A former Polish prime minister has succeeded Herman Van Rompuy as president of the European Council, but this seemingly routine transition signals an imminent move by new European Commission President Donald Tusk to go all-out for free trade as Ukraine threatens to descend into all-out chaos and carnage.
Immediately after being appointed EC Commission President, Tusk spoke with U.S. President Barack Obama by telephone on December 1st, and called for immediate progress on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP).
While headlines about ISIS and Ebola consume tons of ink and paper in newspapers around the world, T-TIP is quietly forging ahead, but it covers a much larger area of the globe than either ISIS or Ebola could control.
And T-TIP was carved out of the same “corporate base” as the North-Central American Free Trade Agreement that destroyed the economies of the Western Hemisphere.
The U.S. Delegation to the European Union, whose Washington office is located on “Robbie Row” at 2175 K Street, is a key conduit for ongoing efforts to integrate at least some government operations and economic regulation between the EU and the United States.
When the delegation published the breaking news on December 2nd announcing Tusk's appointment as European Commission president, it was notable that Tusk made contact with Obama a top priority.
In the bulletin, Tusk said: “I was pleased to speak with the President of the United States, Barack Obama, today (1 December)…” I am pleased that the US President has demonstrated a similarly strong commitment to our transatlantic ties.”
Tusk's personal leanings are complex: his record shows he has some common sense, but he is committed to the notion of “free markets” that has provided an excuse to shield big banks and corporations from real accountability and protects big business at virtually every turn.
Tusk was quick to confirm the central agenda at hand, saying: “We discussed the important work ahead: in negotiating the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP). The T-TIP is not just about free trade, it is an expression of our geopolitical partnership. We agreed to intensify our efforts.”
As I have judged from interviews with various Washington think tanks that worship the golden calf of free trade, the relationship between the EU and the US is based on a merger as much as it is a partnership.
The term “geopolitical partnership” is code for planned closer cooperation between the US and the EU, apparently referring to the integration of their respective regulatory systems to administer the T-TIP framework.
And this framework is a key component of a top-down global economic system tailor-made for big banks and corporations, who have set up tribunals in the T-TIP to challenge domestic laws that are unfavorable to free trade.
Thus, if a country bans genetically modified crops or foods, the T-TIP Court could allow GMO companies like Monsanto to ignore the country's laws, regardless of whether the GMO ban was passed into law by the people or by an elected legislature.
According to Tusk, this “partnership” also includes working closely with the Western side on the Ukraine crisis, which would include sanctions against Russia and “financial support for Ukraine.”
Regarding his meeting with President Obama, Tusk said, “We agreed on how important it is for Russia to withdraw from eastern Ukraine.”
Tusk noted the need for the EU and US to further strengthen cooperation with NATO and said the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which has been monitoring suspected Russian aggression in Ukraine, needed EU and US support.
However, Global Research, a reliable Canadian investigative news site, points out that OSCE monitors “did not record any troops, ammunition or weapons crossing the Russia-Ukraine border in the past two weeks” from August 20 to September 3, 2014, citing Russian news sources. No one is saying Putin is an innocent saint, but even now, the Ukrainian central government appears to be playing the victim, even as it pushes most of the blame for the armed conflict onto Russian “separatists,” when in fact they are the main aggressors.
“Monitors noticed a net increase in young people, both males and females, dressed in military uniform crossing the border in both directions, but no weapons were found among these groups,” Global Research added at the time.
The new EC Chairman working with President Obama also means that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's recent speech to the US Congress may reward Petro with US tax dollars and equipment he has been seeking to fight Russia, a conflict in which the US could become embroiled in to fight an existing nuclear power.
Meanwhile, Global Research reporter James Petras has loudly warned that Ukraine is working with NATO to carry out a planned ethnic cleansing of southeastern Ukraine.
“Kiev's democratically elected 'compromise government' was overthrown in a violent coup in February 2014 and a pro-NATO government was installed,” Petras said.
Petras added that the recent G20 meeting in Australia was marked by an “inflammatory chorus” of Western leaders against Russian President Vladimir Putin. “Putin ultimately responded by expanding Russian air and ground military readiness along the border and accelerating Moscow's economic pivot to Asia. He announced that Russia could not stand by and watch the genocide of entire ethnic groups in the Donbass region,” he said.
Petras therefore asked whether Poroshenko's possible upcoming blitzkrieg in eastern Ukraine was intended to provoke a Russian response to the humanitarian crisis: “Would Russia be prepared to face a NATO-led attack on Kiev and completely break with the West?”
The author is a rotating editor at AmericanFreePress.net and AFP's Bilderberg correspondent. E-mail him at truthhound2@yahoo.com.
