Mideast

Iran dodged another bullet by promising to make concessions during talks with international powers October 1. “Iran emerged as the clear winner at [the] nuclear summit with Russia, China, France, the UK, the U.S. and Germany,” wrote Henry Sokolski, the executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center in Washington, d.c. “Heading into the Geneva talks, the U.S. and the UN Security Council (unsc) were demanding that Iran suspend all nuclear-fuel-making activities or face sanctions. After 7½ hours of negotiations, though, the unsc and Germany blinked, dropped any hint of penalizing Tehran, and let it continue to make nuclear fuel at Natanz.” Take away the spin, and nothing really has changed in Iran’s march toward nuclear-weapons capability.

In fact, two recent press leaks indicate that Iran could be much closer to building a nuclear weapon than experts had previously thought. On October 4, the New York Times published an article stating that the International Atomic Energy Agency reported that Iran has “sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable” nuclear bomb. The same day, the Times of London published a report stating that the purpose of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “secret” visit to Russia on September 7 was to give the Kremlin a list of Russian experts allegedly working on the Iranian weapons program. If these leaks are true, the ramifications could be huge. Geopolitics expert George Friedman wrote that previously “There were many, including Stratfor, who felt that Iran did not have the non-nuclear disciplines needed for rapid progress toward a nuclear device” (Stratfor, October 5). However, “the presence of Russian personnel in Iran,” wrote Friedman, “would mean that the Iranians had obtained the needed expertise from the Russians.”

A shipment of Iranian armaments was intercepted earlier this month in the Gulf of Suez. A German-owned freighter was apprehended carrying eight containers of ammunition from Iran, thought to be en route to either Syria or Hezbollah. The shipment violates the UN weapons embargo in place against Iran. Iran’s blatant disregard of current sanctions—and its ability to thwart those sanctions—is just more evidence of the ineffectiveness of the efforts of the six major world powers that are supposedly committed to solving the Iranian problem.

The Shiite insurgency in Yemen is intensifying, thanks largely to Iran’s support of Shiite al-Houthi rebels who have been battling the Yemeni military for more than two months in the latest round of fighting. Stratfor reports that Iran has sent Hezbollah fighters into Yemen to assist the al-Houthis. Hezbollah claims it shot down two Yemeni military aircraft earlier this month with shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, though Yemeni military commanders deny this, blaming the crashes on mechanical failure. If, however, Hezbollah does have and is using such missiles, says Stratfor, “it would raise a broader concern about where else Hezbollah (or more accurately, Iran) might feel compelled to deploy these weapons systems and where else loose stocks could be floating around the region, particularly in hot spots like Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon” (October 7).

The New York Post reported October 12 that with Iraq’s general election three months away, Iran is conducting an all-out election bid to determine the future of the country. It appears former Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jafaari is Iran’s candidate for prime minister. Jafaari visited Iran last week, meeting with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. “The American era is ending,” Iran’s official news agency quoted Jaafari as saying. “We must prepare for a new era in which Islamic forces set the agenda.” Even Nouri al-Maliki, the current prime minister of Iraq, is distancing himself from the U.S., largely for political reasons. “If Obama wants to run away, no Iraqi can afford to appear more pro-American than the U.S. president,” said a political advisor to Maliki. “Meanwhile,” writes the Post, “Iran is throwing in everything to defeat Maliki and seize control of Iraq’s government.” Among other moves, Iran is pouring huge amounts of money in Iraq, using front companies, and is pressuring Iraq’s Grand Ayatollah Ali-Muhammad Sistani to endorse the pro-Iranian Iraqi National Alliance bloc.

In other Mideast news, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met with Pope Benedict xvi October 8 at the Vatican; and in a speech October 11, Abbas said there “will be no Israeli-Palestinian peace treaty until the occupation of Jerusalem ends.”

Europe

A lot has changed in Europe over the last few weeks. All nations but the Czech Republic have now ratified the Lisbon Treaty. A new government is about to be put in place in Germany. And Germany has launched a major economic attack on the city of London.

On October 2, the Irish public voted in a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, with 67 percent voting for, and 33 percent against. The European Union pressured Ireland into voting “yes.” The nation, according to an Irish mep speaking at a European Parliament session on the Lisbon Treaty, had been “bludgeoned” into accepting the treaty. On October 10, Polish President Lech Kaczynski signed the treaty, meaning that all nations but the Czech Republic have now ratified it. Czech President Vaclav Klaus is blocking Lisbon’s ratification even after both houses of the Czech parliament endorsed the treaty back in May. He already has fought and lost two cases in the Czech constitutional court against the Lisbon Treaty. President Klaus is trying for a third time to use the Czech constitutional court to hold up ratification, but looks likely to fail again. President Klaus may be pressured to back down, just as Ireland and Poland did. If not, pressure is being mounted within EU circles to organize the ouster of the Czech president from office. Continue to watch the EU as it becomes a stronger power, and especially Germany as it continues to maneuver itself into a position of greater strength.

Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Party won the national elections in Germany on September 27, amid exceptionally low turnout. The Christian Democrats are forming a coalition with Guido Westerwelle’s Free Democratic Party (fdp). This will present an interesting challenge for the chancellor. It is thought that the fdp leader will be given the foreign minister’s portfolio, in addition to assuming the vice chancellorship. The challenge will come if his performance in that office is not matched by that of the rising star in German politics, Merkel’s economics minister, Baron zu Guttenberg. Zu Guttenberg has recently surpassed Chancellor Merkel as the most popular politician in Germany, far ahead of Westerwelle. Hailing from the entrenched Bavarian-Frankish, Catholic aristocracy, the young zu Guttenberg is the very antithesis of the liberal, homosexual Westerwelle. He is also the foreign-policy expert within his party, the Bavarian-based Christian Social Union (csu), having taken a lead in foreign-policy debate in the German parliament. Zu Guttenberg was a bright young leader of the young set in Bavarian politics during the long reign of Edmund Stoiber as Bavaria’s prime minister. Watch for the young bloods of the style of this up-and-coming zu Guttenberg to seize the political initiative and begin to shake up German politics.

In an interview with Stern magazine, German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück assaulted London. In this interview, the Telegraph reported September 23, Steinbrück said in effect that “Germany will marshal its forces to ensure that a chunk of the British economy is shut down—whatever the social consequences.” “We will effectively change the rules on the financial market,” he said. London must “share the burden” of paying for the financial crisis by paying more taxes. There is clearly another motive here than just ensuring that another economic accident doesn’t occur. “The world will never be as it was before the crisis; the financial system will become more multipolar,” Steinbrück opined last year. “Anglo-Saxon capitalism” is “finished,” he said. Europeans are capitalizing on the crisis while Britain is too weak to object. Just as manufacturing is the core of the German economy, the financial sector is the main pillar of Britain’s economy. Take away the City of London as a global financial center, and Britain becomes a second-rate nation almost as geopolitically impotent as Spain or Poland. More importantly, the divestiture of banking-sector control to a European regulatory agency would in effect sign away control of the British economy to European overlords.

The EU is consolidating its expansion in the Balkans. The small republic of Macedonia was told it was ready to start membership talks in a European Commission assessment released October 14. This is welcome news in Macedonia, where more than 90 percent of the people support their country’s efforts to integrate with Europe, according to a recent survey by the International Republican Institute. The Trumpet has written before that the German-led EU sees the Balkan Peninsula as strategically important for its imperialistic aims. Apart from Croatia, the Balkan states still have internal issues to resolve before they will be allowed in the EU. However, with the kind of rhetoric coming out of the European Commission, we can expect the rest of the Balkan states to fall under EU control, if not outright membership. For information on what Bible prophecy indicates will happen in the Balkans, and Germany’s future goals for the region, read our free booklet The Rising Beast—Germany’s Conquest of the Balkans.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi may be in serious trouble. On October 7, Italy’s constitutional court ruled that a law passed in 2008 granting the prime minister immunity from persecution was invalid. Now he has to face three court cases against him—one being a serious allegation of corruption. Despite the ruling, Berlusconi was defiant. “I am the best prime minister ever,” he said in a news conference two days later. “I am absolutely the politician most persecuted by prosecutors in the entire history of the world throughout the ages.” Nevertheless, Berlusconi faces some serious challenges. He is losing popularity due to numerous sex scandals. The Vatican has also indicated that it is not happy with his antics. Back in May, the Italian Catholic Bishops Conference warned Berlusconi that he better get his act together in a front-page editorial in its official newspaper. The editorial described his behavior as “worrying” and said, “[W]e ask that the prime minister is more sober, somber and a mirror of the country’s soul.” Berlusconi has certainly not become that. The Vatican is the real powerbroker in Italy. If Berlusconi has lost its support, he will soon be gone.

Latin America/Africa

Colombia has recently reduced its energy exports to Venezuela and Ecuador, causing political tensions in the region. Though the shortages are legitimate—the weather pattern El Niño usually causes an annual shortage in Colombia—the 50 percent reduction in natural gas leaves President Hugo Chávez dry at a time when he was already having trouble meeting his country’s gasoline needs and maintaining the heavy subsidies he employs to shore up his power base. Going forward, Colombia’s domestic needs are increasing and Caracas’s natural gas projects are stalling, so what is currently a short-term problem caused by the weather will soon be a longer-term, more serious issue for Venezuela and Colombia.

The U.S. Embassy and other diplomatic facilities in South Africa closed September 24, reportedly after a threat was phoned in by an al Qaeda cell. Though al Qaeda does have some history of activity in South Africa, it is implausible that an embassy would close over a phoned-in threat, which embassies receive every day. Calling ahead also does not fit with al Qaeda’s usual tactics, and Stratfor believes another militant Islamist group—People Against Gangsterism and Drugs—may have been involved.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe continues his harassment of the Movement for Democratic Change (mdc), this week arresting one of Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai’s aides, Roy Bennett, a senior politician and white farmer who lost his land under Mugabe’s land reform program. In response, the prime minister on Friday said his party would disengage from Mugabe’s zanu-pf party in the country’s unity cabinet. Reuters reports that the mdc said it would “boycott the country’s power-sharing government until sticking points have been resolved and a political deal is reached, sparking the biggest crisis since the administration was formed nine months ago” (October 16). This reaffirms that the only real power in Zimbabwe is despot Robert Mugabe.

Asia

Japan is moving in a new direction under its new prime minister, and that direction is east. During the United Nations summit on September 21, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama met with Chinese President Hu Jintao and proposed they work together to form an East Asian community. While Hatoyama’s proposal is not new, that Hatoyama’s first meeting was with Hu during a global summit demonstrates the increased zeal Japan possesses to foster stronger ties with Asia. The Trumpet has predicted for years that an Asian community will form—one that will include Russia, China and Japan. Japan’s new prime minister looks set to help usher in a new phase of Asian relations that will produce not only an economic alliance but a military one as well.

In a high-level meeting in Moscow September 30, India reaffirmed its “abiding commitment to nurture and consolidate the strategic partnership with Russia.” The meeting covered a wide range of topics but focused on deepening economic ties between the two Asian heavyweights. This is another step toward the forming of a powerful Asian trade and military bloc. For more information on this future alliance, read our free booklet Russia and China in Prophecy.

The EU’s spin machine is working overtime with its recent report on the Georgia war. The EU-sponsored study, presented to senior EU diplomats and the Russian and Georgian ambassadors to the Union on September 30, concludes that Georgia started the 2008 war, not Russia. The report is further evidence that a deal was likely struck between Germany and Russia over Georgia. The report blames Georgia for starting the war by illegally attacking the town of Tskhinvali, and gives Russia exactly what it wants—legitimization of its influence over former Soviet states.

Anglo-America

On October 9, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that it had awarded U.S. President Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize. A flurry of criticism of the award followed, and the panel was forced to defend its decision against accusations of it being premature and undeserved. Chairman Thorbjoem Jagland said, “We simply disagree that he has done nothing. He got the prize for what he has done.” Obama speaking in Cairo to the Muslim world in June and backing off the Eastern European missile defense shield were the president’s stated main accomplishments. “All these things have contributed to—I wouldn’t say a safer world—but a world with less tension,” Jagland said.

Bloomberg reported on Thursday that the Pentagon is revisiting the George W. Bush administration’s doctrine of allowing for preemptive military strikes and may change or delete it. Defense Department Deputy Undersecretary for Strategy Kathleen Hicks said the doctrine needed to “start to take account for” the world being “more complex” now.

The Washington Times reports that President Obama recently relaxed control over missile and space technology sales to China. The president signed over responsibility for approving these technology exports to China from the White House to the Commerce Department. The 1999 Defense Authorization Act specified that the White House sign off on such transactions in order to ensure that “missile equipment or technology, including any indirect technical benefit … will not measurably improve the missile or space launch capabilities of the People’s Republic of China.” The act was passed after several incidents of China surreptitiously obtaining American technology that improved its long-range missiles.

On October 10, the president delivered a speech to homosexuals. Tens of thousands of activists traveled to Washington, D.C., for a pro-homosexual march the day before Obama headlined a fundraising dinner for the movement’s largest activist group, the Human Rights Campaign. Many homosexuals at the march were upset Obama has not done more to promote their special interest. The Washington Post reported that most of the people it interviewed at the event said they voted for Obama. Homosexuals at the march demanded that the president do more for them, including repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, allow them to serve openly in the military, and legalize homosexual marriage. The Post reported that five states have legalized same-sex marriage, but none have done so with the affirmation of a popular vote.

Meanwhile, some conservative lawmakers are on the other side of the argument, calling for the president to fire his director of Safe and Drug Free Schools, who is also the founder of a homosexual activist group and has promoted homosexuality in schools and freely admitted his own drug and alcohol use, saying that his history of abuse makes him able to better help students and teachers on those issues. Obama’s education secretary insists the director is “uniquely qualified” to keep the job.

Britons are receiving more news of corruption reaching the highest levels in London. A senior member of Parliament admitted on Wednesday that he paid more than $163,000 in taxpayer money over three years directly into his own company using his House of Commons expense account.