Subject: SIT 9-7; Yugoslavia, Iraq; Rumors of War Date: 9/7/00 4:21 PM Received: 9/7/00 4:39 PM From: ben works, BenWorks@aol.com To: ben works, BenWorks@aol.com SIRIUS: The Strategic Issues Research Institute Benjamin C. Works, Director 202 257-0157; www.siri-us.com; E-mail: Benworks@AOL.Com --Speak the Truth and Shame the Devil-- STRATEGIC ISSUES TODAY SIT-REP 9-7: Sept. 7, 2000 Iraq, Yugoslavia: Rumors of Wars Sterling, Virginia -- No, SIRIUS has not curled up its toes. It has re-deployed to the Washington, DC area ("the Emerald City of Oz") where we can keep a close eye on developments across the board. I used to use an alternate motto for the institute: "Outside the Beltway, but in the Loop." As of this weekend that will no longer be true as SIRIUS will be locating itself in Arlington, Virginia --inside the Beltway and just down the street from the Pentagon. Within another week or so, SIRIUS should be up and running and back at 100%, but may be off line for a few days as the local phone company is recovering from a major strike, affecting the pace of new installations. To the point(s). Clitnon's Legacy, Iraq & Yugoslavia --Rumors of War: Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that ye be not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. St Matthew 24: 6-7 Many have been rumoring about potential last minute warlike actions by the Clinton Administration; maybe Yugoslavia, maybe Iraq; but I do not have the feeling in my guts that Mr. Clinton wants an uncontrolled bombing campaign at the last minute. On the other hand, Saddam Hussein may be trying to strain the system in his own inconvenient way. Today, Mr. Clinton is trying to talk the Saudis into lowering oil prices --it has crossed over $35 per barrel today (a barrel equals 42 gallons or about 160 liters). Mr. Clinton's team has been trying to lower oil prices since the Spring; instead prices continue to climb and Mr. Clinton's present initiative is too late to drive prices down before Winter. But since both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have experience in oil and oil-related industries, the high prices do not advantage the Republican ticket, since Al Gore's campaign can characterize the GOP's leaders as pawns for "big oil." The point is, if the US finds it has to bomb Iraq now, oil prices will tend to rise further, something Mr. Clinton wants to avoid since it might throw the stock market (back near its all-time highs) and the US economy into a tailspin and possible recession. If any world leader is prepared to discommode Mr. Clinton at the last minute, it is Saddam. My advice, keep your gas tank filled. Mr. Clinton wants a high-profile peace deal for his legacy, but Israeli-Palestinian peace seems out of reach. It appears that both sides may be ready to wait for a new administration. Analysis: It is only about 60 days until the US election --and only about 17 until the Yugoslavian Presidential Election-- and our Mr. Clinton, the world's preeminent narcissist, is desperately seeking a big coup for his "legacy" before he leaves office on Jan. 20th next year, about 134 days from now. In the past few weeks and in more recent days, various correspondents, other analysts and I have picked up many threads of the possible "legacy" initiatives Mr. Clinton may attempt to complete in the waning days of his leadership. War or peace? An "October surprise?" I think in terms of the rational objective vs. the political subjective; of the relative power of perception over reality: Mr. Clinton's demonstrated forte has been to muster perception to overwhelm reality and now, Mr. Gore is offering more of the same --four years more, if he wins. Of course, "inductive reasoning" is the practice of fitting selected facts to a theory that is born of personal prejudice. In its extreme practice, inductive reasoning is the basis for demonization campaigns and for conspiracy theory. Numbers can usually be found to demonstrate a statistical correlation that is held up as proof; though "correlation does not equal causation." The allure of inductive reasoning is that "everything fits" and that it uses sophistry and rhetorical techniques to seduce its audience into accepting its proffered truths. It appeals to ignorance, egoism and emotion. Deductive reasoning --the "scientific method" is slower as it requires that one gathers all the available facts and then test theories. It demands that statistical support show that the numbers demonstrate causation, not mere correlation (coincidence). Deductive reasoning is good for policy but bad for politics as its slowness is not responsive to the "news cycle." So what, you ask? These principles are important to keep in our minds precisely because propaganda is based on inductive reasoning and because we have seen it used repeatedly to justify interventions and military assaults repeatedly in the last eight years. On the domestic side, the same holds true; inductive reasoning is the basis for the "divide and rule" politics of the majority of Democratic politicians, the party's hard core. I have taken this opportunity to install a list of the "Fallacies in Logic" at the website, in order that readers may download and peruse the roster of tricks politicians and propagandists have used since the time of Sophocles and Plato, to bamboozle the electorate, to divide and rule. Please look in the "Archives" section for "Fallacies_in_Logic.html." It is almost a complete guide and may get future updates. As to Rumors of war: Here are the possibilities, all mentioned somewhere in the press, being pursued at this writing: á Of course, there has been much speculation that the US and its collaborating partners in NATO may launch another attack on Yugoslavia, but that seems unlikely for reasons outlined further below. á An air attack on Iraq, which has been played to CNN this week. á The arrest of Bosnian Serb leader, Radovan Karadzic, an indicted war crimes suspect á A peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians --stalled out. á A peace deal between Turkey and Greece over Cyprus --not very earth-shaking. As a bonus, Mr. Clinton has been building a resume for his daughter Chelsea while pursuing the elusive prize for his legacy. The First Daughter sat in on the Camp David negotiations and has traveled with her father, dispensing the Pax Americana, and is presently conferring her maidenly smile upon the gathering of world leaders at the annual United Nations General Assembly love fest. After eight years of his encouraging civil wars in the Balkans, Central Africa, East Timor and elsewhere, I find it the height of temerity that Mr. Clinton now chooses to warn the UN meeting of the forthcoming dangers of civil war, but that is the topic of his present sermonizing. It appears though, that peacemakers are looking for a better sponsorship and more time, rather than rushing through a hasty deal only to satisfy Mr. Clinton's self-esteem needs. In Israel-Palestine, they know what the benefits package contains and that the package will still be there come January and a new administration. That said, in the last few days there have been more suggestions leaking into the media about Iraq, than about another "splendid little war" with Yugoslavia. Though Mme. Albright and her team expended much effort in the last year at trying to arrange the secession of Montenegro, that effort seems to be on hold. Though Britain's Tony Blair supports the conspiracy, the rest of Europe appears to have become more alarmed about the Albanian killers and drug dealers than about the Serbs. There is also the prospect that Mr. Milosevic may actually lose his bid to be directly elected as President of Yugoslavia on Sept. 24, and a NATO-sparked crisis in front of that election makes insufficient political sense. If he wins, the first step from the West will be renew sanctions and to declare the election is rigged --probably true, since he is running about 20 points behind his principal challenger, Vojislav Kostunica. On the other hand, Mr. Kostunica may well win despite the fact that the president of Montenegro Milo Djukanovic, opposition party leader Vuk Draskovic, and Kosovo's UN viceroy Bernard Kouchner are all trying to sabotage the race. Draskovic has put up his own candidate, Djukanovic has called for a boycott and Kouchner, calling the election "undemocratic," is not taking steps to make sure that a fair election takes place among the hundred thousand or so non-Albanians left in Kosovo. Further, he has ensured that any Albanian loyalists in Kosovo will not be able to vote --maintaining the false impression that all Albanians are secessionists. In fact, Mr. Milosevic's proposal to have a vote in Kosovo is more democratic than Mr. Kouchner's UN sponsored elections, set for October. That is because the UN has done nothing to register Serb, Roma, Turk and Albanian refugees in Serbia or Montenegro. Mr. Kouchner is deliberately depriving some 200,000 Kosovo citizens of their right to vote, but since he represents the UN, his elections will be "democratic." This is how the UN-sponsored New World Order is to work. We have seen this trick pulled in Bosnia, too. At the same time, every bit of US and NATO interference in the Yugoslav election process can be interpreted as an effort to sabotage the chances of the opposition and to assure the election of Mr. Milosevic. For instance, in August Mme. Albright's State Department opened an office in Hungary to support opposition parties and the move was so naked --in terms of interfering in a domestic election-- that everybody got angry, including the politicians the US said it was intending to support. No politician wanted to be viewed as a stooge of the US or be seen as a traitor by the electorate. Frankly, it appears that much of Europe has stopped believing in the American proposition that millennial progress can be made by carving up Yugoslavia through encouraging inter-ethnic violence in the name of "democracy" and "human rights." But their governments are also complicit in the conspiracy. At the same time, Mr. Clinton has found that Russia's President Putin is far less pliant than Mr. Yeltsin. Russia and China may have quietly put a hold on further aggression against Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, Global trade and investment is taking up increasing attention --and concern. The European Union's members and other heads of state have begun to absorb the power of America's "new" economic juggernaut, fueled by its lead in "information technology," the internet and the effects of computerization on worker productivity. Political "Globalism" is fine to the anti-nationalists at the UN, but a free-enterprise fueled global boom that cannot be ruled by politics or taxed to benefit subsidized clients is not something that politicians want. Our would-be masters are worried. As to grabbing Mr. Karadzic, I do not anticipate that. He has prepared his "scorched earth" defense, one expects, and if major Serb political figures go on trial, the Hague Court would also have to look seriously at the executive behavior of the Croat and Muslim leaderships as well. That would expose just how much covering up of anti-Serb crimes has been going on these last 9 years. That would not be convenient to a Clinton legacy. Iraq: At the same time, US and British military aircraft over the so-called northern and southern "No Flight Zones," have been raining bombs down on Iraq every few days since December 1998. This has become a 21-month-old forgotten little air war in which Mr. Clinton's administration meant to establish its dominance, but instead, demonstrated the relative impotence of unsupported air power to deter or discipline a resolute opponent. The campaign has also seen the "innovation" of bombs filled with concrete, instead of explosive, in order to reduce the chance of innocents being killed --"collateral damage." Last week the Germans swore they had determined that Saddam was fiddling with missile building again and there was an announcement that the US might send a Patriot missile battery to help protect Israel from a surprise attack out of Iraq --meant to destabilize peace talks. The story died out, as it just has no credibility. Then yesterday (Sept. 6th) I caught a little story on CNN suggesting that if Saddam lunged at his Kurdish population "protected" by the northern no flight zone, the US and Britain would wage a 3-day punitive campaign of concerted Tomahawk missile and aircraft strikes against targets throughout Iraq. That story is of interest as the US would have to send in the Tomahawks and oil prices would rise. It was a similar campaign in December 1998 that initiated this long-running farce. Saddam has refused to allow a new UN weapons inspection regime to pick up where arms inspectors left off in November 1998. Now there are rumors of his suffering from lymphatic cancer. Such rumors generally spark some unrest in Iraq, which may be another part of the reason for warning him against attacking the Kurds and threatening a new punitive bombing campaign. © Copyright 2000 by Benjamin C. Works --SIRIUS www.SIRI-US.com Newsgroup members are entitled to e-mail or re-post this report, in whole or in part, so long as this copyright notice is included.