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Wednesday, May 21, 2014

MASS FISH DEATHS: MILLIONS HAVE BEEN FOUND DEAD ALL OVER THE WORLD IN THE PAST MONTH






Millions of fish are suddenly dying all over the planet. In fact, there have been dozens of mass fish death events reported in the past month alone. So why is this happening? Why are fish dying in unprecedented numbers all over the world? When more than six tons of fish died in Marina Del Ray over the weekend, it made headlines all over the United States.

But the truth is that what just happened off the southern California coast is just the tip of the iceberg. In 2014, mass fish die-offs have pretty much become a daily event globally. Individually, each event could perhaps be dismissed as an anomaly, but as you will see below when they are all put together into one list it truly is rather stunning. So is there a reason why so many fish are dying? Is there something that connects these mass fish death events? Has something about our environment changed? The following are just a few examples of the mass fish death reports that have been coming in day after day from all over the globe…

*In April, 500,000 carp were found “floating belly-up in Kentucky’s Cumberland River“.

*Over the weekend, thousands upon thousands of fish died just off the southern California coastline


California Fish and Wildlife workers are still scooping dead sea life from the surface of the harbor Monday after thousands of dead anchovies, stingrays and even an octopus died and floated up over the weekend.

So far officials have cleaned up 6 tons of dead fish, and they still have a long way to go.

*The death of approximately 35,000 fish up in Minnesota is being blamed on a “lack of oxygen“.

*The recent die off of thousands of fish in the Shark River near Belmar, New Jersey is also being blamed on “oxygen depletion“.

*Officials in Menifee, California are still trying to figure out what caused the death of thousands of fish in Menifee Lake a few weeks ago…


Authorities continued testing the water in Menifee Lake Friday after thousands of dead fish have been seen floating since last weekend.

Menifee city officials first heard reports Saturday of floating fish at the lake, which is located on private property about a half-mile east of the 215 Freeway.

*In the Gulf of Mexico, dolphins and sea turtles are dying “in record numbers“.

*Maryland officials are still puzzled by the death of 7,000 Atlantic menhadenlast month…


State environmental scientists are investigating the cause of a fish kill that left about 7,000 dead Atlantic menhaden in waters that include the Inner Harbor and Fells Point.

Jay Apperson, spokesman for the Maryland Department of the Environment, said that biologists went by boat on Tuesday to the area of Monday’s fish kill. He says the area extended from the mouth of the Patapsco River, up the Baltimore Harbor to Fells Point and Fort McHenry.

*Mass fish die-offs in Lake Champlain up in Vermont are being called “the new normal” by government officials.

*Along the coast of northern California, seals and young sea lions are dying “in record numbers“.

*Three months ago, farmers in Singapore lost 160 tons of fish to a mass die-off event.

*Back in September, approximately 40 kilometers of the Fuhe River in China “was covered with dead fish“.

*Also during last September, close to ten tons of dead fish were found floating on a lake near the town of Komotini, Greece.

The following are some more examples of mass fish death events from just the past several weeks that come from a list compiled on another website

*****

17th May 2014 – Masses of fish turn up dead in a marina in Pultneyville, New York, America. Link

16th May 2014 – Mass die off of fish in a river in Aragatsotn, Armenia. Link

15th May 2014 – Hundreds of fish dying off ‘due to pollution’ in the wetlands of Rewalsar, India. Link

14th May 2014 – Thousands of dead fish washing ashore in Cootes Paradise, Hamilton, Canada. Link

13th May 2014 – Tens of thousands of dead fish wash up along coast of Tasmania, Australia. Link

12th May 2014 – Mass death of fish in the river Eden ‘is a mystery’ in Cumbria,England. Link

11th May 2014 – Thousands of dead Puffer Fish, also dead turtles washing up on various beaches inColombia and Costa Rica. Link and here

11th May 2014 – Hundreds of dead fish found in a pond is ‘a mystery’ in Southborough, England. Link

10th May 2014 – Thousands of fish dead due to pollution in spring in Sikkim,India. Link

9th May 2014 – Die off of Fish ’causes panic’ in the Luda Yana River in Bulgaria.Link

8th May 2014 – Thousands of dead fish appear in a lake ‘shock residents’ in Mangalore, India. Link

8th May 2014 – 12 TONS of dead fish removed from lakes in Chisago County, Minnesota, America. Link

7th May 2014 – Massive die off of fish in reservoirs in Quanzhou, China. Link

7th May 2014 – Thousands of fish found dead on the shores of Roatan,Honduras. Link

5th May 2014 – Hundreds of dead fish wash up on a beach ‘a mystery’ in San Antonio Oeste, Argentina.Link

5th May 2014 – Mass death of fish found in lakes in Almindingen, Denmark. Link

4th May 2014 – Mass die off of fish in a river in Fujian, China. Link

3rd May 2014 – 1,000+ dead fish wash ashore along a lake in Ontario, Canada.Link

2nd May 2014 – 40,000 fish die suddenly in a dam in Piaui, Brazil. Link

30th April 2014 – Mass fish kill ‘worst I’ve seen in 26 years of working here’ in Iowa, America. Link

30th April 2014 – Large amount of dead fish found floating along a river in Xiasha District, China. Link

29th April 2014 – Dozens of sea turtles are washing up dead in South Mississippi,America. Link

29th April 2014 – Thousands of dead fish washing up along the shores of Lakes in Wisconsin, America.Link

28th April 2014 – Turtles and other marine life continue to wash up dead in Bari,Italy. Link

28th April 2014 – Large fish kill found in the Mogi River in Brazil. Link

25th April 2014 – Large fish kill found in a reservoir in Nanchong, China. Link

24th April 2014 – Large amount of fish wash up dead along a river in La Chorrera, Panama. Link

23rd April 2014 – 2 Million fish found dead in a dam in Tehran, Iran. Link

23rd April 2014 – Mass die off of fish in Island lake in Ontario, Canada. Link

23rd April 2014 – Thousands of dead fish appear in a lake in Mudanjiang, China.Link

22nd April 2014 – 1,000 fish found dead in Oona River, County Tyrone,Northern Ireland. Link

21st April 2014 – Large amounts of fish washing up dead along the Panchganga River in India. Link

19th April 2014 – MILLIONS of dead fish found floating in Thondamanaru Lagoon, Sri Lanka. Link

*****

And remember, this list represents events that have happened in just a little over the past month.

So what is causing all of these mass fish death events?

Please feel free to share your opinion by posting a comment below…

Credit to Infowars

Media Reports Rising Food Prices as Positive News

History Shows That When the Elite Lose Control of the Information War, Genocide Is Next


ziggyIn the alternative media, we constantly hear the mantra that if we could only “wake up” enough Americans, we could stop the globalists in their tracks. and then we lament the fact that most of our fellow countrymen are dumber than a box of rocks. However, the worm may be turning and turning dramatically! There are six corporations which control 98% of the media and their media investments are taking a beating. Americans watch almost 35 hours of television per week. That is a lot of Pavlovian conditioning that is taking place as a result of television and the corporate controlled message coming out of the “boob tube”.
Our nation is inundated with an amazing amount of propaganda and a decidedly one-sided view of the world. Gone from the media are any alternative theories behind the 9/11 attacks. The JFK assassination conspiracy theories that were once dominant in the 1990′s have all but disappeared. Benghazi has been whitewashed by the mainstream media (e.g. Fox, CNN, MSNBC). Whatever happened to Fast and Furious?

The Alternative Media Is Having a Big Influence

In light of my recent series on state-sponsored pedophilia, I received over a combined 400 comments and emails which detailed more stories of CPS abuse and trafficking of children which is taking place all across this country. I had over 40 emails from mother’s who have been victimized in a manner similar to Monika Wesolowski, who had her child stolen and allegedly sex trafficked by the 2 gay fathers who now have custody of her son Dylan. Even a prominent reporter from World Net Daily reached out to me because she wants more information on child sex trafficking being conducted under the collective noses of various government agencies. Yet, we do not hear one word of these allegations in the MSM. Even a major watershed event, such as the Bundy Affair, received scant attention from the MSM as has the mounting death toll of patients under Obamacare.

The Public Knows That Something Is Terribly Wrong and the MSM Is Not Providing Answers

The general public knows that something is terribly wrong with this country and its not being covered in the MSM and they are seeking answers. Returning veterans who have served in Afghanistan are returning home with stories of how American soldiers are providing protection for Afghan drug lords. Their neighbors and friends are wondering why these stories are not on the nightly news.The American people are beginning to view the police with more distrust because of the rampant instances of police abuse taking place in this country.
Most Americans know Obama is a foreign national who cares nothing about the plight of the middle class. Obama’s anti-American policies and unwarranted EPA swat teams have alienated nearly all farmers and ranchers and their friends and families are wondering why the media is not covering these abuses.  As a result, farmers, ranchers, veterans and most of the middle class loathe this President and holds him in extreme contempt. Yet, if one was watching nothing but the MSM, they would think that Obama is the epitome of a loyal American doing his best to protect and defend the Constitution.
A growing number of Americans have awakened to the fact that this is not the case and are looking for “alternative” means to get their news. Once an obscure term, most average Americans have now heard of FEMA camps. Most Americans are aware of Fast and Furious despite the minuscule attention paid to this Watergate type of event by the MSM. The sheer number of disenfranchised groups have alerted the rest of us that we are not getting the full truth in the MSM. Most Americans have had some exposure to the alternative media and as a result, we are seeing a lot of Americans in flux in terms of what they now believe about their government.

The MSM Is Now the Dinosaur Media

According to a recently released Pew Research study, the number of prime time viewers for CNN, Fox and MSNBC  fell by a combined fell by11% last year. Eleven percent may not sound overwhelming, so allow me to rephrase this in another light. In 2013, over one in ten Americans have stopped watching the corporate controlled media propaganda which serves to anesthetize and  lobotomize it viewers, listeners and readers from the realities of what is really taking place in this country. Here is the breakdown of the decline of the corporate controlled media empire:
Fox News has lost 6% of its primetime audience and this is the good news for the MSM.
CNN is down by 13%
MSNBC is down by a whopping 24%
Newspaper ad revenues are down by a third and major magazines are selling 20% less ad space in today’s advertising wars.
Sorry George Noory, Coast to Coast AM ratings are also in the toilet. Since Noory fired the more popular John B. Wells, Noory’s audience has caught on to the fact that the show and host fit into the corporate controlled category and they do not represent any semblance of true investigative journalism.
A recent Gallup survey found that an amazing 77% of Americans distrust mainstream media television and are turning to other sources for news and information. According to the Gallup Poll, only HMO’s, the banks and Congress have lower public trust ratings than the media. And would you care to guess who owns the banks, HMO’s and Congress? It is the same people who own the media. This fact tells me that an increasing number of Americans, whether they realize it or not, are rejecting the New World Order. These are the potential foot soldiers of tomorrow’s resistance.

Defining Terms

The mainstream media (MSM) represents the controlling corporate interests in today’s media. The MSM controls an estimated 96-98% of all media outlets. Some of the major players are Gannett, who owns the top 50 newspapers, and Clear Channel Communications who owns approximately 1,300 radio stations. The major goal of the MSM is to propagandize the country by disguising the fact that Americans are now living in a fascist, corporate controlled and banker hijacked government, and as a result, the American middle class has become an endangered species.
The other media in this country is often referred to as the alternative media (AM). I despise this term. Since when is writing and broadcasting the truth and alternative endeavor? The term itself, the alternative media, marginalizes the movement. I prefer the term, the truthful media. However, by convention, I feel compelled to use the term, “alternative media” a little while longer. And what is the purpose of the alternative media? It’s overriding mission is to educate Americans as to the crimes being committed by corporate and government officials which are being covered up by the MSM.

The Yin and the Yang of Opportunity

Nature abhors a vacuum, so where will these disenfranchised MSM dropouts go for their news? The AM is growing by leaps and bounds. In fact the MSM is even admitting defeat. A meant-to-be-secret 96-page internal New York Times report, recently sent to top executives last month contains admissions that the MSM knows they are losing the information war. The newest version of the report describes a newsroom struggling to adjust to the digital world dominated by the MSM. The MSM cannot compete with the AM on its home turf, the Internet.
Ernie Hancock, the publisher of FreedomsPhoenix told me that 60% of younger adults are getting their news from digital sources and that number is sure to grow exponentially. This is the Yin of our truth movement. Globalist insider, Zbigniew Brzezinski, says that the much feared global political awakening is in full swing and it constitutes the biggest threat to the globalist domination of the planet. However, Brzezinski also stated, in a very prophetic manner, it is easier “to kill one million people than it is to control one million people”.  This is the Yang.

 Conclusion

The globalists know they are losing the information war, but they are determined to not lose control and they are willing to sacrifice much of humanity to maintain control. This is why false flag events, martial law, bankster wars and genocide were invented. History shows that when the elite lose control of the propaganda machine  martial law and genocide is the next stop. This is what we must be prepared for in the upcoming months.
Credit to Common Sense

Jordan army’s 2nd Mechanized Division is deployed along Syrian border




The Syrian army offensive, launched Tuesday, May 20 to break the stalemate developing with rebel forces in the tussle for the Syrian Golan town of Quneitra, has raised forebodings in Israel and Jordan lest Assad’s troops bring the fighting up to their borders. So far, the rebel offensive has failed to break through to Quneitra - or even lay it to siege. The Syrian army command, although seriously short of fighting men man, has seized the moment for a counter-offensive.

The Jordanian army has accordingly deployed its 2nd mechanized division along the entire 380 km of the kingdom’s porous border with its Syrian neighbor in battle formation, along with its 60th armored battalion. All leaves have been suspended for officers and men serving in the border sector.

Earlier, the IDF augmented its border troops opposite the Golan and the Hermon range, according DEBKAfile’s military sources.

In its counter-offensive, the Syrian army’s managed Tuesday to capture the village of Um Aswaj near the southern Syrian town of Deraa and is continuing to advance on further rebel positions in the south. It went into action after the rebels Monday captured sections of the main highway from Quneitra to Damascus. This step was supposed to have led to the encirclement of the Golan town. But this did not happen. The intense fire from Syrian 9th Division tanks forced the rebels to abandon the strategic highway.
To make up for its shortage of ground troops for the Golan, the Syrian army has brought in Grad and Scud ground-to ground missiles and conducting air strikes on the rebels with warplanes and and assault helicopters.

The deep concern over the serious security situation evolving on Israel’s northern frontier was strongly reflected in IDF Chief of Staff Gen. Benny Gantz’s explanation to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security Committee Monday for the urgent need to reverse defense budget cutbacks.

“The national order of priorities is changing,” he said, “and with it, unfortunately, national decisions relating to defense. “We are in the throes of a complex challenge to our resources not encountered in the past, with dramatic repercussions for the IDF. I come to you after a difficult week,” said the chief of staff in reference to the situation on the Israeli- Syrian border.

“We are obliged at this time to make painful decisions which affect all systems and all spheres of action for the reserves and the regular army – when it comes to training, the situation in the field and the home front.

“The country has clear orders of priority and on security we have already taken as many risks as are permissible."
DEBKAfile’s military sources report that, for now, the IDF has manned all the Syrian border positions with conscripts. No reserve units have been deployed.


Credit to DEBKAfile

Charles Nenner: War, 2014 Dollar Collapse, Gold Could Go Parabolic and More

Portugal's Largest Bank "In Serious Financial Condition" Auditor Warns



One of Portugal's biggest companies - Espirito Santo International SA - is in a "serious financial condition" according to a central bank driven external audit by KPMG identified "irregularities in its accounts." Rather stunningly, the details are nothing short of ponzi-like as WSJ reported in December that Espírito Santo International was highly leveraged and had been relying heavily on selling debt to an investment fund held by the financial group (i.e. funding debt issuance in one entity with another) and overvaluing hard-to-value assets (ring any bells?).
However, the 'ponzi-like' maneuver, as WSJ concludes shows that while legal and in line with regulatory rules, highlights how corporations, including banks, used financial gymnastics to survive the region's financial crisis.
Given the massive domestic bank demand for sovereign paper, one has to wonder if the sudden 60bps spike in Portuguese bond risk is a signal that all is not well in the European periphery.

Espírito Santo International SA, a large Portuguese conglomerate whose financial practices have been subject to criticism by outside experts, is in a "serious financial condition" and its accounts have "irregularities," according to a document published by one of the company's affiliates.

...

A regulatory filing late Tuesday by Banco Espírito Santo, which is partly and indirectly owned by the conglomerate, said an external audit ordered by the country's central bank into Espírito Santo International's 2013 results uncovered a range of problems.

The auditor, KPMG, "identified irregularities in its accounts and concluded that Espírito Santo International is in a serious financial condition," the bank said in the prospectus that it issued as it prepares to sell €1 billion ($1.37 billion) of shares.
The details of the 'irregularities' are stunning in their ponzi-like nature...
The Wall Street Journal reported in December that Espírito Santo International was highly leveraged and had been relying heavily on selling debt to an investment fund held by the financial group and marketed to clients of the bank.

It also reported that accounting experts raised questions about the value Espírito Santo International gave to its stake in Espírito Santo Financial Group. The valuation was much higher than the market value of Espírito Santo Financial.
While the bank isn't responsible for the parent company's problems, the filing warned, the bank nonetheless could face reputational damage.
Perhaps that is why the sudden rush for the exits in the increasingly tied-at-the-hip sovereign bond market has occurred recently...

If one goes - the other follows...
As WSJ noted in December, this kind of ponzi-like move remains widespread... and entirely ignored by most...
But the maneuver, while legal and in line with regulatory rules, highlights how corporations, including banks, used financial gymnastics to survive the region's financial crisis.


As the mirage of recovery in financials is maintained by the totallifting of all accounting standards and transparency.
Credit to Zero Hedge

Russia, China sign 'gas deal of the century'



Russia and China Do Pipelineistan



A specter is haunting Washington, an unnerving vision of a Sino-Russian alliance wedded to an expansive symbiosis of trade and commerce across much of the Eurasian land mass — at the expense of the United States.
And no wonder Washington is anxious.  That alliance is already a done deal in a variety of ways: through the BRICS group of emerging powers (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa); at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Asian counterweight to NATO; inside the G20; and via the 120-member-nation Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Trade and commerce are just part of the future bargain.  Synergies in the development of new military technologies beckon as well. After Russia’s Star Wars-style, ultra-sophisticated S-500 air defense anti-missile system comes online in 2018, Beijing is sure to want a version of it. Meanwhile, Russia is about to sell dozens of state-of-the-art Sukhoi Su-35 jet fighters to the Chinese as Beijing and Moscow move to seal an aviation-industrial partnership.
This week should provide the first real fireworks in the celebration of a new Eurasian century-in-the-making when Russian President Vladimir Putin drops in on Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing.  You remember “Pipelineistan,” all those crucial oil and gas pipelines crisscrossing Eurasia that make up the true circulatory system for the life of the region.  Now, it looks like the ultimate Pipelineistan deal, worth $1 trillion and 10 years in the making, will be inked as well.  In it, the giant, state-controlled Russian energy giant Gazprom will agree to supply the giant state-controlled China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) with 3.75 billion cubic feet of liquefied natural gas a day for no less than 30 years, starting in 2018. That’s the equivalent of a quarter of Russia’s massive gas exports to all of Europe. China’s current daily gas demand is around 16 billion cubic feet a day, and imports account for 31.6% of total consumption.
Gazprom may still collect the bulk of its profits from Europe, but Asia could turn out to be its Everest. The company will use this mega-deal to boost investment in Eastern Siberia and the whole region will be reconfigured as a privileged gas hub for Japan and South Korea as well. If you want to know why no key country in Asia has been willing to “isolate” Russia in the midst of the Ukrainian crisis — and in defiance of the Obama administration — look no further than Pipelineistan.
Exit the Petrodollar, Enter the Gas-o-Yuan
And then, talking about anxiety in Washington, there’s the fate of the petrodollar to consider, or rather the “thermonuclear” possibility that Moscow and Beijing will agree on payment for the Gazprom-CNPC deal not in petrodollars but in Chinese yuan. One can hardly imagine a more tectonic shift, with Pipelineistan intersecting with a growing Sino-Russian political-economic-energy partnership. Along with it goes the future possibility of a push, led again by China and Russia, toward a new international reserve currency — actually a basket of currencies — that would supersede the dollar (at least in the optimistic dreams of BRICS members).
Right after the potentially game-changing Sino-Russian summit comes a BRICS summit in Brazil in July. That’s when a $100 billion BRICS development bank, announced in 2012, will officially be born as a potential alternative to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank as a source of project financing for the developing world.
More BRICS cooperation meant to bypass the dollar is reflected in the “Gas-o-yuan,” as in natural gas bought and paid for in Chinese currency. Gazprom is even considering marketing bonds in yuan as part of the financial planning for its expansion. Yuan-backed bonds are already trading in Hong Kong, Singapore, London, and most recently Frankfurt.
Nothing could be more sensible for the new Pipelineistan deal than to have it settled in yuan. Beijing would pay Gazprom in that currency (convertible into rubles); Gazprom would accumulate the yuan; and Russia would then buy myriad made-in-China goods and services in yuan convertible into rubles.
It’s common knowledge that banks in Hong Kong, from Standard Chartered to HSBC — as well as others closely linked to China via trade deals — have been diversifying into the yuan, which implies that it could become one of the de facto global reserve currencies even before it’s fully convertible. (Beijing is unofficially working for a fully convertible yuan by 2018.)
The Russia-China gas deal is inextricably tied up with the energy relationship between the European Union (EU) and Russia. After all, the bulk of Russia’s gross domestic product comes from oil and gas sales, as does much of its leverage in the Ukraine crisis. In turn, Germany depends on Russia for a hefty 30% of its natural gas supplies. Yet Washington’s geopolitical imperatives — spiced up with Polish hysteria — have meant pushing Brussels to find ways to “punish” Moscow in the future energy sphere (while not imperiling present day energy relationships).
There’s a consistent rumble in Brussels these days about the possible cancellation of the projected 16 billion euro South Stream pipeline, whose construction is to start in June.  On completion, it would pump yet more Russian natural gas to Europe — in this case, underneath the Black Sea (bypassing Ukraine) to Bulgaria, Hungary, Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia, Greece, Italy, and Austria.
Bulgaria, Hungary, and the Czech Republic have already made it clear that they are firmly opposed to any cancellation.  And cancellation is probably not in the cards.  After all, the only obvious alternative is Caspian Sea gas from Azerbaijan, and that isn’t likely to happen unless the EU can suddenly muster the will and funds for a crash schedule to construct the fabled Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, conceived during the Clinton years expressly to bypass Russia and Iran.
In any case, Azerbaijan doesn’t have enough capacity to supply the levels of natural gas needed, and other actors like Kazakhstan, plagued with infrastructure problems, or unreliable Turkmenistan, which prefers to sell its gas to China, are already largely out of the picture. And don’t forget that South Stream, coupled with subsidiary energy projects, will create a lot of jobs and investment in many of the most economically devastated EU nations.
Nonetheless, such EU threats, however unrealistic, only serve to accelerate Russia’s increasing symbiosis with Asian markets. For Beijing especially, it’s a win-win situation. After all, between energy supplied across seas policed and controlled by the U.S. Navy and steady, stable land routes out of Siberia, it’s no contest.
Pick Your Own Silk Road
Of course, the U.S. dollar remains the top global reserve currency, involving 33% of global foreign exchange holdings at the end of 2013, according to the IMF. It was, however, at 55% in 2000. Nobody knows the percentage in yuan (and Beijing isn’t talking), but the IMF notes that reserves in “other currencies” in emerging markets have been up 400% since 2003.
The Fed is arguably monetizing 70% of the U.S. government debt in an attempt to keep interest rates from heading skywards. Pentagon adviser Jim Rickards, as well as every Hong Kong-based banker, tends to believe that the Fed is bust (though they won’t say it on the record). No one can even imagine the extent of the possible future deluge the U.S. dollar might experience amid a $1.4 trillion Mount Ararat of financial derivatives.  Don’t think that this is the death knell of Western capitalism, however, just the faltering of that reigning economic faith, neoliberalism, still the official ideology of the United States, the overwhelming majority of the European Union, and parts of Asia and South America.
As far as what might be called the “authoritarian neoliberalism” of the Middle Kingdom, what’s not to like at the moment? China has proven that there is a result-oriented alternative to the Western “democratic” capitalist model for nations aiming to be successful. It’s building not one, but myriad new Silk Roads, massive webs of high-speed railways, highways, pipelines, ports, and fiber optic networks across huge parts of Eurasia. These include a Southeast Asian road, a Central Asian road, an Indian Ocean “maritime highway” and even a high-speed rail line through Iran and Turkey reaching all the way to Germany.
In April, when President Xi Jinping visited the city of Duisburg on the Rhine River, with the largest inland harbor in the world and right in the heartland of Germany’s Ruhr steel industry, he made an audacious proposal: a new “economic Silk Road” should be built between China and Europe, on the basis of the Chongqing-Xinjiang-Europe railway, which already runs from China to Kazakhstan, then through Russia, Belarus, Poland, and finally Germany. That’s 15 days by train, 20 less than for cargo ships sailing from China’s eastern seaboard. Now that would represent the ultimate geopolitical earthquake in terms of integrating economic growth across Eurasia.
Keep in mind that, if no bubbles burst, China is about to become — and remain — the number one global economic power, a position it enjoyed for 18 of the past 20 centuries. But don’t tell London hagiographers; they still believe that U.S. hegemony will last, well, forever.
Take Me to Cold War 2.0
Despite recent serious financial struggles, the BRICS countries have been consciously working to become a counterforce to the original and — having tossed Russia out in March — once again Group of 7, or G7. They are eager to create a new global architecture to replace the one first imposed in the wake of World War II, and they see themselves as a potential challenge to the exceptionalist and unipolar world that Washington imagines for our future (with itself as the global robocop and NATO as its robo-police force). Historian and imperialist cheerleader Ian Morris, in his book War! What is it Good For?, defines the U.S. as the ultimate “globocop” and “the last best hope of Earth.” If that globocop “wearies of its role,” he writes, “there is no plan B.”     
Well, there is a plan BRICS — or so the BRICS nations would like to think, at least. And when the BRICS do act in this spirit on the global stage, they quickly conjure up a curious mix of fear, hysteria, and pugnaciousness in the Washington establishment. Take Christopher Hill as an example. The former assistant secretary of state for East Asia and U.S. ambassador to Iraq is now an advisor with the Albright Stonebridge Group, a consulting firm deeply connected to the White House and the State Department. When Russia was down and out, Hill used to dream of a hegemonic American “new world order.”  Now that the ungrateful Russians have spurned what “the West has been offering” — that is, “special status with NATO, a privileged relationship with the European Union, and partnership in international diplomatic endeavors” — they are, in his view, busy trying to revive the Soviet empire. Translation: if you’re not our vassals, you’re against us.  Welcome to Cold War 2.0.   
The Pentagon has its own version of this directed not so much at Russia as at China, which, its think tank on future warfare claims, is already at war with Washington in a number of ways. So if it’s not apocalypse now, it’s Armageddon tomorrow. And it goes without saying that whatever’s going wrong, as the Obama administration very publicly “pivots” to Asia and the American media fills with talk about a revival of Cold War-era “containment policy” in the Pacific, it’s all China’s fault.
Embedded in the mad dash toward Cold War 2.0 are some ludicrous facts-on-the-ground: the U.S. government, with $17.5 trillion in national debt and counting, is contemplating a financial showdown with Russia, the largest global energy producer and a major nuclear power, just as it’s also promoting an economically unsustainable military encirclement of its largest creditor, China.
Russia runs a sizeable trade surplus. Humongous Chinese banks will have no trouble helping Russian banks out if Western funds dry up. In terms of inter-BRICS cooperation, few projects beat a $30 billion oil pipeline in the planning stages that will stretch from Russia to India via Northwest China. Chinese companies are already eagerly discussing the possibility of taking part in the creation of a transport corridor from Russia into Crimea, as well as an airport, shipyard, and liquid natural gas terminal there. And there’s another “thermonuclear” gambit in the making: the birth of a natural gas equivalent to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries that would include Russia, Iran, and reportedly disgruntled U.S. ally Qatar.
The (unstated) BRICS long-term plan involves the creation of an alternative economic system featuring a basket of gold-backed currencies that would bypass the present America-centric global financial system. (No wonder Russia and China are amassing as much gold as they can.) The euro — a sound currency backed by large liquid bond markets and huge gold reserves — would be welcomed in as well.
It’s no secret in Hong Kong that the Bank of China has been using a parallel SWIFT network to conduct every kind of trade with Tehran, which is under a heavy U.S. sanctions regime. With Washington wielding Visa and Mastercard as weapons in a growing Cold War-style economic campaign against Russia, Moscow is about to implement an alternative payment and credit card system not controlled by Western finance. An even easier route would be to adopt the Chinese Union Pay system, whose operations have already overtaken American Express in global volume.   
I’m Just Pivoting With Myself
No amount of Obama administration “pivoting” to Asia to contain China (and threaten it with U.S. Navy control of the energy sea lanes to that country) is likely to push Beijing far from its Deng Xiaoping-inspired, self-described “peaceful development” strategy meant to turn it into a global powerhouse of trade.  Nor are the forward deployment of U.S. or NATO troops in Eastern Europe or other such Cold-War-ish acts likely to deter Moscow from a careful balancing act: ensuring that Russia’s sphere of influence in Ukraine remains strong without compromising trade and commercial, as well as political, ties with the European Union — above all, with strategic partner Germany. This is Moscow’s Holy Grail; a free-trade zone from Lisbon to Vladivostok, which (not by accident) is mirrored in China’s dream of a new Silk Road to Germany.
Increasingly wary of Washington, Berlin for its part abhors the notion of Europe being caught in the grips of a Cold War 2.0. German leaders have more important fish to fry, including trying to stabilize a wobbly EU while warding off an economic collapse in southern and central Europe and the advance of ever more extreme rightwing parties.
On the other side of the Atlantic, President Obama and his top officials show every sign of becoming entangled in their own pivoting — to Iran, to China, to Russia’s eastern borderlands, and (under the radar) to Africa. The irony of all these military-first maneuvers is that they are actually helping Moscow, Tehran, and Beijing build up their own strategic depth in Eurasia and elsewhere, as reflected in Syria, or crucially in ever more energy deals. They are also helping cement the growing strategic partnership between China and Iran. The unrelenting Ministry of Truth narrative out of Washington about all these developments now carefully ignores the fact that, without Moscow, the “West” would never have sat down to discuss a final nuclear deal with Iran or gotten a chemical disarmament agreement out of Damascus.
When the disputes between China and its neighbors in the South China Sea and between that country and Japan over the Senkaku/Diaoyou islands meet the Ukraine crisis, the inevitable conclusion will be that both Russia and China consider their borderlands and sea lanes private property and aren’t going to take challenges quietly — be it via NATO expansion, U.S. military encirclement, or missile shields. Neither Beijing nor Moscow is bent on the usual form of imperialist expansion, despite the version of events now being fed to Western publics.  Their “red lines” remain essentially defensive in nature, no matter the bluster sometimes involved in securing them.
Whatever Washington may want or fear or try to prevent, the facts on the ground suggest that, in the years ahead, Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran will only grow closer, slowly but surely creating a new geopolitical axis in Eurasia. Meanwhile, a discombobulated America seems to be aiding and abetting the deconstruction of its own unipolar world order, while offering the BRICS a genuine window of opportunity to try to change the rules of the game. 
Russia and China in Pivot Mode
In Washington’s think-tank land, the conviction that the Obama administration should be focused on replaying the Cold War via a new version of containment policy to “limit the development of Russia as a hegemonic power” has taken hold. The recipe: weaponize the neighbors from the Baltic states to Azerbaijan to “contain” Russia. Cold War 2.0 is on because, from the point of view of Washington’s elites, the first one never really left town.
Yet as much as the U.S. may fight the emergence of a multipolar, multi-powered world, economic facts on the ground regularly point to such developments.  The question remains: Will the decline of the hegemon be slow and reasonably dignified, or will the whole world be dragged down with it in what has been called “the Samson option”?
While we watch the spectacle unfold, with no end game in sight, keep in mind that a new force is growing in Eurasia, with the Sino-Russian strategic alliance threatening to dominate its heartland along with great stretches of its inner rim. Now, that’s a nightmare of Mackinderesque proportions from Washington’s point of view.  Think, for instance, of how Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national security adviser who became a mentor on global politics to President Obama, would see it.
In his 1997 book The Grand Chessboard, Brzezinski argued that “the struggle for global primacy [would] continue to be played” on the Eurasian “chessboard,” of which “Ukraine was a geopolitical pivot.” “If Moscow regains control over Ukraine,” he wrote at the time, Russia would “automatically regain the wherewithal to become a powerful imperial state, spanning Europe and Asia.”
That remains most of the rationale behind the American imperial containment policy — from Russia’s European “near abroad” to the South China Sea. Still, with no endgame in sight, keep your eye on Russia pivoting to Asia, China pivoting across the world, and the BRICS hard at work trying to bring about the new Eurasian Century.
Credit to Nakedcapitalism.com