das schwerste Gewicht

Our Vampire Elite are afraid of crosses

2011-04-17T16:24:00.005+01:00

The ruling class that is sucking the life-blood out of society and economy is afraid of the cross. It is therefore appropriate that they must be disposed of with a silver bullet.

Have the real Cesium-137 fallout maps been hidden from public?

2011-04-17T14:03:00.004+01:00

Compare these two images.

First the publicly released Cs-137 total column fallout map for 24th March. This analysis was made on 26th March.

Now the map on the server here for the same time on the same date. The key gradient is the same. This analysis was made the day before, on the 25th March.

That's right, it shows the Northern Hemisphere getting absolutely plastered with radioactive Cesium-137. If this is incorrect, why is it kept on file and not the public one? If it is the real version, why is it not publicly released?

Source: five minutes in here. Two youtubers, patrioticspace and dutchsinse are going to travel America with radiation detectors to find out accurate information on what exactly is falling to the ground.

Have HAARPists added whirlpools to their geo-arsenal?

2011-04-13T12:23:00.007+01:00

Not content with thunderstorms, tornadoes, tsunamis, volcanoes and earthquakes?

A gargantuan whirlpool 400 kilometers in diameter has, apparently, appeared out of nowhere off the North East coast of South America. This news has not been reported in the Western mass media so you wonder at its veracity. My link (below) is from the Russian Pravda. Other than that it's mostly blogs and alternative media sites.

Maybe the reason why this story is not reported is there is official censorship at what is now a time of world war, in which there is ongoing multi-dimensional global warfare (information, economic, military, geological).

The usefulness of manufactured powerful whirlpools in the sea that last for weeks, months and even years, is obvious. They can be employed to cut off shipping lanes, sink fleets, cripple trading economies and hinder movement of a navy and aircraft carriers.

According to the link, whirlpools are caused by a combination of vertical movement of water, Earth's magnetic field and charged ions in the water, such as Sodium and Chlorine. Since HAARP involves the deployment of electromagnetic waves you have to wonder if they can now be used to create whirlpools.

In nature these water features are not necessarily impossible for large engine-powered vessels to cross and escape but if they can be weaponised with HAARP and whole regions of open ocean "mined" they could become an obstacle.

Giant ocean whirlpools puzzle scientists

US scientists discovered two giant whirlpools in the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Guyana and Suriname. It became a sensational discovery because this part of the ocean has been studied thoroughly, and no one expected anything like that to appear in the area. More importantly, no one can understand where the whirlpools came from and what surprises they may bring to people.

According to Brazilian scientist Guilherme Castellane, the two funnels are approximately 400 kilometers in diameter. Until now, these were not known on Earth. The funnels reportedly exert a strong influence on climate changes that have been registered during the recent years.

"Funnels rotate clockwise. They are moving in the ocean like giant frisbees, two discs thrown into the air. Rotation occurs at a rate of one meter per second, the speed is sufficiently large compared to the speed of oceanic currents, on the border hoppers is a wave-step height of 40 cm," Castellane said.

If this news story later turns out to be a hoax or somewhat exaggerated I will delete/amend this post.

Official: Fukushima disaster as bad as Chernobyl

2011-04-12T16:33:00.001+01:00

Raised to level 7 from level 5 on the INES scale.

Japan's nuclear safety agency has raised the crisis level at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to 7, from the current 5.

Those people who will still maintain it's not a disaster can now also be raised to a 7 out of a possible maximum 7 on the TBIS (total batshit insanity scale).

Five contours of the plausibly deniable World War III

2011-04-09T16:00:00.013+01:00

The third world war is here and it can be denied.

Here are five amazing things I've learned in the last four months.

1. The Federal Reserve is not part of the US government. It's a private organization that does not even provide accounts. The Federal Reserve is run by globalist Anglo-American-European cabal of bankers which includes, at the top, Rockefellers and Rothschilds. They are using the Federal Reserve to crash the global economy to bring in a global currency and global state. That is, all currencies will soon have to be linked to one metal-backed global currency, and the economy and laws of all states will have to be on rail-tracks set by the global state.

2. Globalists and other governments possess weather weapons which they use to attack countries with earthquakes and tsunamis to blackmail them to do whatever they want. One of the American devices is called HAARP. Other countries, including Russia, have equivalents (photo of "giant Tesla coils" below). HAARP has been cited in this United Nations document as a "heavy type nuclear device".

HAARP was used to take out the coastal Fukushima nuclear power plant to cause an economic and environmental crisis and ensure Japan could not become powerful and independent from globalists while the world economy is demolished. Indonesia was hit with a massive tsumani after a dispute with the globalists over transit rights through the geo-politically crucial Malacca Straits. Haiti was turned to rubble by a HAARP-quake to bottleneck millions of dollars of donations in NGO bank accounts and provide the US Military another military base (humanitarian reasons, always). The trademark aurora-like flashing lights in the sky that pre-warns of a HAARP strike have also been seen before earthquakes in China.

A significant part of World War III apparently involves the world's elite attacking each other with man-made natural disasters as a result of Tesla ionospheric super-heating with civilians a deliberate target.

The "Tesla weapon" is used by pumping billions of watts of energy into the ionosphere from these things where it rebounds back down to earth onto the designated target spot, such as deep into a fault-line, which causes the earthquake (often assisted by natural forces when used in conjunction with moon's gravity). These weather modification systems are used day-to-day and they leave ring-shaped traces on radar.

3. The silver commodities market is heavily manipulated by a group of bankers including JP Morgan, who have made billions of dollars of unfair profit by suppressing the price of silver. The reason for this manipulation is because physical silver does not return a sum in interest so to hold it is, well, boring. Instead they have been gaming the system to make more money than they could by simply holding silver - using the huge JP Morgan war chest to short the market with a flood of paper silver contracts - representing so much silver that most of it doesn't exist to be delivered - to knock out the "stops" of small fry and then buy back the silver cheaper.

When the silver price is suppressed, like a beach-ball submerged under water, the manipulative bankers know the price will always rebound after they do it. They can continue the practice, eating up the small fry, ad infinitum. Well, they could have done, until Max Keiser's Silver Liberation Army charged onto the battlefield to take possession of all the available cheap physical silver, call JP Morgan's bluff on their ability to deliver silver, and make them pay cash to settle physical silver contracts. When the silver price, now at $40.90, reaches $50 JP Morgan is expected to meltdown.

4. Andrea Rossi's invention the Rossi Energy Catalyzer is on the market. Rossi's cold fusion device uses nickle and hydrogen to produce energy and copper. Rossi put millions of his own money into the project. One prototype has been heating a factory non-stop for one year. Currently two commercial-scale plants are being built in the United States and Greece. This amazing, no-carbon cheap energy can provide the needs of a single household from a unit inside the garage that is the size of a refrigerator. Obviously, with the energy revolution this and other inventions promise, the globalists can no longer hold a monopoly and control us through energy supplies. Therefore this liberating technology is likely to meet resistance.

5. The food "revolutions" in the Middle East - caused by bankers using donations of bailouts and printed money to hoard commodities rather than provide loans to small businesses, thus raising prices globally - are manipulated and guided by globalists to create a deliberately chaotic situation. The intention is to bring in more radical governments (the Libyan rebels are Al Qaeda) and take the price of a barrel of oil to $200 as part of the globalist agenda to crash the global economy and bring in the aforementioned global empire. After this mass killings will begin using the flicker rates of television "kill" screens and fluorescent light bulbs to program mass convulsions as the globalists attempt to reduce the world population by at least 80%. Brent crude is now at $125. They must be stopped.

David Willetts gets it right... not for the first time

2011-04-05T20:51:00.002+01:00

I liked David Willetts' book: The Pinch. Well, I liked what I read in a review of it as I haven't actually bought it (couldn't afford it, now don't need it).

Now he's on target again being very brave essentially admitting university educated white women block men from getting jobs on, and rising up, the career ladder.

Willetts said feminism was probably the "single biggest factor" for the lack of social mobility in Britain, because women who would otherwise have been housewives had taken university places and well-paid jobs that could have gone to ambitious working-class men.

He also mentions the role "assortative mating" plays widening social divides because you have two married people capable of earning super-high incomes. The effect is magnified again when the educated couple breed below replacement rate (one kid, to whom they'll provide private education and a leave a trust fund) while the uneducated family has four kids on state benefits.

It's not just working-class men but middle-class men who are widely discriminated against. Feminism is not the most important cause of social inequality compared to the role of private central bankers handing out billions to their buddies in the city, though. Feminism has actually been bankrolled by the global elites to limit upward mobility of males who would bring down their corrupt, kleptocratic global kill grid, in favour of promoting more pliable, barren females.

That Willetts did not mention that is probably why he is a Conservative politician. Even so David Willetts is the smartest politician whose existence I'm aware of (I don't pay attention to the crowd) in British politics. That's not hard thing to achieve, but put it this way: if he had a blog I'd add it to my blogroll.

Of course, I've made similar points quite frequently on the EU Referendum forum, interjecting it into a variety of subjects, because it's central to a lot that happens in society.

So I said that women in their twenties who have degrees (with a few exceptions) should not use up space on the career ladder. It would be better for society if they were married, producing babies, rather than living an unsustainable consumerist lifestyle, drinking and buying MiniCoopers. Women can properly start on the career ladder in their 30s if they want a career.

Always to much rejoicing from everyone. Other examples, Here and here.

Whiskey is a "go to" blog on politics of gender and culture though I and other Steve Sailer readers disagree with about 80% of his interpretations of political events which appear to involve a lot of ideological flag-waving.

Hired bloggers and sockpuppets in global disinformation campaign

2011-04-04T19:33:00.001+01:00

Is debate on the internet always really free?

My red flags for trolls:

Whose side are you on?

You must be fanatically pro-Israel. Hired guns will make sure even reasonable objections, in limited cases, do not stick. There's no debate... Israel is always the innocent party. Sides are defined before the start, and discussion cannot be anything more than a rhetorical slanging match.

You must be fanatically pro-America, as if the US represents a perfect functioning nation we should all aspire to emulate. In reality Americans live under tyrannical global power elite.

You must be fanatically pro-Democracy and Capitalism. Anyone who supports both but doubts either exists is branded a communist/socialist.

Weird reasoning: it's so obvious WAR brings Democracy!

Trolls refuse to recognise the obvious... like the fact that wars of aggression/conquest do not deliver functioning democracy (elections do not make a democratic system) but puppet governments for the global state. NWO trolls try to make us believe war is actually for, and brings, democracy.

You are genocidal Nazis

Very traditional insult used by trolls since the dawn of the internet. NWO trolls use it to ridicule those who discuss global government and the global power wielded by banks that run the private Federal Reserve. Anyone who mentions Rockefeller, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, are not only "conspiracy theorists" but anti-semites who, if given power, will round up all the Jews and drop a nuke on Israel.

Total naivety and complete cynicism in one unwholesome package

Ridicule of those who suggest the government frequently engages in cover-ups as "conspiracy theorists" because government information is always right except in the specific cases when we know it's false, because those cases show how the government is infiltrated by socialists.

For but also against free speech

We must fight wars for freedom but ridicule those who suggest acts of terrorism - called "false flags" - are planned and funded against the West by a global cabal as "conspiracy theorists." And socialists. And Nazis. Whatever, they must shut up. Wars for freedom are too important for there to be any debate about it.

Anyone who protests against the government, does anything to undermine government power, is an anti-democratic socialist.

Lack of democracy, free speech, in West is always caused by socialism. Bankers and global power elite are not involved. Libertarians ... they simply don't exist in this universe.

It's possible to have these views and not be a troll for the global elite... I've shared some of these views over the last 10 years. But to aggressively stand behind them and prevent others from airing alternative opinions, while more and more people discover the alternatives, when researched, to be a reasonable view, is at the very least a losing strategy.

Toyota War II: Rebels out-thought by Gadaffi forces

2011-03-31T20:36:00.002+01:00

A rare good BBC News article, written by John Simpson, has an enlightening account of the tactical battle currently being fought between the Libyan government and the Globalist-Al Qaeda axis.

Essentially what is described is a repeat of the Toyota war, a 1980s era battle when Chad destroyed Libya's mechanised army with a dozen highly mobile Toyota 4x4s, with machine guns and rocket launchers bolted on the back of them.

Until yesterday the rebels had been employing these Chadian tactics very effectively. Under the cover of globalist airstrikes, using the Toyota technicals, they had ploughed through the Libyan front, running rings around the Libyan army, all the way to the strategic coastal town of Sirte.

Sirte is a strategic outpost - the seesaw point - as it lies on the one road that connects the two mass populated halves of Libya. Currently the rebels controls the East - Cyrenacia - and Gadaffi the West, including Sirte.

To defend Sirte Gadaffi's men jumped out of their tanks and into their own Toyotas. Their speed enabled them to skirmish effectively to defend the town and helped neutralise the rebel's air superiority because it was difficult to tell from the air whose vehicle belonged to which side.

Now since the Libyan army has picked up the light weapons, the talk is inevitably of arming the rebels with heavier weapons, or a globalist lead full ground invasion. Or maybe they will just stick peacekeepers in the middle and call it a score-draw.

Libyan war part of larger story of Al Qaeda doing globalists' dirty work

2011-03-30T20:46:00.005+01:00

Al Qaeda's "most wanted" Anwar Al-Awalaki invited to dinner at Pentagon shortly after 9/11.

An Al Qaeda leader who is one of the most wanted men in the world was invited for lunch at the Pentagon in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks, a new report has claimed.

New documents have been obtained which apparently detail how Anwar Al-Awlaki, the first American on the CIA's kill or capture list, rubbed shoulders with high-ranking military personnel just months after the atrocities.

They have also found innovative ways to funnel money to their so-called enemy of the "War on Terror."

The US paid an al Qaeda foot soldier a £17 million reward for the capture of terror mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed - including a £1.2 million bonus to relocate to Britain, it was reported today.

The Libyan Al Qaeda has been on the payroll of British intelligence since at least 1996.

One of the goals of all this funding is to shape and shove the food "revolutions" across the Middle East into a radical Sunni alliance to support a war against Shiite Iran.

Libya: will Al Qaeda rebels execute Gadaffi's one million black immigrants?

2011-03-30T18:01:00.010+01:00

They've started. Worrying news from Africa, the globalist coalition is doing what we expected: providing military cover for Libyan Al Qaeda extremists (the rebels) to ethnically-cleanse black people from Gadaffi's secular, post-nationalist Libya.

ADDIS ABABA — While much of the world’s attention is focusing on crude oil prices and the Libyan pipelines in the east of the country– human right groups say rebels are committing crimes against humanity.

In east Libya, African hunt began as towns and cities began fall under the control of Libyan rebels, mobs and gangs. They started to detain, insult, rape and even executing black immigrants, students and refugees.

In the past two weeks, more than 100 Africans from various Sub-Sahara states are believed to have been killed by Libyan rebels and their supporters.

The big lie about the Libyan occupation (British special forces have been on the ground since February) is not only that we are there to protect innocent civilians. They actually want more control over the oil and gas, and Gadaffi's gold.

But also, the warmongers scare us with wild stories that Gadaffi is going to explode an immigration bomb - send boatloads of immigrants to the European Union. The only way stop him? Invade Libya.

In fact, Gadaffi imported the approximately one million Africans for himself from the African Union in a transparent attempt to "elect a new people" who would be supportive his dictatorial rule. The globalist cartel through the European Union has pursued the same strategy.

Presumably, he doesn't want them going anywhere because Gadaffi recently armed his supportive civilians with Kalashnikovs and other weapons. Currently, Gadaffi held areas can resist the onslaught of ethnic-cleansing to be expected from the globalist Al Qaeda rebels.

But if Tripoli is stormed and Gadaffi is forced out an armed civilian population will be a perfect excuse to send in the "humanitarian" globalist blue bottles to persuade the civilians to disarm themselves and so return the initiative to the ethnic-cleansers.

Dr. Michio Kaku: "obviously this accident has exceeded three mile island"

2011-03-29T22:55:00.001+01:00

Japanese government considers raising accident level to 6 from 5 after nuclear meltdowns and plutonium leaks confirmed.

So we have, at least -

3 Meltdowns
1 Fuel pod exposed to air
Hydrogen gas explosions

So, let's ignore the crisis and refrain from using such emotional terms as "disaster." Not.

Dr. Kaku warns of "permanent dead-zones in Japan." That's obviously going to be the case around the nuclear plants for the near economic future. Question is whether it will eventually be safe enough even for the Mammoths those Japanese scientists are supposed to be bringing back.

Exclusive: Is this a 'smoking gun' video of TUC protest Agent Provocateur trashing HSBC?

2011-03-29T00:05:00.002+01:00

Footage from BBC News coverage of the TUC protest day shows unusual behaviour from a particular "protester" with a black hood and white trainers. The man appears to show something to a uniformed policeman and then crosses police lines in the middle of a fight.

It is obviously now important to find out if there is footage elsewhere of this protester being violent.

Hold up... here we are. This guy may be the same one that rampaged through HSBC. Starts 1.13, he was outside before then with what looked to be a beer can.

Point against this theory: the trousers of the man in the first video look lighter - perhaps blue, whereas this guy's are black. That doesn't rule him out, of course. Having been witnessed on video he may have gone to a shop and changed them. He could claim back the cost on expenses.

Here are some stills

Entering HSBC intent on causing some criminal damage

He didn't like the camera

Hooligan behaviour

Blending into the crowd

Nuclear Engineer compares Fukushima disaster to Chernobyl

2011-03-24T19:39:00.002Z

Arne Gundersen says the Fukushima dispersal towers are not functioning which has caused leaking radiation to roll out the sides of the destroyed reactor buildings. As a result, 20-30 miles outwards there is significant contamination. Even at this great distance, the IAEA reports the contamination is 1600 times normal background radiation. Then he compares the environmental damage to Chernobyl.

Now in comparison, and it's not an exact comparison, but it's pretty good, at Chernobyl the IAEA considered a hotspot if the beta contamination exceeded 500,000 disintegrations every second, or 0.5 mega-becequerels per square meter. So this is on the same realm as what a radioactive hotspot was considered at by the IAEA after Chernobyl.

This is the video. He expects the radiation to continue to leak for a number of weeks, during which time he may post updates.

Edit: an anonymous commentator here provides more explanatory detail.

The Becequerel is a measure of radioactivity - that is the rate of nucleus decays per second - so a given mass of a short-lived isotope, like Iodine-131, will have a much higher Becequerel value than the same mass of a long-lived isotope, like Uranium-235, but of course, with Iodine the radioactivity will only last weeks, for Uranium it will last much longer than that.

The conclusion I get is that in terms of radioactive decays this is a speeded-up Chernobyl and as such is no less dangerous in the short-term. As long as uranium and plutonium is not being leaked in significant quantities this won't be a "Chernobyl".

Fortunately for Japan, the Fukushima reactors are lined up along the Pacific coast so the area of contamination is semi-circular rather than circular, and the wind has mostly been blowing away from land. Although the coast and sea will also be contaminated, radiation is more easily dispersed in water.

Since this video it has been reported: Neutron beam observed 13 times. This is thought to be proof that fission has occurred and that the process of meltdown has begun many times in at least one reactor.

Another reports shows, as I suspected, the evacuation zone is not large enough. Radiation Extends Past Zone, New Report Says

But the model showed that areas where cumulative exposure over 12 days reached 100 millisieverts—the government's maximum for infants—extended beyond the evacuation zone. A map based on data from the center showed areas that received a cumulative 100 millisieverts extended as far as about 40 kilometers northeast and south from the plant.

Official sources say, there are currently three power plants at the Fukushima facility which are accident Level 5 (Chernobyl was 7), which makes it (offically) equivalent to three Three Mile Islands occurring at the same time.

For some people though, this is not a disaster enough. The way to show how clever you are is to deny there has been any problems at all at Fukushima and all reports of leaking radiation are exaggerated and hyped in a way that would suggest the radiation is bad for people. Alex Jones has offered to fly one of these people, Ann Coulter, to Japan, First Class, to take a dip in the cooling pools.

However, I'm not a complete nuko-phobe as I recommend this article highlighting that there is a less risky form of nuclear power available, if we want it: Safe nuclear does exist, and China is leading the way with thorium.

Edit 2: Here's another video which covers Fukushima. This time of an interview with a nuclear engineer responsible for the clean-up at Chernobyl.

What the MSM won't tell you about the Libyan rebels

2011-03-20T11:48:00.010Z

Before I do, quote of the day -

“Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business.”

Obama's Jonah Goldberg War

Isn't it remarkable how long they had to wait build up a critical mass of propaganda - Colin Powell's Yellow Cake / Tony Blair's 45 minutes INCOMING! - to fight a war against Iraq. The Libyan war has sneaked up almost unnoticed... express delivery. Like most things, I suppose invading relatively defenseless countries with the world's most powerful militaries to steal their resources gets easier with practice.

Why are we there?

As we know the globalists want Libya's oil and gas, whether they'll take it all or just half and let Gadaffi keep the Tripoli half (two dictators better than one) I don't know. Here's the obligatory map.

However, some of those who realise this obvious fact believe that there is another good reason for contaminating Libya with uranium depleted ordnance: Gadaffi is holding the European Union hostage by threatening to release an immigration flood. We must invade Libya, to stop immigration!

Good one!!!11.

The real story about Libyan immigration is of course not that they're on the verge of coming over here because of anything the Arab-Berber dictator Gadaffi is doing, nasty as he is. Libya's 1 million black African immigrants come from African Union (they have one too) and Gadaffi deliberately imported them to expand his support base outside his tribe. He doesn't want them to leave.

Libya and Gadaffi has been a central player in expanding the African Union, which has been an alliance vehicle for the projection of Gadaffi's influence after pan-Arabism failed to do anything exciting, like win a war against Israel.

The immigrant exodus is more likely to occur if the rebels successfully take the Western half of Libya, as they recently tried to do on their own.

This manufactured "humanitarian disaster" may of course be stopped with the intervention of foreign troops, which must be considered a given now - Egypt's new globalist military dictatorship looks ripe for that.

So the rebels are Libya's BNP, with added hot-headedness. Put that in your Guardian column and ruminate on it.

Amazing image showing Japan quake supercluster

2011-03-19T13:26:00.004Z

Image taken from USGS's Google Earth KML.

In addition to plate tectonics, explanations of this phenomenon include the tension-clearing effects of supermoon and the impact of a huge solar flare on March 11th, and triggered by HAARP.

How much oil and gas is there in Yemen?

2011-03-19T13:09:00.000Z

In fiat democracy the extended suffrage debases the value of the electorate

2011-02-27T11:19:00.001Z

There has been talk that we don't have a democracy, or that we shouldn't have a democracy because in an electoral system the people vote for the worst elements of high society - the liars, conmen, thieves and warmongers, the lawyers and bankers who pay them.

Our problem is not democracy but our fiat democracy. Our problem is not the process of asking the people what they want, but that of the people being asked the majority are ignorant of governing process, and societal, economic and political of reality. Often, this is by life-choice.

The state puts its valuable democratic system into the hands of the worst elements of low society - the naive young women, the fops who revel in ignorance of anything that isn't connected to their own personal entertainment, the gullible who read the main stream media and do not do their own research.

Like a coin that has been debased of its valuable metals, over the years the size of our electorate has been extended and extended and debased of its collective intelligence, until it has now become a worthless prop of a hyper-power elite.

No amount of extending the suffrage will save a democracy as its value depends on a "Gold Standard" where the intelligence of an individual voter is redeemable at the sperm/egg bank. All should have the opportunity to be given a vote but those who are actually allowed on the electoral register for, say, a limited to five-year governing cycle must meet a minimum reasoning ability.

Mubarak was an obstacle to war with Iran

2011-02-20T11:58:00.005Z

Why did the CIA back the coup in Egypt, that has ripped up the constitution (for democracy! hat tip BBC) and brought about an even more powerful dictatorship which has almost immediately afterwards allowed the Muslim Brotherhood to preach in Tahir Square and an Iranian gunboat and supply ship to pass through the Suez canal, two acts which destabilise the Egyptian relationship with Israel?

Three reasons:

1. Mubarak refused to let the Iranian warships pass through Suez - which Egypt had not allowed since the Iranian revolution - because though this was a defensive move on Iran's part it was a military escalation to a war which Mubarak could only lose

A war with Iran would require Israeli use of the Suez canal for submarines. This would be unacceptable to the Muslim Brotherhood and they might mount terrorist attacks on canal shipping until the canal was closed. Mubarak could not afford to do anything to risk the flow of canal traffic because the average Egyptian currently spends 40% of their daily wage on food and would revolt against him.

So the first reason Mubarak was overthrown was because he opposed the military escalation of war against Iran. Stratfor reported that Israel backed the army's move into the Sinai against Mubarak's home on the Red Sea coast - temporarily breaching the 1979 Peace Treaty - which suggests both Israel and the US (CIA) supported the coup.

2. Mubarak suppressed the Muslim Brotherhood, the parent organisation to Hamas which rules in Egypt and attacks Israel

After stealing all the powers of the state the new Supreme Military Council has now done something Mubarak never did and allowed the Muslim Brotherhood to preach openly in the "revolutionary space" of Tahir Square in a way that destabilises Egypt's relationship with Israel. This destabilisation will happen because the Muslim Brotherhood is the parent organisation to Hamas which rules in Gaza.

Since the hardline military coup was backed by Israel and the CIA this destabilisation may be what they want - it gives them a reason to seize Suez during the attack on Iran. So the second reason Mubarak was overthrown was because he opposed the escalation of religious tensions with Israel that would make it difficult for Egypt to keep the Suez canal open during any Israeli conflict with Iran.

3. Mubarak supported the 1979 Peace Treaty with Egypt

The new Military regime has done at least three things that goes against the 1979 Peace Treaty. The first, before they got power, was moving the army into the Sinai, a move which had Israeli approval. The second, immediately allowing the new regime, which the Pentagon admit they had worked closely with during the transition, to let the Muslim Brotherhood spread anti-Israeli propaganda in Tahir Square. The third, allowing an escalation of the conflict between Israel and Iran by deliberately letting Iranian warships through the Suez canal, when they know they'll have to do the same for Israeli warships - or go to war with Israel or the propaganda spreading Muslim Brotherhood.

The Supreme Military Council of Egypt prevents the masses from revolting with a promise of democracy in the future which Mubarak could not give because he did not want a democracy (any more than the new lot do), and his promise would not have been believed anyway (as it wasn't). Meanwhile they are spreading anti-Israeli propaganda to sabotage any possibility the new constitution and elections will either 1. Happen or 2. Bring about a democratic regime.

Mubarak, though he was a bad ruler for the Egyptians, had to be removed because he was an obstacle to a war which US and Israel want against Iran. Mubarak didn't have any cards left to play after the stakes were raised, so he (was) folded, and the chips went to US and Israel.

A chart showing the cause of the revolt in the UK

2010-12-12T20:23:00.005Z

Numbers from UN population division.

Today in 2010 there are living in the UK about 3.6 million more individuals between the ages 40-55 than there were twenty-five years ago, in 1985. If you further compare the years there are 1.1 million fewer people between age 15-24. The number of individuals between 25-39 is about the same.

This is a fundamentally different demographic structure and it has an influence on culture and the way we are governed. This bubble which is now middle aged (20 years ago it was 20-35, or even 20-45 as the baby boom generation in UK was post war to 1970) has over the last thirty years redesigned governing and economic structures to employ more of themselves in high status, high earning leadership roles. As the bubble rose, the institutions expanded with their cumulative desire for high status, wealth and power.

The effect of this is an extraordinarily expensive architecture of transnational institutions and unaccountable political networks and the tab is now being picked up and felt most by students who are expected to pay high £18-27k tuition fees.

To employ more of themselves the baby boom generation has created more ersatz leadership positions which carry little responsibility but a lot of weight in money. They have expanded international institutions, funded non-governmental organizations and set up quangos and regulatory bodies to police business - rules which favour big, high-status, high-earning (for the directors), transnational businesses.

As the chart shows, the most bloated annual cohorts are not expected to retire for another 5-10 years. In this time they will continue to seek to generate more high status, high earning leadership posts so that as many of them as possible can have a cushy desk job, a title and jet-setting lifestyle that requires 'work' attending conferences that are situated within walking distance of a fine tropical beach.

The last thing this ageing but still ambitious generation wants to do is fight. They think they rule the world and want to do that from the comfort of their well-paid chairs. It is however as yet an open question for how long the generations coming through are going to be prepared to subsidise the lifestyles of this old elite.

Unlike in 1985, because of the huge burden of parasitic elites, the economy is not likely to undergo a boom any time soon. The huge number of young people in 1985 had space in which to rise into well-paid positions because there were 3.5 million fewer people in the most powerful 40-55 age group above them.

As such the only way this younger generation can get anywhere is by 1. physically removing the generations above them or 2. by radically "downscaling" power-structures into an anarchic hyper-localism (or both) and allow the transnational and national institutions to "wither on the vine".

Once this generational conflict has been resolved over the next decade there will be a cultural conflict between the rising numbers of immigrant descendants.

There is a similar demographic profile to the UK in other Western states.

Back-of-envelope geopolitical map South East Asia

2010-11-08T22:53:00.000Z

Pink and green lines are approximation of road links. Red lines are Pakistan-Chinese axis, blue lines Indian-Western axis.

I have India pushing into Central Asia for trade and security purposes, to surround and control Pakistan. A new road has been built from the less-Pashtun north Afghanistan to Iran so India can trade with Afghanistan without going through Pakistan. This road also links Russia with India. Although Russia has military sales agreements with India I have Iran and Russia neutral-ish. The short road from Afghanistan to India through Pakistan is still the more efficient route for Indian trade with Central Asia, particularly for the north of India. China's interest in the region is not getting its supply route dominated by India - hence the new road through the Himalayas to Pakistan.

As you can see from my interpretation Afghanistan is fundamentally split down the middle. Ethnically, as I have suggested before, but also geopolitically.

Obama's Afghan legacy: federalise Pakistan?

2010-08-03T17:13:00.000+01:00

Let's recap the state of play in Afghanistan.

Is complete bureaucratic control of all of Afghanistan possible from Kabul? Answer: No.

Is Taliban victory over the Tajik, Hazara and Uzbek north Afghanistan realistic, given their economic and military support from India and the West? Answer: No.

Is a split-state solution between the north and south of Afghanistan achievable and likely to happen? Answer: I no longer think so. But none of the other options look realistic.

The third of the three options took a boost in October 2009 with an apparent change of American strategy: here -

The new American thinking is that what they deem the "nationalist" Afghan Taliban may be divided from its more extreme elements - and also from al-Qaeda, whose cohorts of foreign fighters are interested almost exclusively in jihad against the West.

I'd like to think President Obama had read what I wrote two months earlier in August 2009 (like the bit about "Western diplomats in the Afghan capital no longer enthuse about women's rights, democracy and nation-building"), but my own thoughts were a product of the time even a year before in 2008. I'd gained knowledge of the importance of Pashtun culture reading HBD blogs like Steve Sailer and GNXP.

Anyway, it's worth reading again what the middle ground in this conflict looks like.

The price of an eventual deal could be allowing Taliban governors to take over southern provinces – perhaps Helmand and Kandahar - the imposition of strict religious laws, and allowing former insurgents to take government posts.

...

Taliban leaders are looking for guarantees of their personal safety from the US, and a removal of the "bounties" placed on the head of their top commanders. They also want a programme for the release of prisoners held at the notorious Bagram US air base in Afghanistan, and at Guantanamo Bay.

In return, he says, the Taliban would promise not to allow Afghanistan to be used to plan attacks on America – the original reason for American invervention, and the overriding aim of US policy in the region.

So as I argued in my article and on EU referendum forums, against a lot of doubters, it seems the Taliban Pashtun may be willing to split from the Arab dominated Al Qaeda terrorist organisation in exchange for power and status they would not get in a Kabul government.

There, Indian-supported Tajiks like Mohammad Fahim (Panjshir Valley) and Ishmael Khan (Herat) have come to dominate the Afghan government, with non-Pashtun minorities like Hazaaran vice-President Karim Khalili (Wardak Province).

Even Pashtun President Hamid Kazai is a divisive figure. Kazai's Duranni tribe gained power because they were willing to trade away government positions to the Tajiks, and other non-Pashtun Afghans. This was something demanded from them by the West but it meant there was little room inside the tent for non-Duranni Pashtuns, and enmity from the Duranni who lost out.

Where there are substantial numbers of poor Duranni tribesmen, like Helmand Province, the Taliban lean on their cultural ties to gain support for the fight against the non-Pashtun and "traitorous" Pashtun. This is why the Taliban group is a distinctly Pashtun phenomenon rather than Tajik even though the two populations are Sunni Muslim: the Tajik gain out of the government, most Pashtun don't.

Since Pashtun dynasties traditionally have flipped between Ghilzai and the Duranni families the key to security in the Pashtun region is a deal between the Ghilzai, who form the leadership of the Taliban, and the Duranni, of the Afghan government.

The Intra-Pashtun conflict and inter-ethnic conflict with non-Pashtuns in Afghanistan mean that Obama's legacy in the region cannot be anything other than a solution in which all the powerful interest groups can be bought off separately.

A two-state solution could take a number of forms. I don't know at this stage which is more likely.

1. A sovereign "Pashtun" state which has a seat in the United Nations

Good: Tajiks, Uzbeks, Haaza get to dominate a state in the north of Afghanistan that has few Pashtuns. Since Pashtuns tend to cause the wars in Afghanistan and run Afghan governments this might lead to moderate levels of economic development. Taliban Pashtun dominated south might again wipe out opium farming.

Bad: Pashtun state has no defined borders. While the vast majority of Pashtuns live in the south and south east, there are pockets in the north. Then there is the question who is going to control Nimruz Province, and the new road to Iran, strategically important for the north because it has reduced their dependency on Pakistani transit.

In 1993 the Durand Line border separating Pakistan from Afghanistan expired after 100 years. A new border would have to be brokered for the new state. Since Pashtuns live well inside Pakistan they might claim Pakistani cities of Quetta and Peshawar inside a new Pashtunistan. Thus Pakistan might block a Pashtun state.

2. Pashtunistan could become part of a devolved Afghan federation in which the Pashtun areas are governed from Kandahar and are responsible for their own police and security. The army would be run from Kabul.

Good: As above. Being essentially two states all groups should get a slice of the pie and cooperation should increase.

Bad: Pashtuns might not accept a deal without their own army divisions located in the south, staffed by Pashtun officers. There would be the arguments over jurisdiction also noted above, where Pashtuns in non-Pashtun regions would want to rule themselves and vice versa. There may be a Pashtun assault on the north to control the whole of Afghanistan and more ethnic cleansing. This would be fairly easy for the Pashtuns to do, as it has been done before, because the north population is more landlocked than the south (which has close connection with Pakistan).

3. The Pashtun region could be made part of a larger Pakistan

Good: Can't think of anything.

Bad: Still the question of where to draw the border between north and south Afghanistan. Added problem of Pakistani Taliban already fighting the Pakistan government. Thus Pashtun groups would likely oppose Pakistani rule.

I have to say I'm now considering the option that Obama may eventually leave the future of Afghanistan in its past: a random mess.

The only other option I can think of is a federalisation of Pakistan in which Pashtunistan, Baluchistan, Sind and Punjab - there may be others, Bangladesh already lost - all have their own local government within a Central Asian Republic kind of state. The Pakistani army, which already receives $1bn a year aid from the United States, would be responsible for external security.

In fact, a 2009 paper "Managing Ethnic Diversity and Federalism in Pakistan" by Mohammed Mushtaq argues that Pakistan should be federalised. Maybe that is the only solution to Afghanistan.

Afghan - Indian relations: about China not Pakistan

2010-08-01T18:08:00.011+01:00

It is received wisdom that Indian interests in Central Asia are designed to counter-balance Pakistan. All Indian actions must be framed versus Pakistan, whilst the geopolitical elephant in the room China - the other 1 billion population rising global superpower, which has a history of conflict with India - is totally ignored.

An example of this standard analysis, Jayshree Bajoria of the Council on Foreign Relations writes -

Afghanistan holds strategic importance for India as New Delhi seeks friendly allies in the neighborhood, and because it is a gateway to energy-rich Central Asian states such as Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. "India is looking to ensure that other countries in the region favor or at least are neutral on its conflict with Pakistan," says J Alexander Thier, an expert on Afghanistan at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP). Afghanistan, on the other hand, he says, looks to India as "a potential counterweight in its relationship with Pakistan."

And so on. But I shouldn't pick on one random Googled individual - how about an entire special issue of a respected International Politics journal?

There are in fact a number of good reasons why India wants to develop an interest in Central Asia irrespective of a conflict with the Pakistani government - which I believe is, aside from rhetoric, as good as finished for now as Pakistani elites become twisted around India's massive economy.

1. Central Asian energy

India is interested in Central Asian energy but only to prop up the Tajik-dominated Afghan government and deny revenue to the Pashtun, not for Indian energy security purposes.

India's actions may suggest it is interested in natural gas from Turkmenistan. India signed a memorandum of understanding for a pipeline that would pass through the problem Pashtun region of southern Afghanistan and Pakistan (Herat-Kandahar-Quetta). As recently as 2008 India, Pakistan and the Afghan government agreed to buy gas from Turkmenistan.

But while the southern part of Afghanistan where the proposed trans-Afghan pipeline would be laid is the flattest piece of land in the region it is also the most politically unstable. It is not a secure source of energy for India for the long-term, or even for Pakistan or anyone else for that matter. For India, there must be the added consideration that the gas must travel through Pakistan, and Pakistan's own secessionist Baluchistan region.

A state which relies on the trans-Afghan pipeline for its gas could easily become dependent on a high-priced, highly unstable source of energy. Another factor against serious Indian interest are the Indian's own relatively healthy domestic energy supplies. India has large reserves of coal which it currently uses for power generation, newly discovered conventional gas fields, and potential for economic unconventional shale gas, and coal bed methane. So while the Indian government might act interested in Central Asian gas it does not seem to be an essential resource for India.

The pipleline is still important to India in one way: through transit rights. There is $300 million per year up for grabs for whichever Afghan government can control the flow of gas from Turkmenistan. If the Pashtun south controlled the revenue from the pipeline from Kandahar rather than the Tajiks from Kabul the money would prop-up a Taliban type Pashtun regime that does not have strong relations with India, rather than a regime friendly to Tajikistan and India.

2. Strong relations with Tajikistan

Tajiks are culturally closer to Indians than the rural, feuding Afghan Pashtuns. Tajik-Afghanis are urban, business orientated, educated in Indian universities. Tajiks enjoy Indian culture, like Bollywood films and Indian television programmes. Afghan-Indian relations are therefore a euphemism for Indian-Tajik relations as the Tajik community might be expected to gain the most out of the reconstruction projects.

India wants to improve its relations with Tajikistan to use it as a geopolitical stepping stone to out-flank China on its Xingjiang province border. To do this India needs to assist the large Tajik population in northern Afghanistan. India therefore has more interest developing good relations with Tajikistan than with Turkmenistan, and India would also rather be friends with the Tajik population of north Afghanistan than the Pashtun south of Afghanistan. This should be reflected in major aid projects to the region.

Indeed it is. We learn from the first source India has given a $17 million grant to Tajikstan so they can modernise a hydroelectric power plant. We also know India has given $1.2bn in reconstruction aid to Afghanistan since 2001. The largest projects, like the Zaranj-Delaram road connection to Iran, and Salma Dam project near Herat, are all close to sizeable Tajik populations in the Afghan north-west (dark green in the Stratfor map below).

The road project to Iran (from Herat through Nimruz province) is significant because it offers the more urban Tajiks and Uzbeks another trade route with India and the rest of the world through Iran, rather than Pakistan. The road also brings the sea port to closer for the Herat region than the alternative via the Khyber Pass. Additionally the BBC article says India are "erecting power transmission lines in the north" which has returned 24 hour electricity to Kabul.

3. Trade economies

It makes sense for the populous Indian north west (14 million in New Delhi alone) to develop a better trade relationship with Afghanistan - the Tajik north at least. New Delhi is closer to Kabul by road (about 1200km) and air than are Calcutta or Mumbai. A whole swathe of Central Asia including Tajikistan is nearer to the Indian capital than the southern Indian region of Kerela and the city of Chennai. It makes economic sense for the region to become more integrated, such as in the supply of refrigerated fresh fruit and vegetables, and there will always be elites willing to support such moves in return for a slice of the pie.

4. Out-flanking China

In 1962, 48 years ago, India and China fought a war over their border. This conflict is much forgotten - what with the India-Pakistan Kashmir dispute - but is a much more important motivator for India seeking a special-relationship with Tajiks in Central Asia than conflict with Pakistan. India also had a major skirmish with China in 1987 in the Indian north-east. Given India's military superiority over Pakistan it is unlikely to lose a war against Pakistan any time soon but it could against China. This makes India's recurrent conflict with China more significant than its conflict with Pakistan.

The 1962 war is interesting for being a purely land war, fought at high-altitude in the Indian north-west, and being one which India lost. The war of 1962 was fought primarily over the Aksai Chin Himilayas and the Chinese construction of National Highway 219, a militarily strategic road which connected the two troublesome Western provinces, Tibet and Xingjiang.

While India lost the war for Aksai Chin it still considers this territory part of India. Were India in a position of strength and China one of weakness, Indians might attempt to take it back with force - and prop up anti-Han Chinese independent states in Xingjiang and Tibet. However India might be looking to threaten China even before conflict by providing covert assistance to anti-Han Chinese groups via Tajikistan and the road link into Xingjiang across the border in southern Kyrgyzstan (screen cap from Google maps below).

At the elite/government level the Pakistan-Indian conflict is much less immediately important than the Sino-Indian conflict. I expect the trade route between Afghanistan and India to be kept open for now. No, I don't expect Pakistan to be an irrelevance as China will eventually lean on Pakistan, and groups in the region, to undermine Indian interests in Central Asia. This could lead to separation of the undeveloped Pashtun part of Afghanistan from the better functioning Tajik-dominated part and the closure of the Kabul-Wagah trade route.

Received wisdom of the Afghan conflict as a geopolitical tussle between Pakistan and India is therefore not only light-weight, it is wrong as it does not explain current economic cooperation between the two governments (such as the Kabul-Wagah trade route... for now). It also says nothing about India's funding of reconstruction projects which favour Tajik-Afghans. If the Indian interest in Afghanistan was really against Pakistan rather than China there would be more Indian attempts to draw the Pashtuns away from Pakistan. That there do not seem to be such an interest shows the Pakistan-India dispute is less relevant than the India-China one for the continuing Afghan conflict.

Ethnic map of Britain

2010-07-29T20:58:00.010+01:00

For some reason typing in "ethnic map of Britain" into Google image search doesn't produce an ethnic map of Britain. At least not in the top 100 or so. This is strange since you can Google an ethnic map of somewhere far away, like Afghanistan.

There is one hit, an Independent newspaper headline, for "race map of Britain". That's from 2006 and there are interesting details in the captions, so I'll post it again below. As you can see, the title is a misnomer as 99.9% of the "diversity" is in England.

This map is not quite what I was looking for because a "diversity" map includes Jewish people and no doubt Poles, Irish and other white foreigners. I'd like to know at least the proportion of white to non-white. That map would better show up broad cultural and linguistic differences between Britons.

So the only thing to do was to draw up a map myself. Wikipedia is not the most up to date or accurate source on demographics but it was the quickest and good enough for starters. Here it is that map.

(This is not yet an ethnic map but it's a start.)

Again, like the Independent map diversity is very much an English phenomenon. The regions, counties with long coastlines, hills, the large land areas with low population densities have the lowest concentration of non-white Britons.

Our largest non-white groups, South Asian and Black Britons, are mostly to be found on the flat lands of England, along a SE/NW economic corridor between London and Manchester. The corridor also extends down to East Sussex which may have something to do with the Channel Tunnel and ferry ports, or it could just be because those counties are close to London.

It's pretty startling how the South West, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have got away with so little diversity, all +98% white. I wonder if there is a reason for that?

Afghanistan-Britain-India nexus

2010-07-27T23:29:00.004+01:00

David Cameron has visited India and with him half the cabinet and the great and good of British industry and culture. The intention is to increase trade (currently £11bn) and help British ngoligarchs like Tescos and Oxfam get a better foothold in India.

India by 2014 may have an internal market worth £352bn. This would be much less than China's £975bn consumer market in 2008, but a lot of Indians speak English so it's understandable the government of the day up-sticks and moves to Bangalore even if a slice of the Shanghai pie is bigger. In return, India would like Indians to be able to move to Britain to work, learn and use the NHS - that's something not so easy to do with the European Union cap on non-EU migrants.

Nethertheless there is something Britain can do to put India in our gratitude. Help keep the new trade route with north Afghanistan open. India wants to put Tajik north Afghanistan in its geopolitical pocket. This as much to challenge Chinese influence in Central Asia as anything to do with Pakistan - serious Indo-Pak conflict, beyond posturing, being essentially over for now.

Indeed, as the once great power which drew up the lines in the region, the British Commonwealth is arguably a bridge between the two old feuding sub-continent states. Anyhow, now they both possess nuclear weapons, I believe the Indo-Pak elites have also recognised wider war is futile and have decided on putting partisan objectives before national ones. It worked so well in Western Europe.

The British role involves squaddies jumping on IEDs on Afghan roads so the trucks can pass through, or just by hanging around to make an obstacle of themselves to any organised Pashtun move on the more developed north. But you say Pakistan doesn't seem to get anything out of this deal - it's just a "Afghan-Britain-India" nexus,will never happen - not quite. Prediction: Pakistan will be given "Pashtunistan" or a Pashtun state will be created under the wing of Pakistan.

So.

Pakistan will get their "strategic depth". Indians will be able to develop and advance on Central Asia. British NGO workers will get their paid ~~humanitarian missions~~ holidays indefinitely. British brass will be able to play with their toys and those of north Afghanistan. Big business will get a slice of India. Have I just elucidated the pathway in the state formerly known as Afghanistan by which everyone wins (supposedly)?

The ethnicity map below is from this Stratfor article by the excellent George Friedman (who hasn't yet, to my knowledge, written about the Afghan-Britain-India nexus). There are many available on the net but this one is particularly clear and colourful.

The Pashtun are coloured orange, Tajik and Uzbek in the north are green and brown respectively. The trade route from Afghanistan to India goes through the Kyber Pass, directly East of Kabul on this map. The Pashtun region being coloured entirely orange glosses over its social complexity. Pashtuns are riven by tribal divisions (e.g. Durrani vs. Ghizai) and by cultural rifts between their few urban settlements, the rural farmers and the Pashtun nomads.

Jobs for the girls?

2010-07-15T12:20:00.003+01:00

Since there is no civil society in Afghanistan I found it somewhat surprising to find in the directory of development organization the non-state has 174 civil society development organizations. Judging by Afghanistan's neighbours, civil society organizations aren't particularly interested in Central Asia. Why Afghanistan? It might therefore be useful to do a more detailed analysis of what non-governmental organizations (NGOs) there are in Afghanistan and what they stand for.

So I've created an unofficial chart (below) based on my own imperfect categorisation of the different organizations numbered "CSO" (Civil Society Organisation).

The two most nebulous categories are friendship and campaigns. The campaigns section includes landmine organizations and some peace and democracy NGOs, but women's groups have been totalled separately. Friendship included voluntary organizations and ones along the lines of "American Friends of Afghanistan". The Other section contained coordinating meta-NGOs, some which used the word "technical" and some that didn't fit in any of the main categories.

Included in Relief/Aid section are so-called humanitarian organizations like Oxfam and World Vision. The largest aid organizations also have a political agenda. This is that they want to deliver aid in a militarily secure environment, because if they stopped delivering aid people would choose to hold on to their money to give later rather than give it to sit in Oxfam's or whatever's bank account.

The results: I expected more human rights organizations. For example, there appears to be no Amnesty International office in Afghanistan. AI does qualify as a development organization on other country pages, like Barbados (what an onerous posting that is). Afghanistan must be just way too much of a tough gig.

Afghanistan is awash with generic humanitarian organizations and medical non-governmentals. These are mostly young doctors and middle class university graduates who can't get jobs back in Europe. One reason why middle class Westerners like to fund middle class institutions like relief giving NGOs is because it gives their middle class children, many of whom are daughters, a platform to travel the world that doesn't involve getting shot at.

There's a strong combined showing by women and children, which makes up more than 10% of the total. This isn't much of a surprise as one of the original justifications for being in Afghanistan was to better the lot of the women. A quarter of the seats in the Afghan Parliament are reserved for women even though only 18% of young Afghan women are literate. At the 2010 elections 28% of those elected were female.

The bulk of the educated women in the Afghan parliament likely come from the more literate Afghan ethnic groups, like the Tajiks, who do not oppress their women as much. Tajikis are a non-tribal, urban group who are everywhere, but predominate in the north and west making up about 27% of the Afghan population. Unlike the Pashtun, the Tajiks are an ethnic force for holding Afghanistan together as a post-racial Anglo-Saxon type state but, of course, the Tajiks already have a state called Tajikistan next door.

So on the one hand we have pressure from the Tajik community to keep Afghanistan going as a non-state because it increases their political influence, and on the other we have pressure from the development community to keep Afghanistan going because it provides something for their daughters to do. Is the Afghan war being extended way beyond its demonstrable failure because it provides jobs for the girls?

Gorilla, gorilla

2010-07-13T22:08:00.002+01:00

I've often wondered if poor states get development help from states, international government organizations (IGOs) and civil society operators (CSOs) because they are poor and need help - like is supposed to happen. Or whether they get aid because they are a good place for global AIDministrators to have a paid holiday on charitable donations. With data from the fascinating directory of development organization I've decided to test whether my cynicism has any factual support.

As wikipedia tells us, development aid is different from humanitarian aid because it is designed to make the recipient country more wealthy over the long haul. The idea is to enable a poor state become rich enough to overcome humanitarian crises on its own and so not need any emergency assistance from foreign taxpayers or donating citizens ever again. Official development assistance (ODA) is usually provided in form of small grants and loans, while non-governmentals often help out with equipment, medical care, expertise in a field of knowledge, teaching and research. Since poor states have the greatest need for all of these things we should find the poorest states have more development organizations than their more wealthy neighbours - assuming there is no war going on.

Caveat: An assumption of mine is that many of the listed CSOs in the directory will be staffed by local administrators who are funded by international donors either directly or through their government which received the funds. I assume further that if these organizations don't have a foreign representative working with them, they or the government department which took the donor's money, will get a visit from a foreign aid coordinator representing the international donor once a year - who would check-in to ensure nobody was getting ripped off. The point I'm making is that if a bunch of money is donated somewhere that will usually entail one or more foreign official paying a visit to see where that money has gone. If international donors don't check up, just hand over the cash then there can be no paid-for holiday for someone. (My data is not so fine grained that I can filter-out the domestic CSOs and just look at international CSOs).

Note on methodology: I've chosen landlocked African states and split them into regional groups based on their closest neighbours and climatic zone. They're in groups because I want to compare like with like. For example, Chad will never have the Victoria Falls so its level of tourism will unlikely ever be comparable to Zambia unless there is a major war there. Its bio-inheritance, from savannah and charismatic megafauna like elephants and cheetahs in the south to Sahara desert in the north, is more similar to its neighbour Niger. African regions also have politics that make cross-regional comparison problematic. For example, the Mugabe Zimbabwe regime has lead to an increase in tourism to Zambia, and the history of genocide in Rwanda and Burundi might be expected to affect those nations.

Central Africa: Central African Republic, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi

With the poor and landlocked Central African states an obvious trend is the number of development organizations increase with population size. We can assume that a major reason why Uganda has over ten times more development organizations and nearly seven times more official development aid than the Central African Republic is because it has a nearly seven times larger population. Uganda has a greater number of poor than the Central African Republic and throw in a more complex development agenda (complicated by such issues as Uganda's south/north Bantu/Nihlotic split) you attract, like flies to a dunghill, many more development organizations.

Uganda's total number of development organizations does however look very high to me - but I can't tell from the chart if it is appropriate for a country of its size. A comparison with Ethiopia, to Uganda's north east, might therefore be revealing. Ethiopia apparently has a population of 88 million, a per capita GDP $400 less than Uganda's, and receives a lot more ODA. Yet at 598, Ethiopia has 271 fewer development organizations than Uganda, whose number of development offices begins to look suspiciously inflated.

Now turn to a comparison of Rwanda and Burundi: again we run into a possible case of development office inflation. Rwanda's population is 19% larger than its neighbour but has two-thirds more development organizations (including finance, training, private sectors etc.) and one third more CSOs, all both no doubt funded in part or whole by Rwanda's 83% fatter ODA budget. Both Burundi and Rwanda have had periods of genocide in recent history and they both have a similar level of infant mortality and HIV infection, so in terms of international pity the two states should be about equal.

Like Ugandans are more wealthy than Ethiopians, so Rwandans are slightly richer (if that word can be used to distinguish two shitpoor states) than Burundi. In 2008 Burundi scored slightly lower (better) on the Freedom House number (Civil liberties + Political Rights) so political oppression is unlikely signficant. You'd expect Rwanda to have a few more development organizations compared to Burundi but Burundi is so incredibly poor and development organizations are supposed to help a country develop, aren't they?

What explains the development organization profile of Uganda vs. Ethiopia and Rwanda vs. Burundi - why do the poorer states not have a higher number of development organizations compared to their comparable neighbours? I suggest Uganda and Rwanda have popular tourist attractions which global tranzis like to visit. International organizations and non-governmental groups are more likely to develop a funding relationship or set up a regional office in a state with a major tourist attraction than one which does not because when the global tranzi goes on work call he or she can take time out to visit - perk of the job, if you like. It only makes sense.

On this matter Uganda has three World Heritage sites, which is five less than Ethiopia's, but one of them is the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, home to the hugely popular and endangered Mountain Gorilla. Big Ape tourism is one reason Uganda has 500,000 more tourists a year than beautiful Ethiopia. What about Rwanda? You guessed it, there are Mountain Gorillas there too, in Volcanoes National Park. But not in Burundi, which means the latter now lags Rwanda's tourist figures upwards 388%.

South Central Africa: Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Botswana

Malawi possesses the largest population, yet despite high infant mortality and elevated levels of HIV infection, and being the second poorest of the states, it is, relatively speaking, the worst off for development organizations. Sure, in this region the competition is very high, with Malawi not being badly off for tourists. But possessing a land area of just over 100 square kilometres it does not have the same potential for safari tourism that its three-seven times larger neighbours can exploit. In 2009 Zimbabwe, Zambia and Botswana had between 28-36% of their land area protected in environmental law compared to 15% in Malawi.

Excluding the fun Mugabe's having at Zimbabwean's expense (which probably suppresses Zimbabwe's ODA and CSO figures) Malawi would undoubtedly be the poorest of the four states badly in need of the most development organizations. Another telling figure on the chart is the number of IGOs that want to set up office in Malawi - not many. That Malawi posted a comparatively reasonable FH number of 8, compared to Zimbabwe's 13 did not seem to help much. Like Zambia, Zimbabwe possesses half of the Victoria Falls natural wonder. It also possesses a total of five World Heritage sites.

I would guess that the very high HIV infection rate in wealthy Botswana, another excellent ~~development~~ safari holiday destination, accounts for much of its stupendous levels of ODA.

West Central Africa: Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad

Mali, of Timbuktu yore, dominates the development industry in this region whilst being neither the poorest or the largest population. Mali possesses four World Heritage sites (three of them for cultural importance). However, I hear objections the sub-Saharan African state's relative political stability of FH 5 may provide an 'innocent' explanation for the high number of IGOs, CSOs and development assistance, at least compared to its neighbour Burkina Faso, FH 8.

I'm loathe to accept this as an explanation. We know from Zimbabwe's high level of development organization that a very oppressive state does not always deter the committed development tourist, so a mere 3 points on the FH scale between Mali and Burkina Faso isn't going to matter. The four World Heritage sites must richly appeal to the tranzi's sense of non-Western civilization. The preference for providing aid to Mali could only be motivated by tourism. Mali and Burkina Faso both have charismatic mega-fauna, like hippopotamus, giraffe and elephant, but Mali has the Timbuktu too.

Further east into Niger, the Second Taureg Rebellion and a habit of tourists going missing might explain why Niger, which has the same level of population as Burkina Faso, is not yet challenging in the big fauna tourism market. Given the political instability in Niger and attacks on foreigners the state's lower numbers of development organization and ODA cannot be a surprise. Chad is the wealthiest, least populous, and has the most oppressive government of the four. This might explain why it's per capita number of development organizations sits closer to Niger than Mali and Burkina Faso. There's not much to visit in Chad that cannot be seen somewhere better, so Chad ends up with fewer IGOs than Botswana.

Southern Africa: Lesotho and Swaziland

The last case study is a very clear example of development tourism. The richer, more oppressive state with smaller population has come to possess the greater number of development organization (the amount of ODA though is weighted heavily in favour of the more populous, freer state). Does the International Baby-Food Action Network really have to have a base in Swaziland and not in Lesotho where there is an equally serious problem of child mortality (and presumably more babies dying)?

Sources: TOT 1-9 | POP (M) | GDP p/c ($) | ODA ($) | FH# 2008 | HIV | INF. M | Tourists 1/2 |

Not all cleaner fish

2010-07-06T23:12:00.001+01:00

If it achieves nothing else, the presence of Western forces in Afghanistan will continue to provide employment for countless transnational hangers-on (see 1 and 6).

Two poor Central Asian states. Two different development profiles.

1. International Organizations
2. Government Institutions
3. Private Sector
4. Finance Institutions
5. Training and Research
6. Civil Society
7. Consultancy
8. Information
9. Grantmakers

Source: Directory of Development Organizations.

In terms of natural resources, Uzbekistan has decent reserves of natural gas which might explain its higher GDP but Afghanistan has huge mineral resources.

Uzbekistan's advantage really is that it has a cooperation bonus as a functioning state: the largest ethnic group within its boundaries makes up 80% of the population, compared to 40% in Afghanistan.

No amount of transnational busy-bodies with guns and/or clip-boards is going to put Afghanistan together. The best chance of stability in the region is a split-state solution, which leaves ethnic groups the majority in their own states.

But if there were actually a balance of power in the region the tranzis might have to go home. But now they have their feet on the ground, how hard is that going to be?