Tax

World Revolution IV: The House of Rothschild (1)

“Does anyone seriously suppose that a great war could be undertaken by any European state, or a great state loan subscribed, if the House of Rothschild and its connections set their face against it? Every great political act, involving a new flow of capital, or a large fluctuation in the values of existing investments, must receive the sanction and the practical aid of this little group of financial kings.”

– J.A. Hobson, Imperialism: A Study


rothschild-empire-red-shield-clan_thumb.gifTwo-headed eagle emblem of the Byzantine Empire on a Red Shield – Today this is the Russian coat of arms

While Israel tries to sabre-rattle its way to a war with Syria and Iran it is no coincidence that the latter country is one of only three left in the world whose central bank is not under Rothschild control. Their banking methods have defined Western economics by rigging the market whether its gold or stocks or derivatives; ensuring that the political system works entirely for the banks and their corporations; making sure that huge loans are accepted can never be repaid so that countries are racked with debt and social conflict so that astronomical interest leads directly into the coffers of banking families – just like the Rothschilds.

When you have majority control of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) the Federal Reserve, The Bank of England, The European Central Bank and the bank of International Settlements and own most of the wealth in the world, you can essentially do whatever you wish. [1]

Money as a giver of freedom or slavery has been largely in the hands of the Rothschilds since the 19th Century when merchants and industrialists first began to flex their considerable muscle. Once again, Jewish people have had to cope with having primary psychopaths nested in their religion and culture and who have turned it inside out and upside down with ease, redefining the very perception of money and economy in the process. No one will argue that the consequences of cartel-capitalism has proven to be a disaster for the globe but a coup d’état for a select few. What is more, like so many Khazar Zionists and international bankers, they are using the Jewish people as convenient front for their activities.* [2] 

The Rothschild family’s influence cannot be understated. Various members of the dynasty have often been cited as the core movers behind most large-scale banking shifts and international policy change. Yet, there has been little recorded in print about the family (although that is beginning to change). Much of what we know is hearsay and witness testimony which is enough to ratchet up rumours and conspiratorial legend that stands the test of time. This would not be reason enough to pay any heed to such allegations if were not for the fact that the history of the family seems to find itself at the heart of all financial manipulations for the last 200 years.

Rothschild Biographer Niall Ferguson reminds us that during the early days of Rothschilds’ ascendance to power, they rapidly gained:  “a mythic, talismanic status in the eyes of other Jews; not only the Jews of the Kings, but also the ‘Kings of the Jews’—at once exalted by their wealth and yet mindful of their own lowly origin.” [3] And as Michael Collins Piper notes: “… the Rothschilds did maintain a Talmudic and Judeo-centric attitude, despite their common intercourse with the Christian crowned heads and noble families of Europe. And this is noteworthy, inasmuch as other Jewish banking families in England did intermarry on a wide-ranging basis with scores of members of England’s aristocratic families.” [4]

What is more, the family was unquestionably guided by the principles of the Babylonian Talmud, a collection of mystical Jewish instructions rooted in the authority of Levite priests and magickal workings of the Kabbalah. And there is also the little matter of where they stand within the Zionist cabal and in turn, the Global Occult Establishment. What is certain is that Zionism was and is a driving force even a fanatical one. When the maintenance of that belief has an endless supply of money then you can be sure that the repercussions are immense. (More on this and its relevance to Rothschilds’ rule in the Occult Zionism series.)

Mayer Amschel Rothschild, son of Amschel Bauer, was born in 1743 in the Jewish quarter of Frankfurt, Germany in which his ancestors lived. Although educated for a rabbi, he started as a money-lender and dealer in old coins before being offered a job based in Hanover by the Oppenhiemer family in 1755, shortly after the death of his father. Rothschild’s financial acumen and ambitious drive presented a fortuitous meeting with a General von Estorff for whom he ran various errands leading to rapid advancement and a junior partnership in his finances. Von Estorff would be the link to the German royal family and the palace of Prince William. When you have a gift for finance it’s not long before you come to the attention of those with wealth and inherited status. Loaning money to the aristocracy is far more profitable than the common man. Moreover, it allowed him to manage bigger loans secured by taxpayers.

By 1769 with Mayer a regular fixture at the Royal Court and business dealings with the Prince at an all-time high, he was permitted to hang a sign on the front of his business premises declaring that he is: “M. A. Rothschild, by appointment court factor to his serene highness, Prince William of Hanau.” [5] His father had adopted their name from the sign of the house (“Zum Rothen Schilde” or “Red shield”) derived from the Red Flag an emblem of the Khazar or Ashkenazi Jews in Eastern Europe whose guiding light was that of Revolution. Understanding its deeper significance he changed his name to Rothschild and the royal sign and The Red Shield were then positioned side by side over his door. With his business protected the Rothschild enterprise took on new ambitions where financial known-how met ideology and perhaps the occult.

Mayer Amschel Bauer was going places.

The Illuminati and/or Rosicrucian lore is firmly rooted in fact as we saw in the previous posts. However, it was unlikely to have appeared out of nowhere, or just a product of Professor Adam Weishaupt’s megalomaniacal mind. Indeed, the first mention of the order was a 15th century Jewish-German occult sect which was alleged to have practiced a form of Satanism. Perhaps the principles of Illuminism were unearthed and given a dusting down in 18th Century Germany with M.A. Rothschild as the source, due in part to his enormous capital. He was either wholly responsible for, or more likely had a leading role in the creation of the Illuminati, which proceeded to insinuate itself in freemasonry, taking advantage of its inherent weaknesses. There simply isn’t any way possible that Rothschild and Weishaupt were unconnected in their respective meteoric ascents to power. Each were anti-Christian and each were ideologically and symbiotically bound to each other.

In the end, the Order of the Illuminati was as much a financial banking operation as it was an ideology and nothing could have been more effective in establishing a global banking house than a secret society firmly ensconced in Establishment Europe of the time. So it was perhaps, that Professor Adam Weishaupt was entrusted with the task of extending a money empire and anti-Christian, political ideology across the West and beyond. It was obvious to Mayer Rothschild that in order to realise unfettered control over the world’s money supplies which were hoarded under the monarchs of Europe, something had to be done to the Church, namely its destruction.


 “Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws.”

Baron M.A. Rothschild


A Jewish-German who had converted to Catholicism early in his life, Weishaupt proved a highly capable Rothschild agent. A former Jesuit-educated Catholic priest turned atheist, he had come to loathe the Jesuit Order and everything they stood for. A passionate admirer of the revolutionary ideas of Voltaire (who was likely an Illuminist himself) Weishaupt sought to put into practice what would soon become reality in Revolutionary France, best summed up by Voltaire in a letter to King Frederick II which read:

“Lastly, when the whole body of the Church should be sufficiently weakened and infidelity strong enough, the final blow (is) to be dealt by the sword of open, relentless persecution. A reign of terror (is) to be spread over the whole earth, and… continue while any Christian should be found obstinate enough to adhere to Christianity.” [6]

After the marriage to his wife Gutle Schnaper the first of Rothschild’s son Amschel was born followed by Salomon a year later in 1774 and Nathan in 1777. The merchant banking firm of the House of Rothschild was founded in 1776 just as Adam Weishaupt officially completed his organisation of the Illuminati on May 1 of that year. The infiltration of freemasonry rapidly took place alongside the seduction of the gentry and intellectuals of the day. Lodges of the Grand Orient were established much to the chagrin of conventional freemasonry. The money which allowed Weishaupt to do this may have come from the rising wealth of the House of Rothschild.

Just about every method of deception and control from Illuminati agents was formulated and carried out in order to seduce or coerce those in positions of power. Sexpionage and extortion seeped into the Establishment with aim of establishing a comprehensive network of financial bondage. Once caught in the trap individuals would become agents to further the cause.  As we know, In 1785, the Illuminati’s true intent was discovered and the Bavarian government outlawed the sect, closing all the Bavarian lodges of the Grand Orient. Such was the shock and alarm both from freemasonry and government circles in Germany it prompted an extensive publication of the sect’s actions and future objectives entitled: The Original Writings of The Order and Sect of The Illuminati” which was sent to all the heads of Church and State. The details of the document were drawn from the chance finding of portion of Weishaupt’s papers on the body of an Illuminist agent killed from a lightning strike whilst on horseback. It was at this time, perhaps as a precautionary measure, the Rothschilds decided to move to Frankfurt, where two years previously the headquarters of Illuminised freemasonry were located.

With the birth of Karl Rothschild in 1788 and James a few years later, the sparks of the French Revolution which had been struck by Illuminati members began to catch fire in 1789 thanks in part to the lack of action from the Bavarian government’s warning and with only a handful of dissenters across Europe. This revolution was a bankers’ dream. It established a new constitution and passed laws that forbade the Roman Church from levying tithes (taxes) and also removed its exemption from taxation.

Amidst the backdrop of Illuminism and Napoleon’s rise to power, the Rothschild dynasty expanded its financial banking hubs across Europe. With his father’s capital, Nathan Mayer Rothschild set up a banking house in London and was so successful that by 1810 he was the most important banker in England, having accrued vast sums of money from royalty and the rich alike, in particular Prince William IX of Hesse-Hanau, one of Napoleon’s sworn enemies who had decided to leave $3,000,000 of his money with him for safe-keeping. Nathan invested the money in gold from the East India Company knowing that it would be needed for Wellington’s peninsula campaign. The Rothschilds supplied gold to both sides of the war (Nathan in England; Jacob in France) in order to receive the maximum return from a risk-free debt.

With the Illuminist network already in place it was less problematic to install an advanced courier postal service running along the most economic and efficient lines both geographically and logistically which would guarantee immediate and direct information straight to the Rothschilds, thus providing a form of financial prescience which was far in advance of any system of reconnaissance and communications of the day. Indeed, British royalty and the European elite relied on this service which meant that politically sensitive, confidential information could by-pass the mainstream media of the day. It also meant however, that it would be easy for Rothschild agents and therefore, perhaps the Illuminism of the day to have complete access to correspondence between British Royalty and the European elite. This inevitably led to the buying and selling of financial intelligence on companies and warring factions during the Napoleonic Wars and all future conflicts. As Gutle Schnaper, Mayer Amschel Rothschild’s wife said just before her death “If my sons did not want wars, there would be none,” perfectly summing up the past and present role of global banking today. [7]

So, we see here how essential this network was to be in the stimulation of geopolitical crises and the propagation of debt to exacerbate the need for international conflict and war – War after all, means money.


“The House of Rothschild has arisen from the quarrels between states, has become great and mighty from wars [and] the misfortune of states and peoples has been its fortune.”

Freidrich von Scherb, History of the House of Rothschild


Since the discovery of the Bavarian Illuminati the spread of occult power within Europe had been redirected through Carbonarism (“charcoal burners”) who were a disparate collection of freemasonic secret societies in Italy who believed in revolution and the destruction of the Church. Their influence over revolutionary groups in Europe was substantial and may even have extended to Russia. Author Fritz Springmeier’s research from his book Illuminati Bloodlines (1992) indicates that Amschel’s son Karl Rothschild was tasked with the responsibility for infusing Italian Carbonari lodges with Illuminsm. This gave rise to further systemised attacks against the Catholic Church with the notable document of the Alta Vendita which describes a Masonic plan to infiltrate the Catholic Church and spread Illuminist-led liberalism within it. It was eventually published by Jacques Crétineau-Joly in his book L’Église romaine en face de la Révolution in (1859) with official support by Catholic Popes of the time. By the mid-19th Century Rothschild links to freemasonry were assured with James Meyer Rothschild a 33 degree Scottish Rite Mason and his brother Nathan a member of the Lodge of Emulation. Solomon Meir Rothschild became a freemason on June 14, 1809.

The five sons were made barons of the Austrian Empire in 1822 and who went on to expand banking operations into England, Italy, France, Austria and Prussia making it the most successful and powerful merchant bank of the time. The London branch was headed by son Lionel and then succeeded by Nathan M. Rothschild who gave Rhodes his important task of opening up South Africa for both the British and Rothschild’s resource monopoly. The other sons had branches in Paris, (James) Berlin (Amschel) Vienna (Soloman) Naples (Charles). Nathan M. Rothschild was elected head of the family following his father, Mayer Amschel Rothschild’s death.

Nathan M. Rothschild also made sure to start selling a surfeit of British bonds (or consuls) on the Stock Exchange so that other traders thought that the British had lost the war against Napoleon thus pushing them to panic sell. When the consuls lost their value Nathan told his employees to purchase all the consuls they could so that when it was known that the British had won the war the consuls would shoot up in value thus allowing the House of Rothschild to make a killing, effectively controlling the British economy. When N.M. Rothschild did became governor he also owned and operated England’s Royal Mint Refinery which meant he became the primary gold agent to the Bank of England with all the power that such a position entails. So, it is that France and Britain remain a particular stronghold of Rothschild finance.

Over in the United States the banking charter for House of Rothschild had run out, with Congress voting against its renewal. Nathan, having spent time and energy threatening Congress, sided with the British and declared: “Teach those impudent Americans a lesson. Bring them back to colonial status.” The setback didn’t last long. The 1812 declaration of war by the Americans was the result of a several issues which had come to the boil. With the Rothschilds already backing the British and the French in the Napoleonic Wars the American war of independence was deemed more important. With a costly war against the British Empire the United States would be in debt, thus more amenable to renew the charter for Rothschilds’ bank. After the war, the Rothschilds managed to get back into the American money supply once again when Congress passed a bill for another banking charter, this time for twenty years.

Meyer Amschel Rothschild died on September 19, 1812. His will spelled out specific guidelines that were to be maintained by his descendants:

1) All important posts were to be held by only family members, and only male members were to be involved on the business end. The oldest son of the oldest son was to be the head of the family, unless otherwise agreed upon by the rest of the family, as was the case in 1812, when Nathan was appointed as the patriarch.

2) The family was to intermarry with their own first and second cousins, so their fortune could be kept in the family, and to maintain the appearance of a united financial empire. For example, his son James (Jacob) Mayer married the daughter of another son, Salomon Mayer. This rule became less important in later generations as they refocused family goals and married into other fortunes.

3) Rothschild ordered that there was never to be “any public inventory made by the courts, or otherwise, of my estate…Also I forbid any legal action and any publication of the value of the inheritance.”  [8]

From 1814-1820 business with the Vatican proceeded successfully until the Rothschilds were firmly ensconced in Vatican City and their banking fraternities. They were less successful with the Tsar Alexander I of Russia, who, unlike Europe had not come under the Illuminist rule and the Rothschilds’ international banking network which was part of the designs of a Revolutionary World government. Indeed, the Russian aristocracy had actively resisted all of their financial terrorism and by refusing to do business with them it had cost the Rothschilds dear since they very much wanted to get their hands on Russian oil fields. As a consequence, the Tsar and his family of the House of Romanov would perish under those same plans channelled through a Wall St.-Zionist-led Bolshevik Revolution straight out of the text book of Illuminist philosophy.

It is hard to do justice to just how powerful the House of Rothschild and their financial empire had become by the mid-19th Century.  Jacob Rothschild in Paris, died in 1868 with a fortune worth, from today’s evaluation the equivalent to $300,000,000 with a yearly income of around $40,000,000. By 1913, that fortune was worth over $2,000,000,000. [9] This immense fortune accrued by family members was predicated on a religious and financial code of intermarriage within the Rothschild family, a practice long undertaken by aristocrats and royalty. For example, Jacob Rothschild married the daughter of his brother, Baron Salomon Rothschild of Vienna. As the Rothschild’s thought of themselves as Jewish royalty it was a natural move, although this was more to do with the prevention, as they saw it, of a dilution of their capital and thus their international leverage.[10]

Remaining true to the ethos of segregation from the world of gentiles, marriage was restricted to other Jewish members of banking families such as the the Cohens, Goldsmids, Samuels, the Brofmans of America and the Montefiores of England and the Sassoons in Asia. Indeed, the Rothschilds hounded out one of their own family for transgressing this unwritten law. In 1839, Nathan’s second daughter Hannah Mayer had the temerity to marry a gentile and convert to Christianity which was considered quite against the Jewish tribal code as well as the Rothschild plans to keep it in the family as financial strategy. James Rothschild in Paris wrote a letter to his mother summarising what should be done next, in lieu of the fact that she had:

“… robbed the whole family of its pride and caused us such harm that it can longer be addressed. You say, my dear Nat, that she has found everything except religion. However, I believe that [religion] means everything. Our good fortune and blessings depend on it. We shall therefore, wipe her from our memory and never again during my lifetime will I, or any other member of our family see or receive her. We now want to wish her all the best and banish her from our memory as if she never existed.” [11]

The rules of the Talmudic religion lay behind the Rothschilds operations, where the idea of Jewish Royalty was never far from their minds. After all, the European social elite were there to be exploited not to be joined. If not marriage of sons, daughters, cousins and siblings, then strong business ties cemented with freemasonic handshakes and proxy organisations such as the Round Table were the preferred route. The Sassoons for example, allowed them to extend their reach fully into all areas of Asia; via the Montefiores across Australiasia; the Oppenheimers through their control of the diamond trade in South Africa and their Round Table agent Cecil Rhodes, who was able to monopolise the gold and silver mining for the family.

The House of Rothschild was just beginning to get into its stride.

 


* Some academics suggest that The Rothschilds lineage is from the Khazars, an Asiatic, Mongolian race of people whose origins can be traced back to a country called Khazaria, now known as Georgia. The Khazars converted to the Jewish faith in 740 A.D. which means that claims that Israel’s unquestioning birth right is even harder to swallow when its heritage is sourced from about 80 percent of Jewish people known as Ashkenazi Jews who appear to be from a very mixed genetic pool indeed. Even so, it depends how far back one wants to go. In the end, it is the psychopath that counts not the ethnicity that is prey to its infection.


Notes

[1] http://www.rothschildarchive.org/ | ‘Rothschilds Want Iran’s Banks’ By Pete Papaherakles, American Free Press, February 10, 2012.
[2] The Thirteenth Tribe: The Khazar Empire and Its Heritage By Arthur Koestler, Published by Hutchinson, Random House; illustrated edition 1976 | ISBN-10: 0091255503 | See also: ‘Gene study hopes to settle debate over origin of European Jews’ Agence France-Presse, 17 Jan 2013: “Geneticist Eran Elhaik of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland, trawled through this small mountain of data in search of single changes in the DNA code that are linked to a group’s geographical origins. […] “… Eastern European Jews descended from the Khazars, a hotchpotch of Turkic clans that settled the Caucasus in the early centuries AD and, influenced by Jews from Palestine, converted to Judaism in the 8th century. The Judeo-Khazars built a flourishing empire, drawing in Jews from Mesopotamia and imperial Byzantium.
They became so successful that they sent offshoots into Hungary and Romania, planting the seeds of a great diaspora.
But Khazaria collapsed in the 13th century when it was attacked by the Mongols and became weakened by outbreaks of the Black Death. The Judeo-Khazars fled westwards, settling in the rising Polish Kingdom and in Hungary, where their skills in finance, economics and politics were in demand, and eventually spread to central and western Europe, according to the “Khazarian Hypothesis.”
“We conclude that the genome of European Jews is a tapestry of ancient populations including Judaised Khazars, Greco-Roman Jews, Mesopotamian Jews and Judeans,” says Elhaik.
“Their population structure was formed in the Caucasus and the banks of the Volga, with roots stretching to Canaan and the banks of the Jordan.”
Many things are unknown about the Khazars, whose tribal confederation gathered Slavs, Scythians, Hunnic-Bulgars, Iranians, Alans and Turks. But, argues Elhaik, the tale sketched in the genes is backed by archaeological findings, by Jewish literature that describes the Khazars’ conversion to Judaism, and by language, too.” | See also more up-to-date research from: ‘The Khazars: An Overview, Israelite Tribes in Exile’ by Yair Davidiy – http://www.britam.org/khazars.html
[3] p.137; Ferguson, Niall The House of Rothschild: Money’s Prophets (1999) Published by Penguin, ISBN-10: 0140240845.
[4] p.127; Collins Piper, Michael, The New Babylon – Those Who Reign Supreme (2008)
[4] Chambers’s Encyclopaedia, 1908, Volume VIII: “Rothschilds”.
[5] ‘Voltaire and Frederick the Great’from Books and Characters, French and English by Lytton Strachey, 1915 edited by Geoffrey Sauer 1997.
[6] 1849: Gutle Schnaper, Mayer Amschel Rothschild.
[7] ‘The Illuminati and the House of Rothschild’ By Kennthe Parsons http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/rothschild.html
[8] op.cit Collins Piper p. 127
[9] Ibid.
[10] op.cit Ferguson, p.321.

The “Structural Adjustment” Team I

By M.K. Styllinski

“The causes of the sustained crisis of development in the Third World are extremely complex, but it is certain that excessive reliance on export-led growth in an unstable world economy creates major structural problems that all growth strategies must avoid. But exports are at the core of the IMF philosophy, and its guidance has gravely hindered the struggle of innumerable poor nations to escape their suffering.”

Gabriel Kolko


The World Bank, (WB) The International Monetary fund, (IMF) and The World Trade Organisation (WTO) are responsible for extending Official Culture on a macro-social scale. They are by default, a global cartel spreading a belief which has translated the true meaning of globalisation as a New International Economic order which has led to decades of social, economic and cultural decay for the world.  The unofficial goals of the IMF and World Bank was to always make sure that the consolidation of riches and power would remain in Elite hands and be expanded; fully aware that World War II gave them the opportunity to do just that.

As with so many institutions hastily created during the end and just after the Second World War, The World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) were founded by US and British Governments at The Bretton Woods Conference in 1944 Hampshire, USA. The official line was to develop strong economies for those European countries most affected by the carnage of the War. What it also did was to firmly establish an overriding economic belief to the exclusion of any other. Both are closely allied with Wall Street bankers and the US Treasury so that economic policies that benefit private investors and financial speculators in the free-market are guaranteed to be implemented, come what may.

The best illustration of this is the “Washington Consensus” developed by the World Bank and IMF members in the early eighties and which finalised the process of large-scale outsourcing, financial deregulation, and privatisation. This paid huge dividends for multi-national corporations, the international banking industry, Wall St., and the world’s richest family dynasties but proved to be a social, cultural and ecological disaster for both the working and middle-class in the West and the developing world. It was finally eclipsed by the rise of China but the results live on.

Both the IMF and the World Bank decisions are based on 40 percent of the votes from the G8 countries which is not what you might call “representative.” Considering its toxic effects its more than ironic that the IMF is funded with taxpayer money, yet functions in a state of secrecy and legal immunity. Extraordinarily, the World Bank and the IMF are not accountable for their actions under law. It is therefore almost impossible to dismantle this vast banking entity holding so many countries to ransom with almost breath-taking hypocrisy that it is somehow acting as global saviour. At the same time, as with the United Nations, if the US sees something that threatens its interests then it merely has to veto the proposed action by the World Bank and sit back and puff on a cigar. This extends to the design and implementation of loan packages by international bankers and finance staff without any participation from civic society or government policy and most importantly, from those it will most affect.

At 18 percent of the vote the US straddles both institutions and makes sure that the power of their veto always conforms to US and G7 interests. This means the global economy stays within the narrow confines of what is possible and not possible which is defined by the very same institutions in the first place. This in turn, ensures that poorer nations are excluded from all talks despite being present at the meetings.

A flagship example of this reality-disconnect arrived in the form of the “Structural adjustment” policy replaced by the euphemistic “Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers” (PRSPs) in 1999. The latter sounded wonderfully altruistic but the framework and “solutions” remain exactly the same, namely, to determine other countries economic policies so that they fall into line with the dominant Capitalist model of the West. That means comprehensively trashing social welfare introducing austerity measures in order to pay for the “generous” loans to rebuild its infrastructure. With its headquarters in Washington, D.C., the IMF describes itself as “an organization of 188 countries working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty.”  The organisation’s stated objectives are to promote international economic cooperation, international trade, employment, and exchange rate stability, including by making financial resources available to member countries to meet balance of payments needs.

The sticking point in all this is that if you increase and promote Neo-Liberal economic policies which are, by nature, elitist and centralist then poverty can only be the end result. Hence the idea of the IMF reducing poverty will still produce large guffaws of incredulity at any self-respecting anti-globalisation gathering. Much like the World Bank, the IMF is better suited as a warden of a global apartheid as described by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in 1980. The IMF and the World Bank have overseen the Structural Adjustment scam for decades and it only becomes comprehensible when one sees these giants as glorified loan sharks for the corporate, banking and military sphere as it is in these sectors that the institutions pay dividends.

When the country becomes the victim of a global economy that causes intolerable strains on its economic infrastructure, then it is persuaded to turn to the very institutions that are part of the problem in the first place. If economic catastrophe looms then the IMF is usually the first port of call. This is an open door not just to loans but the whole economic policy that requires a complete “re-adjustment” to their worldview. It is a Faustian bargain and one which leaves the social fabric of the country irrevocably torn. The prioritization of debt repayment overrides all and any other consideration, where GDP becomes the only measurable unit of human currency so that values, community and local business mean nothing.

In order to ensure that the debt remains viable and the corporations and bankers that oversee the privatization and liberalisation that ensues social welfare programs and other cultural initiatives are inevitably cut in order to feed the new black hole of intervention. Deregulating the markets of targeted countries opens them up to rampant speculation, corporate predators and the endemic corruption that goes with it. This means it is much easier to sell off a nation’s assets at sub-standard prices. Haiti is a case in point. In 2000 the IMF stepped in and carried out food terrorism by forcing the nation to accept highly subsidized genetically modified US rice while making sure that Haiti’s farmers did receive the same treatment. US corporations now have the monopoly on Haiti’s food production, distribution and exports with over 50 percent of rice being sold back to the Haitians. The indigenous farmers meanwhile have become yet more victims of the US monoculture and have ended up working in sweatshops for slave wages. [1]

Under structural adjustment, social spending from government budgets to programs and subsidies are all severely cut or reduced in order to quickly start repaying the debt. The whole way of life changes: hospitals, businesses and schools begin to be sucked into the dollar-sign mentality where materialism replaces values and a sense of community are extinguished. The cost of living rises exponentially while the quality of life plummets. Everything becomes a matter of survival as poverty arrives with a vengeance. Meanwhile, bankers and corporatists are upgrading their yachts and opening new off-shore tax accounts.

As we have seen in spectacular fashion, the IMF’s record of bailing out countries (which is really bailing out the Banksters) continued during the 2008 economic collapse up to the present time. IMF bailouts deepen, rather than solve, economic crises except when countries such as Iceland reject the IMF debt slavery and actually take Banksters to court. [2] Bailouts of billions of dollars amount to shoring up a financial system that favours the status quo rather than staving off collapse. South Korea, Thailand, Mexico, Brazil, Russia and others have all experienced the consequences of the IMF’s “helping hand” which led to severe economic instability to surface in other countries. Billions of dollars, pounds and euros have disappeared into a black hole which has meant that vast cuts in social systems under the banner of “austerity measures” have been secured so that the taxpayer actually foots the bill for reckless and criminal activities of the bankers themselves. It is no coincidence that large Anglo-American banking firms made billions of dollars of profit after governments showered them with bailouts while the general public in both Europe and America suffered a massive drop in their standard of living with unemployment soaring to levels unheard of. [3]

The number of Mexicans living in extreme poverty increased to over 50 percent during the 1995 IMF-imposed economic reforms and peso bailout and the national average minimum wage fell 20 percent. This is a familiar story and one which has now led to a severe global depression with the bankers kicking the bailout can further down the street in an attempt to cream as much hedge fund benefits from this financial disaster as they can. They knew it was coming as all good high-level speculators do. This is exactly what has happened in the past to some Asian, European and Latin American countries, most famously Argentina which suffered from a protracted and very serious economic collapse in 2001 after being considered a model of compliance from IMF and US treasury loan “largesse.” [4]

To allow an easy ride for foreign investors to plunder countries targeted by the Structural Adjustment Team restrictions to what can be bought, sold and owned is lifted. Interest rates are also increased in order to push up and maximize profitability for the corporate marauders who then syphon it off to their native countries. Meanwhile, local economies and their communities disappear to produce unemployment, immigration and the increase in the inner city slum quota.

Commensurate with this arrival of what is touted as an economic saviour is the dramatic reconfiguration of agriculture as one of the most important influences of the Structural Adjustment Team. Subsistence farming, community-based local produce and environmentally sustainable practices gives way to monoculture farming predicated on pesticides, herbicides, GM food-stuffs and genetically modified crops. The whole nature of a society and a nation are altered from the control of food and food production. Local competition is quickly eradicated as wealthy landowners and managers take over. The rise in famine and malnutrition surfaces rapidly in response to agribusiness, as does the level of environmental degradation from massive exploitation of resources.

Under the IMF’s take on reality, export production is king; a diversified domestic economy cannot work. At least, not if you are a bankers intent on reaping short term benefit. It literally pays to place the country into debt. Almost 80 percent of all malnourished children in the developing world live in countries where there is a food surplus and farmers have changed from local to intensive farming for the West. [5] Structural adjustments were a euphemism for turning a country inside out and having its insides picked clean by an economic model that was number-based rather than human-based. In summary, it is another form of global, economic imperialism.

In a desperate attempt to prop up the global financial and centralised government systems to which it owes its existence, the IMF released a report called “Taxing Times” in October 2013, outlining schemes to allow bankrupt governments to accrue more money through higher taxes and even confiscate money straight out of our bank accounts. This occurred in the 2012 financial fiasco in Cyprus which saw those with savings above £100,000 lose over 75 percent to government looting which will serve as a template for a more global enterprise enshrined in law.

Massive transfer of wealth to governments and corporations is what the Structural Adjustment Team do so well. Indeed, since people are very much more aware of the danger of having their pensions and savings stolen by this institution it means it must device more devious ways of preventing that resistance. Which is why the report warms to the European Union’s idea of taxing anyone with more assets than debt so that the global financial system remains tied to debt and fiat currency.

Without debt the IMF and its brothers cannot exist. Though the report is dressed up as targeting the tax–haven rich in reality, it is the middle classes who hold much of the proportionate savings thus offering a vast untapped source of revenue. Woe betide the average wage earner and the rich who are not enmeshed in the Establishment as they will become the targets of a new tax regime designed to continue the present iniquities rather than lose them. After all, the IMF realises that it cannot tax the assets of the 1 percent of its super-rich brethren as it wouldn’t be enough to service government needs. However, factor all those middle-class households with positive net wealth then it represents a bonanza of untapped taxation.  Taxes of 60 – 70 percent are being touted as a means to find new sources to both increase and feed the debt hole. As corporations and private businesses are also seen as a way to inaugurate a massive new global taxation scheme underpinned by regulatory enforcement it really means that the same centralised system will continue to funnel extortionate amounts of money into pointless government programs which underpin unceasing, infinite maw of debt as the arbiter of economic reality. And the IMF want to erect these new taxes in law before people have a chance to understand what it means: a further tightening of the screw of cartel capitalism where private property and personal assets are up for grabs. True structural reforms will remain absent under the IMF stewardship.

The IMF has a partner in crime.

The WTO acts as the oil between ‘free-trade’ nations encouraging global competition and the unrestricted flow of goods and services. But because globalisation means more and more trans-national companies taking a bigger and bigger slice of the pie then “competition” has come to mean “exploitation” rather than the now almost quaint notion of measured capitalism proposed by the Keynesian model. The WTO is therefore a tool of corporatism like its partners.

It must be considered the height of hypocrisy regarding the standards of these institutions who insist on countries adhering to democratic reforms as prerequisite to receiving their loans. It is clear however that neither the IMF, the WB, the WTO or for that matter the United Nations  come close to being examples of anything approaching democratic. While the WTO in particular, may be constitutionally democratic, its actions and net results are perfect examples of the opposite where corruption and financial misappropriation is highly damaging to any countries that fall under its influence.

The WTO is essentially a corporate enabler. It makes sure the small print is limited and regulations designed to protect the consumer and the ordinary man and woman in the street are so diluted as to be non-existent. Trade agreements are the WTO’s forte as is the continuing expansion of the corporate net. But to make sure these trans-nationals have unlimited market access, circumvention of the domestic laws, civil rights, access to natural resources and services of vulnerable countries must be carried out and the WTO trade agreements provide this opportunity, dressed up as benefits for all.

Some of the most important and influential agreements from the WTO include:

  • The 1994 General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) This “general agreement” means that ways were found to remove any and all domestic restrictions and regulations to trade. It makes a nation’s right to govern itself i.e. its sovereignty is thrown out of the window under the pretext of free trade.
  • The Trade Related agreement on International Property Rights (TRIPS) is perhaps the most dangerous “agreement” formed at the Uruguay round of the WTO talks which permits intellectual property rights to include seeds and plants. It is the basis upon which corporations like Monsanto have held farmers to ransom and prosecuted many for planting unlicensed seeds which have already been genetically modified to have a limited life so that farmers must buy a new batch every year. Thousand year old ties to Nature and her knowledge have been tossed out of the window in a matter of a decade. Peter Drahos writes that “It was an accepted part of international commercial morality that states would design domestic intellectual property law to suit their own economic circumstances. States made sure that existing international intellectual property agreements gave them plenty of latitude to do so.” [6]
  • The Trade Related Investment Measures (TRIMS) allows domestic finance to fall under the domination of corporate dictates while eroding a nation’s ability to have a say in their own policies regarding foreign investments domestic fiscal policy.

What all this means is that GATS, TRIPS and TRIMS are the means by which vulnerable countries are coerced into giving up their economic, social and cultural independence while their often unique resources are plundered – all under law.  They are able to do this because corporate lobbyists have direct access to government policy makers and spend billions of dollars making sure the WTO agreements stay firmly in the court of corporatism. Which is why most developing countries are never able to have a voice or stand up for their rights once they have been seduced by the false promises of loans which are only given on the agreement to implement Structural Adjustment Programs.

 


Notes

[1] Oxfam America Research Backgrounders: ‘Haiti Rice Value Chain Assessment: Rapid diagnosis and implications for program design’ By David C. Wilcock and Franco Jean-Pierren| http://www.files.meetup.com/1337582/Rice%20Value%20Chain%20Backgrounder%20.pdf
[2] ‘Iceland just sentenced its first bankster to prison’ by James http://www.12160.info, Social Network, December 28, 2012.
[3] ‘Eurozone Unemployment Soars to New High’ VOA News, April 2012. – http://www.voanews.com/content/eurozone-unemployment-reaches-record-high/1579633.html | ‘Youth unemployment soars, and it’s not just a phase’ By Heather Stewart, The Guardian, 13 April 2012 -www.guardian.co.uk/business/economics-blog/2012/apr/13/youth-unemployment-rising-work-programme | ‘Gallup Finds Unemployment Rate Soars Following Presidential Election’ By Tyler Durden, http://www.zerohedge.com June 12, 2012.
[4] ‘Economic debacle in Argentina: The IMF strikes again’ – “Argentina’s economic policies during the 1990s were developed under the direction of the IMF. The following article analyses the fatal flaws in these policies.” By Arthur MacEwan, TWN Third World Network via http://www.fpif.org. | http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/twr137b.htm
[5] ‘Facts and Figures About the UN Millenium Goals’ http://www.gender-cawater-net / In its 2000 Millennium Declaration, the United Nations set 8 goals for development, called the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). These goals set an ambitious agenda for improving the human condition by 2015.
[6] p38; Information Feudalism, By Peter Drahos with John Braithwaite, New Press, 2003 | ISBN-10: 1565848047.