy as
basically sound, similar to how most conventional analysts argued
about the Chinese economy over the past year. Inherent fragility
and unsustainability are the key issues now driving securities
markets – in China, in the U.S, and globally. And, importantly,
sentiment has shifted to the view that policy tools have been
largely depleted."<END QUOTE>

As I've written many times (see "28-Aug-15 World View -- Explanation of Price/Earnings ratio and Stock Valuations"
), Wall Street stocks are in an enormous
bubble, with the S&P 500 Price/Earnings ratio at an astronomical 22,
far above the historical average of 14. Generational Dynamics
predicts a financial panic and crisis, with the Dow falling to below
3000. ETF Daily News and Alt-Market.com and Credit Bubble Bulletin

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Finland, Soldiers of Odin,
European Union, Schengen Agreement, George Soros,
France, Manuel Valls, Jean-Claude Jüncker, Donald Tusk,
Sykes-Picot Agreement, Balfour Declaration,
Francois Georges-Picot, Mark Sykes, Yemen,
United Arab Emirates, UAE, Palestine, Israel,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Eugene Rogan, Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Russia, Vladimir Putin,
Iran, Seyed Ali Khamenei, Doug Noland

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*** 25-Jan-16 World View -- Farcical Syria peace process 'proximity talks' to begin this week in Geneva

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Previous attempts at Syria 'peace talks' ended in farce
• Syria peace process 'proximity talks' to begin this week in Geneva

****
**** Previous attempts at Syria 'peace talks' ended in farce
****


Vietnam anti-American antiwar protester John Kerry gives the 1960s 'peace sign' at a United Nations news conference in Vienna last week (Reuters)

US Secretary of State John Kerry is spearheading the drive for peace
talks for "peace talks" to get a "political solution" to the war in
Syria. This follows the efforts by Kerry and others in the successful
Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, successful Afghanistan Taliban peace
talks, successful Pakistan Taliban peace talks, and successful
Ukraine-Russia peace talks.

Oh wait.

Not only have all the above "peace talks" been total failures, so have
several previous attempts at Syrian peace talks.

Let's recall that in March 2012, the vitriolicly anti-American
former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan headed up the
effort to bring peace to Syria. At that time, al-Assad had already
massacred thousands of Sunni women and children as punishment for
peaceful protesting, and only a few thousand refugees had already fled
to Turkey. Bashar al-Assad made a fool of Kofi Annan by promising
that he would make an "honest effort" to achieve peace in his country,
at the same time that he was launching brutal attacks on civilians in
Idlib.

At that time, I wrote "22-Mar-12 World View -- U.N. Security Council adopts farcical 'peace plan' for Syria"
. The terms of the 6-point peace plan were:

• Syria commits to work with Kofi Annan “in an inclusive
  Syrian-led political process to address the legitimate aspirations and
  concerns of the Syrian people.”
• Syria commits to stop fighting and immediately stop troop
  movements and use of heavy weapons in populated areas. As these
  actions are being taken, Syria should work with Annan to end all
  violence, under U.N. supervision. Annan will seek similar commitments
  from the opposition to stop all fighting.
• Syria accepts and implements a daily two hour “humanitarian pause”
  to deliver aid and evacuate the injured.
• Syria commits to intensify “the pace and scale of release of
  arbitrarily detained persons” and provide a list of all places where
  such people are being held.
• Syria commits to ensure freedom of movement throughout the country
  for journalists “and a non-discriminatory visa policy for them.”
• Syria commits to “respect freedom of association and the right to
  demonstrate peacefully as legally guaranteed.”

The whole "Syria commits" was a joke, since al-Assad honored no
commitment. In fact, the whole peace plan was a joke. As I wrote in
"3-Aug-12 World View -- Kofi Annan resigns in failure as Syria envoy"
, Annan was bitter and
angry when he resigned, blaming his decision on what he described as
Syrian government intransigence, on increasing militancy by Syrian
rebels and on finger-pointing and name-calling by members of the
United Nations Security Council.

In fact -- and this is important -- the whole "peace plan" was
deceitful sham on the part of al-Assad. He continued to say that he
was "honestly" working for peace when he had no intention of doing so,
but continued his genocidal attacks on innocent Sunni women and
children. He agreed to the "peace process" so that his acolytes in
the press and online would keep supporting him and lying for him as he
slaughtered more and more innocent people. The "peace process" also
provided cover for Iran and Russia to continue supplying billions of
dollars of weapons to the al-Assad regime for use in slaughter of
innocent women and children; and it provided cover for the U.S. and
Britain and France and Turkey to do nothing, since doing something
might harm the "peace process." After Annan resigned, Lakhdar Brahimi
took over as U.N. and Arab League envoy to the "peace process," but to
no avail.

That whole "peace process" was a deceitful sham by Syria, Russia and
Iran that allowed them to completely humiliate that total fool, Kofi
Annan.

The Three Satans of the modern world are Syria's Bashar al-Assad,
Russia's Vladimir Putin, and Iran's Seyed Ali Khamenei. These Three
Satans are entirely to blame for the following:

• Mass slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people in
  Syria.
  
• Motivating tens of thousands of young Sunni men to travel to Syria
  and fight the Bashar al-Assad regime. These young men came from
  countries from South Asia to North Africa and up to the Russian
  Caucasus, and they've resulted in the formation of the so-called
  Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh). Thousands of girls from
  around the world have also traveled to Syria for love, to marry the
  ISIS jihadists. ISIS now spreading out to create terrorist groups in
  these same countries from South Asia to North Africa and up to the
  Russian Caucasus.
  
• Creating a refugee crisis with millions of refugees and displaced
  persons that is destabilizing the entire Mideast and Europe, as I
  wrote about yesterday in "Migration crisis signals historic shifts in Europe and Mideast"
  .

These Three Satans have done an almost unbelievable amount of damage
to the world, and now John Kerry is going to be "negotiating" with
them. This ought to be sickening.

****
**** Syria peace process 'proximity talks' to begin this week in Geneva
****

Here's how I described the "Geneva-II" peace conference led by Lakhdar
Brahimi, when I wrote about in January 2014:
In the mornings, both sides are in the same room with
Brahimi. The two sides are in the same room, but they don't talk to
each other. Each of them talks only to Brahimi. The purpose of the
morning sessions is to discuss the agenda for the afternoon sessions.
In the afternoon sessions, the two sides are in different rooms, and
Brahimi goes back and forth between the rooms, like Henry Kissinger's
"shuttle diplomacy."

Well, I didn't know it at the time, but there's a phrase to describe
this kind of peace talks. They're called "proximity talks," as
opposed to "face to face talks," because the two sides are in
different rooms.

The proximity talks were supposed to begin today (Monday), but they
couldn't because there's no agreement on who will represent the
anti-Assad "rebels." Russia already controls the al-Assad side, and
apparently wants to control the "rebel" side as well. Apparently,
none of the "rebel" groups wants to take part in the talks, because
they realize that they're only a farce that will be used as a fig leaf
to allow al-Assad and the Russians and Iranians to continue the war
and then blame the "rebels" for violating the "peace process."

According to news reports, John Kerry has announced a "breakthrough"
and a "compromise." Apparently a delegation of Kurds will also take
part in the negotiations, which is one of the demands of the Russians,
who are allied with the Kurds. This will be in addition to a "rebel"
group favored by Kerry. The news reports don't indicate whether the
Kurds will be in the same room as the al-Assad negotiators, or in the
same room as the "rebels," or in a third room all by themselves. In
the latter case, Kerry will have to go from room to room to room,
instead of just from room to room. That's the way "proximity talks"
work.

Actually, the word "negotiations" is already a joke, since the Syrians
are already saying that they have no intention of negotiating. Before
the active intervention by Russia, the al-Assad regime was losing more
and more territory, and his army was near collapse. But now, thanks
to the massive Russian bombing campaign on homes and neighborhoods of
civilians supporting the "rebels," the al-Assad regime is doing a lot
better, and believes that it has no reason to negotiate.

In remarks published on Sunday by Hilal al-Hilal, a senior official in
al-Assad's ruling Baath party:

<QUOTE>"We are not going to give today what we did not give
over the past five years. This year will be the year of victory
for Syria because of the heroic acts and sacrifices by its army
and people,"<END QUOTE>

So what's the point of these "proximity talks"? They're just another
scam by the Three Satans to cover up the massive disaster they've
created.

Whenever I hear about a "political solution in Syria," there are two
questions that always immediately go through my mind.

The first question has to do with peaceful demonstrations. Even if
there were some kind of political solution, what would al-Assad do if
peaceful demonstrations began again? If he allowed them to go on,
then it would prove to the world that his whole motivation for
starting the war in 2011 was idiotic. So he would have to start
bombing innocent Sunni women an children again, and the war would
begin again.

The second question has to do with ISIS and with the al-Qaeda linked
Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Nusra Front). They aren't even going to be part
of the non-negotiations in Switzerland. So what does Kerry think
would happen to them if they were presented with some "political
solution"?

I was listening to the BBC on Sunday, and I heard an analyst give an
answer to that question. He said that once a political solution was
reached, then all the Sunni jihadists would leave ISIS and al-Nusra,
and go home, since the political solution would leave them no more
reason to fight, and then ISIS and al-Nusra would dissolve.

Just as al-Qaeda has dissolved in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen,
Somalia, Algeria and Mali. Oh wait.

Really, we have so many people living in Fantasyland these days, it's
no wonder that the world is on fire.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is a
generational Crisis era, where the rules of diplomacy and mediation
and compromise from the 1990s no longer apply. These "proximity
talks" are a joke and a scam by the Three Satans, al-Assad, Putin, and
Khamenei, who have already caused an enormous catastrophe, and have no
intention of stopping now. Bloomberg and AP


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Vietnam, John Kerry, Kofi Annan,
Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Lakhdar Brahimi, Russia, Vladimir Putin,
Iran, Seyed Ali Khamenei, proximity talks, Hilal al-Hilal, Baath,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Nusra Front

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You're calling the 3 Satans Assad (Syria) Putin(Russia) & the dude in Iran-- & these assholes are our allies??!?? So wtf does that make us? Oh f* ck

Originally Posted by marypoza

> You're calling the 3 Satans Assad (Syria) Putin(Russia) & the dude
> in Iran-- & these assholes are our allies??!?? So wtf does that
> make us? Oh f* ck

Josef Stalin was certainly a Satan, having been responsible for the
mass starvation, torture and mass slaughter of tens of millions of
people, and as I always like to point out, Stalin was America's ally
in World War II. Draw your own conclusions from that.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Josef Stalin was certainly a Satan, having been responsible for the
mass starvation, torture and mass slaughter of tens of millions of
people, and as I always like to point out, Stalin was America's ally
in World War II. Draw your own conclusions from that.

Yet Boomers insist that America must remain a goody-two-shoes. Our geopolitical position would improve immensely if boomers move out of the way, relinquish their grip on power and let the younger generations make their own decisions rather than trying to keep those generations suppressed politically. Yes mainstream establishment vote for Hillary 2016, someone who still thinks its 1992. In France, Le Pen's party has a high chance of coming to power soon.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Josef Stalin was certainly a Satan, having been responsible for the
mass starvation, torture and mass slaughter of tens of millions of
people, and as I always like to point out, Stalin was America's ally
in World War II. Draw your own conclusions from that.

Isolationism, a type of mass hysteria, prevented the US from preparing for WW2. In order to win we had to make a deal with The Devil.

We never learn.

Originally Posted by XYMOX_4AD_84

> We never learn.

That's what generational theory is all about.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

*** 22-Jan-16 World View -- Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'
• The European Central Bank saves the stock markets for another day

****
**** Clown protesters mock Finland's xenophobic 'Soldiers of Odin'
****


Clown carrying sign 'Sieg Fail' to make fun of Soldiers of Odin, whose leader is a neo-Nazi

A group of clowns has taken to the streets of the town of Tampere in
Finland to make fun of a new group of anti-migrant vigilantes called
the "Soldiers of Odin," named after a war-like Norse god.

The vigilante group was formed late last year in the northern Finland
town of Kemi, near the point on the border which has become an entry
point for migrants arriving from Sweden. They wear black jackets, and
run street patrols carrying carry signs saying things like "Migrants
not welcome." Police have received complaints that they've approached
migrants, and also citizens whom they've accused of being migrants,
and harassed them and threatened them with violence.

After the recent reported incidents of hundreds of alleged sexual assaults by Muslim migrants in Cologne on New Year's Eve,
The Soldiers of Odin have spread to
other towns, and similar groups have sprung up in other countries.
Most Finns oppose them, but they've received qualified support from
the nationalist Finns Party, and they've been increasing in popularity
since the New Year's Eve incidents.

In the Finnish town of Tampere on Saturday night, the Soldiers of Odin
street patrols were met by a group of clowns calling themselves the
"LOLdiers of Odin," where LOL stands for "laughing out loud."

The vigilante group named themselves after the mythical Norse god Odin
who was highly war-like. However, Odin did not end well. At the time
of the cataclysmic Ragnarök between the giants and the gods, Odin
fought with the enormous wolf Fenrir. Fenrir killed Odin and
swallowed him. Fenrir also swallowed the earth and sun. After the
Ragnarök ended, everything was destroyed, and the world had to be
recreated. Think of it as the mythological analog to World War III.
Helsinki Times and BBC
and Helsinki Times and Daily Sabah (Turkey) and Encyclopedia Mythica

You rang? Jag heter Ragnarök_62.

Yes, the world would be recreated, ie. a 1st turning.
Some clarification is needed. The saga/edda of Ragnarök actually has has you say, the reset period, that being IRL, a 4th turning. The part left out is the ensuing 1st turning. As such from the Wiki article.

Originally Posted by wiki

Chapter 53 begins with Gangleri asking if any of the gods will survive, and if there will be anything left of the earth or the sky. High responds that the earth will appear once more from the sea, beautiful and green, where self-sown crops grow. The field Iðavöllr exists where Asgard once was, and, there, untouched by Surtr's flames, Víðarr and Váli reside. Now possessing their father's hammer Mjolnir, Thor's sons Móði and Magni will meet them there, and, coming from Hel, Baldr and Höðr also arrive. Together, they all sit and recount memories, later finding the gold game pieces the Æsir once owned. Völuspá stanza 51 is then quoted.^[37]
High reveals that two humans, Líf and Lífþrasir, will have also survived the destruction by hiding in the wood Hoddmímis holt. These two survivors consume the morning dew for sustenance, and from their descendants the world will be repopulated. Vafþrúðnismál stanza 45 is then quoted. The personified sun, Sól, will have a daughter at least as beautiful as she, and this daughter will follow the same path as her mother. Vafþrúðnismál stanza 47 is quoted, and so ends the foretelling of Ragnarök in Gylfaginning.^[38]

That's one reason I chose the handle. The second is I'm of Swedish decent. The 3rd is that 1962 was the year of the Cuban missile crisis. There was a real possiblity the world would have blown its head off with the nuclear gun.



and

Originally Posted by John

****
**** The 2016 market meltdown raises fears of financial crisis
****

The first three weeks of 2016 have been the worst start of the year in
market history. There were two emergency market shutdowns in China
within the first four trading days of 2016. The Dow Jones Industrial
Average has never lost this many points within the first three weeks.
Trucking freight in the U.S. is in steep decline. Jobless claims are
beginning to surge again.

According to financial analyst Doug Noland:

<QUOTE>"The world has changed significantly – perhaps
profoundly – over recent weeks. The Shanghai Composite has dropped
17.4% over the past month (Shenzhen down 21%). Hong Kong’s Hang
Seng Index was down 8.2% over the past month, with Hang Seng
Financials sinking 11.9%. WTI crude is down 26% since December
15th. Over this period, the GSCI Commodities Index sank 12.2%. The
Mexican peso has declined almost 7% in a month, the Russian ruble
10% and the South African rand 12%. A Friday headline from the
Financial Times: “Emerging market stocks retreat to lowest since
09.”

Recent weeks point to decisive cracks at the “Core” of the
U.S. financial Bubble. The S&P500 has been hit with an 8.0%
two-week decline. Notably, favored stocks and sectors have
performed poorly. Indicative of rapidly deteriorating economic
prospects, the Dow Transports were down 10.9% to begin 2016. The
banks (KBW) sank 12.9%, with the broker/dealers (XBD) down 14.1%
y-t-d. The Nasdaq100 (NDX) fell 10%. The Biotechs were down 16.0%
in two weeks. The small cap Russell 2000 was hit 11.3%.

Bubbles tend to be varied and complex. In their most basic form, I
define a Bubble as a self-reinforcing but inevitably unsustainable
inflation. This inflation can be in a wide range of price levels –
securities and asset prices, incomes, spending, corporate profits,
investment and speculation. Such inflations are always fueled by
some type of underlying monetary expansion – typically monetary
disorder. Bubbles are always and everywhere a Credit phenomenon,
although the underlying source of monetary fuel often goes largely
unrecognized. ...

[In the 'Periphery':] At $275 billion, Chinese Credit growth
surged in December to the strongest pace since June. While growth
in new bank loans slowed (15% below estimates), equity and bond
issuance jumped. China’s total social financing expanded an
enormous $2.2 TN in 2015, down slightly from booming 2014. Such
rampant Credit growth was (barely) sufficient to sustain China’s
economic expansion. At the same time, I would argue that Chinese
stocks, global commodities and developing securities markets in
particular have been under intense pressure due to rapidly waning
confidence in the sustainability of China’s Credit Bubble.

A similar dynamic is now unfolding in U.S. and other “Core”
equities markets: Sustainability in the (U.S. and global) Credit
Bubble - the monetary fuel underpinning the boom - is suddenly in
doubt. The bulls, Fed officials and most others see the economy as
basically sound, similar to how most conventional analysts argued
about the Chinese economy over the past year. Inherent fragility
and unsustainability are the key issues now driving securities
markets – in China, in the U.S, and globally. And, importantly,
sentiment has shifted to the view that policy tools have been
largely depleted."<END QUOTE>

As I've written many times (see "28-Aug-15 World View -- Explanation of Price/Earnings ratio and Stock Valuations"
), Wall Street stocks are in an enormous
bubble, with the S&P 500 Price/Earnings ratio at an astronomical 22,
far above the historical average of 14. Generational Dynamics
predicts a financial panic and crisis, with the Dow falling to below
3000. ETF Daily News and Alt-Market.com and Credit Bubble Bulletin

There's actually more to this. We seem to have a spate of local government bankruptcies.

1. Chicago School District.

2. Puerto Rico.

3. The state of Illinois.

4. frakking oil companies.

I surmise that the spate of upcoming bankruptcies along with bubbles bursting will be financial Ragnarök. I foresee a booming business in repo companies and foreclosure proceedings here in the oil patch from this thing alone. Oil has already crashed and I believe the same sort of thing will happen when the current housing/stock bubbles run their courses.

One look at Amazon's PE ratio shows the madness. 852 does not look like a sane number to me. This is the sort of thing QE(x) has wrought. It drove bond yields to zilch and folks went "risk on" to get some sort of yield. This, will not end well.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Josef Stalin was certainly a Satan, having been responsible for the
mass starvation, torture and mass slaughter of tens of millions of
people, and as I always like to point out, Stalin was America's ally
in World War II. Draw your own conclusions from that.

-- we're making deals with the devil

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

You rang? Jag heter Ragnarök_62.

Yes, the world would be recreated, ie. a 1st turning.
Some clarification is needed. The saga/edda of Ragnarök actually has has you say, the reset period, that being IRL, a 4th turning. The part left out is the ensuing 1st turning. As such from the Wiki article.



That's one reason I chose the handle. The second is I'm of Swedish decent. The 3rd is that 1962 was the year of the Cuban missile crisis. There was a real possiblity the world would have blown its head off with the nuclear gun.

Thanks for letting us know about why you chose your handle.

My handle has a nordic basis too, of course. But I am not Norwegian. The nearest I can tell is that my very, very distant relative who founded the Montgomery line (on which was my great grandmother) were descended from Gomere, a viking who founded a fort on a mountain and established his family in north-eastern France, came over with William I and split into 3 branches; I am from the Irish branch.

There's actually more to this. We seem to have a spate of local government bankruptcies.

1. Chicago School District.

2. Puerto Rico.

3. The state of Illinois.

4. frakking oil companies.

I surmise that the spate of upcoming bankruptcies along with bubbles bursting will be financial Ragnarök. I foresee a booming business in repo companies and foreclosure proceedings here in the oil patch from this thing alone. Oil has already crashed and I believe the same sort of thing will happen when the current housing/stock bubbles run their courses.

One look at Amazon's PE ratio shows the madness. 852 does not look like a sane number to me. This is the sort of thing QE(x) has wrought. It drove bond yields to zilch and folks went "risk on" to get some sort of yield. This, will not end well.

Gloom and doom. But you know my prophecy. Remember, I predicted the actual crash, and when. I am not predicting one coming soon. So my credibility is on the line, and I stand by my prediction. Skeptics lke TnT think I just make vague predictions and "don't get it." I think I have been, and am, pretty clear. No bust. I don't see how I can get much clearer than that. The next recession will be one third the size of the last one. OK, there's a quantity. I just pulled it out of the air. How close will it come to reality? I don't know. But if it happens it will be in the 2018-2020 period. I don't remember if I have a specific date for it.

But how did QE cause bond yields to go to zilch? Again I don't understand your cause and effect allegations there. The Fed deliberately lowered interest rates and kept them low. No QE involved.

But I understand there are some bubbles brewing out there. Housing is the worst. But it burst once, to little long-term effect. And derivatives are not so out of control based on that bubble now, and Dodd Frank has mechanisms to deal with it as long as the Republicans can't repeal it.

Oil has crashed, but I can't see it not coming back up again as long as our economy still runs mostly on fossil fuels. This current oil bust is mostly engineered by our wonderful ally, the Saudis, to drive our frakking boom to bust. I guess they can keep prices low for a while. But they can't go much lower.

*** 26-Jan-16 World View -- Mass protests force Moldova to choose between Europe and Russia

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Mass protests force Moldova to choose between Europe and Russia
• Moldova crisis presents opportunities and dangers for Russia

****
**** Mass protests force Moldova to choose between Europe and Russia
****


Hundreds of protesters broke through police lines on Wednesday to get into Moldova's parliament on January 20 (Reuters)

Months of anti-government protests in Chisinau, the capital city of
Moldova, reached a head last week on Wednesday, when tens of thousands
of stormed the parliament building, and police began using tear gas
against the protesters, resulting in dozens of injuries. This mass
riot was triggered by parliament's approval Pavel Filip to be prime
minister. The protesters chanted "We Are the People" and "We Want our
Country Back" and "Down with the mafia" in both Romanian and Russian,
and demanded that the president, prime minister, and parliament all
resign, and new elections be called.

Protesters are demanding the investigation of the “theft of the
century” – the disappearance of an incredible $1.5 billion, 15% of the
country's GDP, from three national banks ahead of the parliamentary
election of 2014. The money was discovered to be missing a year ago,
in January 2015. The prime minister Vlad Filad was arrested on
corruption charges, and the parliament appointed a successor, Valeriu
Strelet. In October, Strelet was dismissed in a no-confidence vote,
and Moldova has had no government until Wednesday of last week, when
the parliament selected a new prime minister, Pavel Filip.

There are two major ideologies in Moldova, the pro-Europe side and the
pro-Russia side. Since 2009, the pro-Europe side has governed, but
since the corruption scandal broke a year ago, voters have become
increasingly disgusted with all sides.

The prime minister selected last week, Pavel Filip, is still nominally
on the pro-Europe side, Filip is thought by many to be under the
control of billionaire Vladimir Plahotniuc. As a result, both
pro-Europe and pro-Russia protesters temporarily put aside their
differences and turned against Filip after he was selected last week.

If there are new elections in the near future, it's expected that the
pro-Russia side will win in the parliament, which will then select a
pro-Russia prime minister. However, Filip, and Plahotniuc behind him,
are resisting that outcome.

Filip himself is making the usual claim of politicians in power by
saying that his stepping down could harm the country:

<QUOTE>"We could find ourselves in a deep economic and social
crisis. It's possible that Moldova wouldn't be able to pay
salaries and pensions for four months."<END QUOTE>

Adrian Candu, the speaker of parliament, says that there's no legal
way to call elections now, and adds:

<QUOTE>"The current government and parliamentary majority
really has to show results in days and weeks. We are counting on
the first 100 days of the government to show actions and
results. The time for nice messages is over."<END QUOTE>

However, both pro-Europe and pro-Russia groups accuse Filip and
Plahotniuc of holding on to power in order to hide their corruption.
Many observers don't believe that the new government will have even
100 days before widespread riots begin, perhaps modeled after the
Maiden riots in Kiev, the capital city of Ukraine, in 2013-2014,
leading to a major European and Russian crisis. BBC and Irish Times and Jamestown

****
**** Moldova crisis presents opportunities and dangers for Russia
****


Map of Moldova highlighting Transdniestria / Transnistria province (Economist)

Moldova is a small country squeezed between Ukraine and Romania. A
strip of land on Moldova's border with Ukraine is the province of
Transnistria. Polls in Transnistria indicate that people there would
like to secede from Moldova and join the Russian Federation, in the
same way that happened to Ukraine's Crimea peninsula. In fact, when
Russia was in the process of invading Ukraine in 2014, leading to the
annexation of Crimea, it was widely believed that Russia's invasion
would continue on to the port of Odessa and then on to link up with
the secessionist Transnistria province of Moldova.

That never happened, as the Russians became bogged down in East
Ukraine, and the Russian economy was beset by Western sanctions and
then by crashing oil prices. And now with Russia's military adventure
into Syria, Russia is stretched too thin to revive a large military
incursion into western Ukraine.

Now there's a new opportunity for Russia. If there are new elections
in Moldova, and if, as expected, the pro-Russia factions win, then
Russia will have a political change of government that will gives it
influence of Moldova without the cost of a military invasion.

If pro-Russia forces come to power in Moldova, it would be a big
public relations coup. Furthermore, such a victory would help settle
the Transnistria issue, by unifying the secessionist province with the
Moldovan government so that they're all pro-Russia.

However, such a victory would be a mixed blessing for Russia, as it
would trigger other problems, according to Russian journalist and
political analyst Gevorg Mirzayan. In these days of sanctions and
counter-sanctions, both Ukraine and Romania would act harshly to
pro-Russian forces in Moldova.

<QUOTE>"[Ukraine's] reaction to pro-Russian forces in
Chisinau would not be difficult to guess – a sharp hardening of
relations and an economic blockade of Moldova from the east would
be almost inevitable.

As for Romania, here too there are several possible negative
scenarios. It's doubtful that the EU will simply close its eyes on
Moldova's demonstrative return to the Russian orbit, and using a
deterioration of the socio-economic situation, they would attempt
to convince Moldovans that they have made the wrong choice.

As a result, Moscow, which already has its hands full, will have
to analyze all the options for supporting a pro-Russian government
in Chisinau."<END QUOTE>

Mirzayan points out that if the pro-Europe factions continue to
discredit themselves, especially following the corruption scandals,
then the pro-Russia opposition will become stronger in the long run.
Global Risk Insights (2015-Nov-10) and Sputnik News (Moscow) and Global Research


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Moldova, Chisinau, Europe, Russia,
Vlad Filad, Valeriu Strelet, Pavel Filip, Vladimir Plahotniuc,
Adrian Candu, Transdniestria, Transnistria, Ukraine, Crimea,
Romania, Gevorg Mirzayan

Permanent web link to this article
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Originally Posted by Eric the Green

> But you know my prophecy. Remember, I predicted the actual crash,
> and when. I am not predicting one coming soon. So my credibility
> is on the line, and I stand by my prediction. Skeptics lke TnT
> think I just make vague predictions and "don't get it." I think I
> have been, and am, pretty clear.

What did you predict, and when did you predict it?

Is there still a link to the original prediction online?

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Thanks for letting us know about why you chose your handle.

My handle has a nordic basis too, of course. But I am not Norwegian. The nearest I can tell is that my very, very distant relative who founded the Montgomery line (on which was my great grandmother) were descended from Gomere, a viking who founded a fort on a mountain and established his family in north-eastern France, came over with William I and split into 3 branches; I am from the Irish branch.

Originally Posted by teh internets

From ei meaning "ever, always" (or einn "one, alone") and ríkr meaning "rule, power". The original form is Erik, which has been borne by nine Danish kings. Also used as a nickname for Frederic and Frederick. Scandinavian legend relates that the explorer Leif Ericson (son of Erik the Red) landed on the shores of America 500 years before Christopher Columbus. Literary: the name was not widely used among English-speaking people until 19th-century British fiction writers Frederic Farrar (in "Eric", or "Little by Little") and H Rider Haggard (in "Eric Brighteyes"). Author Erich Segal; musician Eric Clapton; skater Eric Heiden; actors Eriq La Salle, Eric McCormack.

First name confirmed.

"The Green" is Anglo Saxon. You can fix that by this translation: "Det Grønne" . It's close enough to English that folks will still know what it means.

Gloom and doom. But you know my prophecy. Remember, I predicted the actual crash, and when. I am not predicting one coming soon. So my credibility is on the line, and I stand by my prediction. Skeptics like TnT think I just make vague predictions and "don't get it." I think I have been, and am, pretty clear. No bust. I don't see how I can get much clearer than that.

Uh, we're having a bust here in the oil patch at present. First, the frakking companies are all pretty much insolvent. If the price of oil stays stuck below $50/bbl they all go. Next, you have the oil service companies like Schumberger that are laying off scads of folks. That's another facet of the bust. The layoffs then affect government tax revenue and make a mess.

Like this: http://newsok.com/article/5394200 [Yeah, I know relying on oil for revenue isn't the brightest idea nor is blowing a huge wad on the department of corrections. ]

The next recession will be one third the size of the last one. OK, there's a quantity. I just pulled it out of the air. How close will it come to reality? I don't know. But if it happens it will be in the 2018-2020 period. I don't remember if I have a specific date for it.

That's not necessary. Ragnarök will be for those who have money in overpriced stocks, overpriced houses, and "risk on" investments like junk bonds. It will also be for those who are counting on pensions which are underfunded to the point that their owners are defacto insolvent like Illinois. IOW, the bust will affect assorted known areas. It all gets back to Cheney's statement. Those are the "known knowns". Those are all done, stick a fork in them.

But how did QE cause bond yields to go to zilch? Again I don't understand your cause and effect allegations there.

and

The Fed deliberately lowered interest rates and kept them low. No QE involved.

You answered your own question. More details here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_easing

Let's take mortgages for example. The Fed purchases mortgage instruments which makes their price go up and thus decreasing the interest rate. That is exactly how QE lowers interest rates below market equilibrium. I chose mortgages because they are further out on the yield curve than 30 day t bills. QE thus lowers interest rates on longer dated financial instruments. It's been a major fail because the lower interest rates have fueled all of those bubbles John's been discussing. Btw, it fucks over pension funds as well because the rate of return on their longer term interest bearing financial instruments has been repressed by QE. Please read the wiki article and get back with John and I. QE also fuels bubbles because bubble financial instruments like stocks get bid up as well as a side effect which makes for some really asinine PE ratios.

But I understand there are some bubbles brewing out there. Housing is the worst. But it burst once, to little long-term effect. And derivatives are not so out of control based on that bubble now, and Dodd Frank has mechanisms to deal with it as long as the Republicans can't repeal it.

The above is a known unknown. What do you think will happen to banks if the collateral value of their loans crashes? The same goes for subprime auto loans. Methinks they'll have a big headache foreclosing on underwater mortgages and repoing upside down car loans.


Here's a blast from the past.
http://www.investors.com/gm-risky-su...ns-fuel-sales/
It looks like some people just never learn, Eric. GM got bailed out the last time around and just look what they're doing now. How fucking stupid.

Oil has crashed, but I can't see it not coming back up again as long as our economy still runs mostly on fossil fuels. This current oil bust is mostly engineered by our wonderful ally, the Saudis, to drive our frakking boom to bust. I guess they can keep prices low for a while. But they can't go much lower.

1. They've been wildly successful in busting out frakking.
2. I'll cast a Chinese curse upon them. "May the Saudis live in interesting times".

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

First name confirmed.

"The Green" is Anglo Saxon. You can fix that by this translation: "Det Grønne" . It's close enough to English that folks will still know what it means.



Uh, we're having a bust here in the oil patch at present. First, the frakking companies are all pretty much insolvent. If the price of oil stays stuck below $50/bbl they all go. Next, you have the oil service companies like Schumberger that are laying off scads of folks. That's another facet of the bust. The layoffs then affect government tax revenue and make a mess.

Like this: http://newsok.com/article/5394200 [Yeah, I know relying on oil for revenue isn't the brightest idea nor is blowing a huge wad on the department of corrections. ]



That's not necessary. Ragnarök will be for those who have money in overpriced stocks, overpriced houses, and "risk on" investments like junk bonds. It will also be for those who are counting on pensions which are underfunded to the point that their owners are defacto insolvent like Illinois. IOW, the bust will affect assorted known areas. It all gets back to Cheney's statement. Those are the "known knowns". Those are all done, stick a fork in them.



and



You answered your own question. More details here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_easing

Let's take mortgages for example. The Fed purchases mortgage instruments which makes their price go up and thus decreasing the interest rate. That is exactly how QE lowers interest rates below market equilibrium. I chose mortgages because they are further out on the yield curve than 30 day t bills. QE thus lowers interest rates on longer dated financial instruments. It's been a major fail because the lower interest rates have fueled all of those bubbles John's been discussing. Btw, it fucks over pension funds as well because the rate of return on their longer term interest bearing financial instruments has been repressed by QE. Please read the wiki article and get back with John and I. QE also fuels bubbles because bubble financial instruments like stocks get bid up as well as a side effect which makes for some really asinine PE ratios.


The above is a known unknown. What do you think will happen to banks if the collateral value of their loans crashes? The same goes for subprime auto loans. Methinks they'll have a big headache foreclosing on underwater mortgages and repoing upside down car loans.


Here's a blast from the past.
http://www.investors.com/gm-risky-su...ns-fuel-sales/
It looks like some people just never learn, Eric. GM got bailed out the last time around and just look what they're doing now. How fucking stupid.


1. They've been wildly successful in busting out frakking.
2. I'll cast a Chinese curse upon them. "May the Saudis live in interesting times".

HA so if anyone should have that name it should be me. I am an Anglo Saxon descendant. Tough luck Eric.

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

> It all gets back to Cheney's statement. Those are the "known
> knowns."

Actually, I believe the statements about known knowns and known
unknowns comes from Donald Rumsfeld.