BRICS, North Korea and US Rage

First, who or what is BRICS? BRICS stands for an association of trade agreements and mutual aid between Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.  The BRICS  association is causing major fits in the US.  In fact, the Obama administration is choking with rage.  But why, one may inquire.  Countries form trade and mutual aid agreements all the time.  The US has such associations with many countries, including some of the above.  But this particular association between Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa is an association like no other. It could conceivably change the entire economic map of the world.

 Bloomburg .com News (03/25/13)in bold headlines reads “BRICS NATIONS PLAN NEW BANK TO BYPASS WORLD BANK, IMF”.   How about them apples?  BRICS will not use the US dollar as their currency, but their own currencies.  Let’s see…what might this do to the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, UN Security Council and major global international US backed banks?  Consider for a moment.  BRICS compose 25 per cent of global GDP and 40 per cent of the world’s population.   Might the people of these countries prefer to deposit whatever money they have with their own banks?  Borrow from their own banks?   Might they prefer not to be bullied or threatened or overcharged  by the power of the US  banks in conjunction with the IMF and World Bank?    What would this mean on the global stage?

I think it would mean that the back of Western economic hegemony would be broken.   Not all at once, of course, but gradually.  With time here would no longer be unlimited amounts of money sucked out of poor people the world over that has enabled the US to crush other countries with death dealing “shock and awe”, or drone attacks. No more “austerity” imposed by IMF and the World Bank.  No more deliberately creating recessions by The Federal Bank in the US in order to make money scarce so the wealth the banks and Wall Street hold becomes more valuable. This is why the Obama administration and military is choking with rage.  And what does the US do when it gets angry or feels threatened in the slightest by the idea that other people in the world might not love them and their blood sucking banking system?  They reve up the war machine.

The US (along with Israel) had hoped to go into Iran.  Hillary Clinton made impassioned plea after plea, at the UN, threat after threat, warning after warning, to China and Russia not to block the US desire to shock and awe Iran.  But China and Russia weren’t interested in helping the US acquire a foothold in Iran.

 Iran is in their backyard.  The Russians and the Chinese are not crazy.  Why would they help the US overrun their own neighbourhood?   Not much headway here for the US so they started on Syria.  Hillary Clinton began speaking forcibly about regime change in Syria.   Regime change like in Libya, Iraq, Egypt, and Afghanistan.  Clinton didn’t seem in the slightest bothered that  the protesters in Syria were reported  to be increasingly composed of  the Muslim Brotherhood with ties to Al Qaida and the Taliban. The war on terrorism was supposed to be about war on the Taliban and Al Qaida, the ones who wanted to come to this continent and kill us.  But it now seems the US will bond with anybody who will take them physically closer to Russia and China and if that’s the Taliban and Al Qaida so be it.  But that plan hasn’t gone anywhere, either. 

And now, thoroughly frustrated with China and Russia for thwarting their right to invade and occupy whatever country they please, they now have this BRICS thing to deal with.   It’s all too much.  But still, these intellectual giants surmise, there’s North Korea.  North Korea is being disobedient to the US and the UN and this disobedience might after all be the best way for the US to sneak up to and spread along China’s borders.

They truly are crazy.  And China knows this.  Which explains why China is being low key about North Korea.  China is not advertising the army she is amassing along the border with North Korea.   Aljazeera English reported (4/4/13) a US spokesman told the press that the US had come to the conclusion that perhaps they themselves were at fault for the increased tensions by recent US actions that may have been misinterpreted  by North Korea.  And that the US would like to cool down the situation (CBC evidently hasn’t received the news yet.  As of yesterday (4/6/13) CBC is still mouthing the US one sided line of North Korea’s threats with no mention of  the US  moderation). But exactly why has the US decided to pull back somewhat on Washington’s “Playbook” plan is somewhat curious (“The Playbook Plan”  being  the White House approved plan to ratchet up tension with North Korea during the Pentagon’s war games with South Korea  (Wall Street Journal article by Adam Entours and Julian E. Barnes  (4/3/13)  entitled “US dials back on Korean show of force ).   

But perhaps the US has just discovered the recent massive Chinese military build up along China’s borders with North Korea.   This has been done quietly with no fanfare or threats to anybody.  Just a massive buildup of military strength in case some stupid decision is made by the US or South Korea under US directions to try to invade North Korea. And somebody in the Obama Administration must have had a flash back to the Korean War.

  I remember back in the fifties as a young housewife listening to the radio news about the Korean War while my baby napped.  I was horrified by the announcer’s description of what he called “the hordes of Chinese solders spilling over the border into Northern Korea to slaughter American soldiers when the US was just trying to do good and bring democracy to the entire Korean peninsula.”  What kind of people must these Chinese be, I wondered?    But in spite of the ignorance of the American people, including my own, the US sensed they had made a grave mistake and immediately pulled their military away from the Chinese border.  The Korean War ended quickly after that with the northern half of Korea given over to China’s influence.  And that influence still reigns.  China primarily supports North Korea, but does not own her. However, China will most certainly do what has to be done, as in the past, to protect North Korea and China’s own borders.

And the Obama administration and US military will just have to choke on its own rage.    The world is changing and they will change with it, or die as a nation. As will all of Europe and the Western World, including us.  The world will be the worse for it in many ways, I am sure, but I think it will also be better.  Much better.   When the dust settles.