Middle East

The troop incursion into southern Afghanistan that began in early July under the U.S.’s new war strategy has resulted in an increase in casualties, with Britain losing 15 soldiers in two weeks and the U.S. losing seven in a single day. Already July has equaled the deadliest month of the war, and casualties for 2009 are up 40 percent over 2008. U.S. and British forces have gained control of Taliban strongholds in the opium-growing Helmand province. It appears, however, that the Taliban have, for the most part, chosen not to fight but rather to retreat to the mountains and prepare to mount attacks. While the influx of troops may bring a degree of tactical success, says Stratfor, this should “not to be confused with operational and strategic success” (July 13). Robert Maginnis, a senior strategist with the U.S. Army, writes that President Obama does not have the critical tools necessary for success in Afghanistan. At the moment, he says, there are “not enough troops (U.S., allied and Afghan), American public support, sufficient time, civilian expertise, Afghan grassroots support and Pakistani cooperation.” Time is on the Taliban’s side, and as casualties mount, the fragile public support in the U.S., and in its main ally, Britain, will falter.

On Monday, four EU countries and Turkey signed an agreement formally launching the Nabucco gas pipeline project, which will take natural gas from the Caspian Sea region and the Middle East through Turkey to Europe. While initially the pipeline is to transport Central Asian gas, it will eventually source gas from Iran, Iraq and Egypt. “Nabucco’s viability critically depends on gas supplies from Turkmenistan and Iran,” says Asia Times Online, commenting that it was more than coincidence that Turkmenistan announced on Sunday that a new pipeline was being laid to the Iranian border. “Clearly, Iran is gearing up as the transit corridor for Turkmen gas that will go into Nabucco. … No doubt, Tehran has decided that come what may, Nabucco offers a fantastic means of entering into a strategic partnership with Europe in a near-term scenario. [I]t is no longer an issue of ‘whether’ or ‘if,’ but of ‘when’ it is that European companies can tap Iran’s massive gas reserves” (July 15). The pipeline is designed to decrease the EU’s dependence on Russian gas. But reliance on Iran and the Middle East for energy will prove to be every bit as dangerous for Europe, as our booklet The King of the South details.

Persecution and harassment have led to over half of Iraqi Christians fleeing Iraq in the last few years, Robert Spencer reports. Just this past Sunday, five churches in Baghdad were bombed. Spencer says that Christians enjoyed relative equality under Saddam Hussein’s regime, but this has changed radically since his demise. “Groups dedicated to the imposition of Islamic law over the country began to victimize Christians on a large scale,” he says. And, “Now that Barack Obama is removing U.S. troops from Iraq, this resurgent Islamic supremacism will only gain momentum.”

Europe

Former Polish Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek was elected European Parliament president on Tuesday, becoming the first politician from a former Communist country to hold the presidency. Although the position of European Parliament president is largely ceremonial, Buzek said his election sent a “strong signal” to countries that joined the EU in 2004, describing it as “homage to the millions of citizens who made the Iron Curtain fall down.” For the next five years, he added, there will be “no more ‘us’ [Central Europe] and ‘you’ [Western Europe], but one Europe.” Biblical prophecy clearly depicts an end-time European superpower as standing on two legs—east and west.

The Wall Street Journal reports that European governments are rushing to increase their power to nationalize sick financial institutions in the wake of the economic crisis. But the new powers are raising property issue concerns among investors who worry that the rules give governments too much leeway for abuse. The rush to legislate more government power is also further evidence that Europe’s banking crisis may be far from over. As the Trumpet wrote last October, “Time after time, it has been the pretext of a ‘crisis’—economic, religious, social, military or otherwise—that opened the door for Europe’s most notorious leaders—Napoleon, Charles the Great, Louis the xiv, Bismarck—to rush through and grab power, then unite nations and start bloodbaths.” Europe’s economic crisis warrants close watching.

Meanwhile, this week Germany moved to increase the state’s powers of surveillance due to heightened concerns of a terror attack in the run-up to the national elections. The far-reaching package of measures includes airport controls, tighter surveillance of Islamists and warnings about traveling to North Africa. We continue to monitor Europe for such evidence of growing militarism and muscularity on the part of European governments, particularly directed at Islamist threats.

Asia

On July 5, China arrested Stern Hu, the head of Australian mining giant Rio Tinto’s iron ore operations in China, on charges of bribery and “stealing state secrets.” Hu’s arrest comes one month after Rio Tinto’s highly politicized rebuff of Chinese state-owned Chinalco’s proposed $19.5 billion takeover. This has led some to conclude that Hu’s arrest is part of a payback for perceived Australian meddling to scuttle the deal. According to the Asia Times, “Hu’s incarceration is a rude awakening for Rudd’s government to the reality that China calls the shots in most bilateral relationships these days” (July 14).

China is also after natural resources in Latin America. Beijing has now surpassed the U.S. as Brazil’s biggest trading partner and is on a path to do the same with other Latin American nations. It is also rivaling the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank as the major lender to Latin America. China is employing its vast foreign currency reserves to invest in Latin American companies and purchase goodwill from local communities. Although America is rapidly losing its position of preeminence in Latin America, it is Europe’s manufacturing economies, especially Germany’s, that will come into direct competition with China for South America’s untapped resources.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on July 10 reiterated his threat to deploy missiles in Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania, if the U.S. goes ahead with its missile defense shield in Europe. The tough talk came just days after President Obama attempted to hit the “reset button” in U.S.-Russian relations on his visit to Moscow. Eager to appease Russia, the U.S. president may be changing America’s stance. On his trip to Moscow last week, President Obama avoided any strong rhetoric on the missile defense plans and instead told the Russians that he has launched a review of the program. Obama also showed weak support for Ukraine and Georgia’s desire to join nato. It looks like President Obama is blinking first in this stare-down over Eastern Europe.

Africa/Latin America

U.S. President Barack Obama made his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa on July 11, delivering a speech in Ghana. His message was largely built around tough love—that Africans need to take responsibility for their own situation rather than expecting someone else—presumably the U.S.—to do it. In reality, though, there is a continuing race for African resources, one that Europe is prophesied to win at the expense of native Africans. For more information on the fight for resources and the future of Africa, read “The Battleground” from the March 2006 Trumpet.

On July 15, Roberto Micheletti, interim president of Honduras, offered to resign as long as the exiled Manuel Zelaya is not reinstated. Three days earlier, Micheletti said Zelaya could be granted amnesty as long as he returns home quietly: “If he comes peacefully first to appear before the authorities … I don’t have any problem [with granting him amnesty],” Micheletti told the Reuters news agency in Tegucigalpa. This behavior reinforces the obvious: There was no military coup in Honduras.

Anglo-America

June unemployment data is drawing an unhappy picture for American workers. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (bls) report, the U.S. officially lost 460,000 jobs last month. For its calculations, the bls automatically adds between 150,000 and 200,000 jobs. Based on initial filings for unemployment benefits, the actual jobless figure is probably closer to 600,000. When discouraged and “underemployed” workers are included, the unemployment rate is already above 16 percent, and duration of unemployment now is at an all-time high.

On Monday, the British Embassy in Tel Aviv confirmed that London has partially halted arms exports to the Israeli Navy. Britain revoked five of its 182 weapons export licenses, thereby blocking the sale of spare parts for Israel’s Sa’ar 4.5 gunships. The British made the decision because these gunships were used in Israel’s military operation in Gaza six months ago. “We do not grant export licenses where there is a clear risk that arms will be used for external aggression or internal repression,” the embassy statement said. The decision was made even though one of Britain’s top commanders has said that “the idf did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.” Meanwhile, British politicians have voted to pledge $30 million to train and support Palestinian security forces. For more Bible prophecies that show Israel will no longer be able to rely on Britain—nor the United States—read, “The Tie That Binds America, Britain and Israel.”