UK Faces "A Miserable End" If It Joins "War Maniacs" US And South Korea

Ahead of tonight"s missile launch across Japan, North Korea warned that The UK “faces a miserable end” should it decide to join the joint military exercises being conducted by the US and South Korea that began last week, according to local media reports cited by Russia Today.

The annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian drills, which have been conducted every year since the Korean War ended in an uneasy ceasefire, involve nearly 20,000 troops and have long provoked the ire of North Korea’s leaders.

In a statement, North Korea’s official KCNA news agency denounced Washington and Seoul as “warmongers” and said the drills are proof of their intention to invade the North. It also branded its enemies as “war maniacs” and “dull immature infants.”

“The reality vividly shows that the US ambition for stifling the DPRK [North Korea] remains unchanged no matter how much water may flow under the bridge and the puppet group’s ambition for invading the North remains unchanged,” it said.

“We solemnly warn not only the US and puppet group, but also satellites, including the UK and Australia, which are taking advantage of the present war maneuvers against the north, that they would face a miserable end if they join in play with fire by tiger moths of war.”

For its part, the UK hasn’t said anything about taking part in the drills.

KCNA dismissed South Korea’s claim that the annual exercises are meant to be defensive, saying “formations of strategic bombers loaded with nuclear bombs are always ready for sorties.”

Meanwhile, an editorial in North Korea’s Sinmun newspaper said the joint military exercise is “the most explicit expression of hostility against us, and no one can guarantee that the exercise won’t evolve into actual fighting.”

It added that the exercises were tantamount to “pouring gasoline on fire and worsening the state of the [Korean] peninsula.”

The UK could formally refuse a call to help the US fight a war against North Korea as long as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un doesn’t strike the US, according to RT.

“Although Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty states that an attack on one NATO member is an act of aggression against the entire military alliance, the application of this provision is limited only to attacks on member states’ territories in North America, Europe and the Atlantic.”

If Kim’s warheads were to strike US military bases in the Pacific, the US could ask for Britain’s assistance, but would be unable to compel the UK and other NATO allies to join in the fight against the North.

Responding to the earlier missile launch, UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson said he is "outrgaed" by the "reckless provocation" of North Korea"s latest missile launch.

Militarization Of Scandinavian Peninsula: Time To Ring Alarm Bells

Authored by Alex Gorka via The Stratgeic Culture Foundation,

Much has been said about NATO reinforcements in the Baltic States and Poland perceived in Moscow as provocative actions undermining security in Europe, while very little has been said about gradual but steady militarization of Scandinavia. The theme does not hit headlines and it is not in focus of public discourse but one step is taken after another to turn the region into a springboard for staging offensive actions against Russia.

Ørland in southern Norway is being expanded to become Norway’s main air force base hosting US-made F-35 Lightnings – the stealth aircraft to become the backbone of Norwegian air power. Norway has purchased 56 of such aircraft. F-35 is an offensive, not defensive, weapon. The nuclear capable platforms can strike deep into Russia’s territory.

Providing training to Norwegian pilots operating the planes carrying nuclear weapons, such as B61-12 glider warheads, constitutes a violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1968. Article I of the NPT prohibits the transfer of nuclear weapons from NWS (nuclear weapons states) to other states: «Each nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices». Article II requires NNWS (non-nuclear weapons states) not to receive nuclear weapons: «Each non-nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to receive the transfer from any transfer or whatsoever of nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or of control over such weapons or explosive devices». How can Russia be sure that these aircraft don’t carry nuclear weapons when there is no agreement of any kind in place to verify compliance with the NPT?

Ørland is located near Værnes - the base that hosts 330 US Marines. In May, the base hosted the biennial NATO military exercise «Arctic Challenge Exercise 2017» to involve over 100 planes from 12 nations. It was the first time a US strategic bomber (B-52H) took part in the training event.

The choice of the base was carefully calculated to keep the planes away from the reach of Russian Iskander missiles (500 kilometres) but no location in Norway is beyond the operational range of Kalibr ship-based sea-to-shore missiles and aircraft armed with long-range air-to-surface missiles.

In June, Norway’s government announced that the decision was taken to extend the rotational US Marine Corps force stationed at Værnes through 2018. The move contradicts the tried-and-true Norwegian policy of not deploying foreign military bases in the country in times of peace.

Also in June, the United States, United Kingdom and Norway agreed in principle to create a trilateral coalition built around the P-8 maritime aircraft to include joint operations in the North Atlantic near the Russian Northern Fleet bases.

Norway is to contribute into NATO ballistic missile defense (BMD) system by integrating its Globus II/III radar in the Vardøya Island located near the Russian border just a few kilometers from the home base of strategic submarines and 5 Aegis-equipped Fridtjof Nansen-class frigates. The radar construction is underway. The Vardøya radar can distinguish real warheads from dummies. Another radar located in Svalbard (the Arctic) can also be used by US military for missile defense purposes.

The country’s ground forces are stationed in Lithuania as part of a NATO multinational force under German command.

Sweden, a close NATO ally, has been upgrading its military with a sharp hike in spending. Last December, the Swedish government told municipal authorities to prepare civil defense infrastructure and procedures for a possible war. The move was prompted by the country’s return to the Cold War-era ‘Total Defense Strategy’. In September, 2016, 150 troops were put on permanent service on the island of Gotland to «defend it from Russia». Sweden maintained a permanent military garrison on Gotland for hundreds of years until 2005.The Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB) has ordered a review of 350 civilian bunkers on the island. The shelters are designed to protect people against the shock wave and radiation from a nuclear detonation, as well as chemical and biological weapons.

In March, Stockholm announced plans to reintroduce compulsory military service abandoned in 2010. The conscription will come into force on January 1, 2018.

Sweden said in June it wishes to join a British-led «Joint Expeditionary Force», making Swedish participation in a general European war all but inevitable.

This month, the Swedish military announced plans to conduct its largest joint military exercise with NATO in 20 years. Called Aurora 17, the training event is scheduled for September. The drills will take place across the entire country but focusing on the Mälardalen Valley, the areas around cities of Stockholm and Gothenberg and on the strategic island of Gotland. More than 19,000 Swedish troops will take part along with 1,435 soldiers from the US, 270 from Finland, 120 from France and between 40-60 each from Denmark, Norway, Lithuania and Estonia.

In June, Russian President Putin warned «If Sweden joins NATO this will affect our relations in a negative way because we will consider that the infrastructure of the military bloc now approaches us from the Swedish side».

In June, 2016, Finland took part in NATO BALTOPS naval exercise. It was the first time NATO forces trained on Finnish territory (The coastal area at Syndale). Back then, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told his Finnish counterpart, Timo Soini, that the Kremlin would take unspecified measures to respond to increased NATO activity in the Baltic region. According to Lavrov, «We do not hide our negative attitude to the movement of NATO"s military infrastructure towards our borders, to dragging new states into the military activity of the bloc».

All these facts and events summed together demonstrate that militarization of Scandinavia is progressing by leaps and bounds to undermine the security in Europe. No hue and cry is raised in the Russian media but the developments are closely watched by Moscow. Visiting Finland on July 27, President Putin said Russia was «keeping an eye on certain intensification in the movement of military aircraft, ships and troops. In order for us to avoid negative consequences, situations that no one wants, we need to maintain dialogue». He also stressed readiness for dialogue with neutral countries that border the Baltic Sea like Finland which is not part of the NATO military alliance.

The facts listed above show the situation is grave enough to top the agenda of the NATO-Russia Council. But it’s not the case as yet. Last year, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the current President of Germany who was Foreign Minister at the time, slammed NATO for «saber-rattling and war cries» and provocative military activities in the proximity of Russia’s borders. He called for an arms control deal between the West and Russia. Fifteen other members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) joined Steinmeier"s initiative: France, Italy, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Spain, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Sweden, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Portugal.

Actually, the initiative to relaunch the negotiation process does not belong to Germany. Russia’s proposal to discuss a new European security treaty was rejected by the West. The draft document was published in 2009. In March 2015, Russia expressed its readiness for negotiations concerning a new agreement regarding the control of conventional weapons in Europe.

Moscow has never rejected the idea of launching talks to address the problem. It does not reject it now. The NATO-Russia Council could make a contribution into launching discussions on the matter. It has not done so as yet. Actually, nothing is done to ease the tensions in Europe and the Scandinavian Peninsula in particular. Meanwhile, the situation is aggravating misunderstandings and whipping up tensions.

How Will The Empire End?

By Chris at www.CapitalistExploits.at

It was back in the early 1800"s that the Brits left the sodden, miserable shores of their murky island, grabbed their trumpets, tucked their trousers into the socks, and began conquering the world with the cunning use of flags.

 

Like all good conquerors, they had a backup plan in the event flags didn"t work - guns, which - as it turned out - work bloody well.

From about 1815 to 1915, our tea-drinking friends were so successful in this endeavour that the soggy little island in the North Atlantic had turned nearly a quarter of the globe red at its peak.

They were, of course, not the first to embark on empire building.

Ahead of them is a long list: the Babur Empire, lasting from the 17th to 18th century and spanning Europe and Asia. Then there was the "Golden Horde"... the Mongols, who at the height of their reign, incorporated over a quarter of the worlds land mass.

Let"s not forget Pax Romana. The empire lasted 500 years and at its height extended into Africa, Europe, and the Middle East and bullied about a quarter of the world"s population. All impressive in its own right.

The structure was a familiar one. Tried and tested. The state provides security (military) to ensure stability and enforcement of legal contracts. And while this cost a lot of money, in return the vassal states pay taxes to the empire.

As long as the taxes exceeded the costs of keeping the restless natives in check things were golden.

As we know this math didn"t last forever for any of the empires, including the Brits, who (under increasing costs and decreasing revenues) lost their shiny empire, put away their flags, trudged back to the pub to talk about the weather, and became plumbers.

During their conquering reign, however, they gifted large swathes of the rest of the world common law principles (used to this day) and lessons in how to be frightfully polite (not used to this day). In return, the rest of the world gifted them actual cuisine which is why today we don"t starve when visiting the soggy island. Without it, I assure you, the place would be completely empty of visitors.

What is fascinating is that the collapse of the British empire ushered in modern nation states as we know them today.

In 1960 the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Harold Macmillan, delivered a famous speech known as the "Wind of Change" where he discussed this:

“One of the constant facts of political life in Europe has been the emergence of independent nations… Especially since the end of war, the processes which gave birth to the nation-states of Europe have been repeated all over the world… 

 

Fifteen years ago this movement spread through Asia. Many countries there, of different races and civilization, pressed their claim to an independent national life. To-day the same thing is happening in Africa…

In different places it may take different forms, but it is happening everywhere. The wind of change is blowing through the continent… Whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact. We must all accept it as a fact.”

You may have noticed that all of the power structures mentioned above were centralised structures. Top down - like a pyramid, with the wealth accumulating at the top.

Even the emergence of individual nation states were and are really just "mini me"s" of an empire structure, which is to say centralised. This all made perfect sense in the industrial age where commandeering and controlling costly infrastructure was critical. Things such as railroads, canals, mines. Today, we live in a different world, which I"ll come to in a bit, but first...

Drawing Parallels With Today

Just as each empire has finally succumbed to the gravity of unprofitable ventures, today we have much of the developed world labouring under similar problems.

Europe, the poster child for socialism, has a structure whereby member states in the EU contribute to a centralised bureaucracy and receive a number of benefits in return. The problem is the math doesn"t work.

Across the ditch, our American friends have much the same issues. A top down structure, centralised... and ever increasingly so.

Today, however, the gravity forces at work are due to a setup where those in power will actually cause the demise of this structure. Let me show you how.

Today, the costs and losses of the empire (I"m using the term loosely here to include the nation states of the world but in particular the US and EU) are socialised. Like an insurance policy, the costs are distributed across society. The rewards are, however, privatised. They don"t accrue to the state... and this is very different from how the Romans or Genghis Khan ran things.

Lobby groups and big business push for policies and privileges that will benefit their chosen industry and/or business.

In turn, the state tilts the playing field in their favour. This comes at a cost, and that cost is a cost to the state, not the industry being favoured.

When enough of this happens... like now, for instance, then the finances get all wonky. What"s ironic is that the revolving door between Wall Street and the White House is parasitic on the state, which in turn is a parasite on the citizenry.

Parasites can be fed and maintained up until the point where they kill the host. The Cheneys, Gores, Bushes, and Clintons of this world don"t siphon funds directly from the treasury like our friend Mugabe and his ilk. They just do the same thing via companies and charities. It provides a cloak to true intentions... but the results are the same. A math problem which reaches breaking point.

This is a problem not just for the US and Europe. It"s a problem for the nation state structure, which is more buggered than an alter boy in the Vatican.

This is because the centralised structure of not only running a country but doing business at every level is being destroyed.

The vast majority of real wealth in the world today involves intellectual property, and in the information age... which is where we find ourselves living in today, this matters a great deal to centralised structures.

Consider that, for the first time in history, individual companies are worth more than the most modern large governments of the world. It is a consequence of an ongoing unstoppable trend towards decentralisation, and it promises to bring us an entirely different empire that will follow the existing one.

While it"s easy enough to see that the empire won"t last... what replaces it will, I believe, look distinctly different to yet another centralised nation state. This I"ll deal with in some other article, but one thing I"m confident in is that the distribution of wealth isn"t likely to change. Pareto"s principle is well defined and consistent. What changes are those at the top and those at the bottom. For today"s article, let"s ask the question of what... or how this empire succumbs.

Will the catalyst be the massive bond bubble breaking? And yes, boys and girls... it is a bubble.  

US 10-year, German Bund 10-year, UK Gilt 10-year

The philosopher Nietzsche noted: “In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, it is the rule.”

Or will it be some military fiasco?

Qatar, North Korea, Russia, South China Sea, Syria escalating and drawing in more participants.

Or something else?

Question

Cast your vote here and also see what others think awaits us

- Chris

"A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within." — Ariel Durant

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Container Ship Was On Autopilot When It Struck USS Fitzergerald

A deadly collision between the Philippine-registered container ship ACX Crystal and Navy destroyer USS Fitzgerald that left seven sailors dead earlier this week occurred while the ACX was on autopilot, according to a report in the Washington Free Beacon.

While investigators say they’ve found no evidence the collision was intentional, that the ship was relying on its computerized navigation system at the team of the collision means hackers could’ve infiltrated into the ship’s navigation system and steered it into the Navy ship – though the collision off the coast of Japan could’ve just as easily been caused by a malfunction, or human error if the system’s warning signals were ignored.

“The Philippines-flagged cargo ship ACX Crystal was under control of a computerized navigation system that was steering and guiding the container vessel, according to officials familiar with preliminary results of an ongoing Navy investigation.

Investigators so far found no evidence the collision was deliberate.

Nevertheless, an accident during computerized navigation raises the possibility the container ship"s computer system could have been hacked and the ship deliberately steered into the USS Fitzgerald, an Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer.”

The ship’s tracking data, particularly a part of the record showing how the ship reacted after the collision, is the most telling piece of evidence that it was on autopilot, sources told the Free Beacon that it’s clear the container ship was on autopilot.

Commercial ship autopilot systems normally require someone to input manually the course for the ship travel. The computer program then steers the ship by controlling the steering gear to turn the rudder.

The system also can be synchronized with an electronic chart system to allow the program to follow courses of a voyage plan.

Tracking data broadcast from the Crystal as part of the Automatic Identification System (AIS) shows the ship changed course by 90 degrees to the right and slightly reduced its speed between around 1:32 a.m. and 1:34 a.m. After that time, the data shows the ship turned to the left and resumed a northeastern coarse along its original track line.

Private naval analyst Steffan Watkins said the course data indicates the ship was running on autopilot. "The ACX Crystal powered out of the deviation it performed at 1:30, which was likely the impact with the USS Fitzgerald, pushing it off course while trying to free itself from being hung on the bow below the waterline," Watkins told the Free Beacon.

The ship then continued to sail on for another 15 minutes, increasing speed before eventually reducing speed and turning around. 

"This shows the autopilot was engaged because nobody would power out of an accident with another ship and keep sailing back on course. It’s unthinkable," he added.

Speaking at a news conference earlier this week, Vice Admiral Joseph Aucoin said the impact crushed berthing cabins below the waterline and ripped open a large hole in the vessel. Bodies of the missing sailors were found in the berthing cabins. Aucoin declined to say how many of the seven missing sailors had been recovered, but Japanese media said all had died.

Commander, US 7th Fleet, Vice Adm. Joseph Aucoin, answers questions about #USSFitzgerald Full video available here https://t.co/14zqjOWfJZ pic.twitter.com/FMwputRfVJ

— DVIDSHub (@DVIDSHub) June 18, 2017

The damage to the ship was significant, Aucoin said.

“There was a big gash under the water," Aucoin said at Yokosuka naval base, home of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, the docked Fitzgerald behind him. "A significant portion of the crew was sleeping" when the destroyer collided with the Philippine-flagged container ship, destroying the commander"s cabin, he said.

The Fitzgerald is salvageable, he said, but repairs will likely take months. "Hopefully less than a year. You will see the USS Fitzgerald back," Aucoin said.

The rarity of such crashes has also raised questions about what caused the collision, and who might be at fault.

As the WSJ notes, collisions at sea involving Navy ships are extremely uncommon, according to Bryan McGrath, a former destroyer captain, who said they occur only once or twice a decade, if that. He said he couldn’t remember a recent collision that was this consequential.

“There are 275 ships in the Navy and 100 are under way all over the world,” navigating “millions and millions of miles” every year, said Mr. McGrath, who retired in 2008 and is now a consultant. “This is very, very rare.

US naval history includes a few notable accidents. In 2005, the USS San Francisco, a Los Angeles-class submarine, hit a seamount or underwater mountain, injuring dozens of crew. In 2001, the USS Greeneville, another Los Angeles-class sub, performed an emergency ballast blow for special visitors aboard the vessel, surfacing quickly and hitting a Japanese fishing ship on the surface near Hawaii, killing nine crew members of the Japanese vessel.

In one of the Navy’s worst incidents, the aircraft carrier Wasp in April 1952 collided with the destroyer Hobson in the North Atlantic, killing 176 men.

Mr. McGrath declined to speculate as to what occurred or who or what might be to blame in the Fitzgerald incident. The collision occurred in darkness in a high-traffic area of the Pacific, he said. The most concerning aspect of the collision, from the destroyer’s point of view, is the damage to the Fitzgerald’s starboard side below the waterline, resulting from the container ship’s construction and the way its bow hit, he said.

the Fitzgerald collided with the merchant vessel, which was more than three times its size, some 56 nautical miles southwest of Yokosuka early on Saturday. Three people were evacuated to the U.S. Naval Hospital in Yokosuka after the collision, including the ship"s commanding officer, Bryce Benson, who was reported to be in stable condition. According to Reuters, Benson took command of the Fitzgerald on May 13. He had previously commanded a minesweeper based in Sasebo in western Japan.

The Fitzgerald limped into port on Saturday evening, listing around 5 degrees, a U.S. Navy spokesman in Yokosuka said. The flooding was in two berthing compartments, the radio room and auxiliary machine room, he said. There were 285 crew onboard.

Doug Casey Warns, The EU's Collapse Is Now "Imminent"

Authored by Nick Giambruno via InternationalMan.com,

On April 23, French voters could drive the entire European Union into its grave.

Doug Casey and I recently discussed this historic election—and why it matters to US investors.

Nick Giambruno: Doug, you predicted the fall of the European Union a few years ago. What has changed since then?

Doug Casey: Well, what"s changed is that the entire situation has gotten much worse. The inevitable has now become the imminent.

The European Union evolved, devolved actually, from basically a free trade pact among a few countries to a giant, dysfunctional, overreaching bureaucracy. Free trade is an excellent idea. However, you don"t need to legislate free trade; that’s almost a contradiction in terms. A free trade pact between different governments is unnecessary for free trade. An individual country interested in prosperity and freedom only needs to eliminate all import and export duties, and all import and export quotas. When a country has duties or quotas, it’s essentially putting itself under embargo, shooting its economy in the foot. Businesses should trade with whomever they want for their own advantage.

But that wasn"t the way the Europeans did it. The Eurocrats, instead, created a treaty the size of a New York telephone book, regulating everything. This is the problem with the European Union. They say it is about free trade, but really it’s about somebody’s arbitrary idea of “fair trade,” which amounts to regulating everything. In addition to its disastrous economic consequences, it creates misunderstandings and confusion in the mind of the average person. Brussels has become another layer of bureaucracy on top of all the national layers and local layers for the average European to deal with.

The European Union in Brussels is composed of a class of bureaucrats that are extremely well paid, have tremendous benefits, and have their own self-referencing little culture. They’re exactly the same kind of people that live within the Washington, D.C. beltway.

The EU was built upon a foundation of sand, doomed to failure from the very start. The idea was ill-fated because the Swedes and the Sicilians are as different from each other as the Poles and the Irish. There are linguistic, religious, and cultural differences, and big differences in the standard of living. Artificial political constructs never last. The EU is great for the “elites” in Brussels; not so much for the average citizen.

Meanwhile, there’s a centrifugal force even within these European countries. In Spain, the Basques and the Catalans want to split off, and in the UK, the Scots want to make the United Kingdom quite a bit less united. You"ve got to remember that before Garibaldi, Italy was scores of little dukedoms and principalities that all spoke their own variations of the Italian language. And the same was true in what’s now Germany before Bismarck in 1871.

In Italy 89% of the Venetians voted to separate a couple of years ago. The Italian South Tyrol region, where 70% of the people speak German, has a strong independence movement. There are movements in Corsica and a half dozen other departments in France. Even in Belgium, the home of the EU, the chances are excellent that Flanders will separate at some point.

The chances are better in the future that the remaining countries in Europe are going to fall apart as opposed to being compressed together artificially.

And from strictly a philosophical point of view, the ideal should not be one world government, which the “elite” would prefer, but about seven billion small individual governments. That would be much better from the point of view of freedom and prosperity.

Nick Giambruno: How does Brexit affect the future of the European Union?

Doug Casey: Well, it"s the beginning of the end. The inevitable has now become the imminent. Britain has always been perhaps the most different culture of all of those in the European Union. They entered reluctantly and late, and never seriously considered losing the pound for the euro.

You"re going to see other countries leaving the EU. The next one might be Italy. All of the Italian banks are truly and totally bankrupt at this point. Who"s going to kiss that and make it better? Is the rest of the European Union going to contribute hundreds of billions of dollars to make the average Italian depositor well again? I don"t think so. There"s an excellent chance that Italy is going to get rid of the euro and leave the EU.

If Marine Le Pen wins the elections, France will leave as well. That would be a smart move. She would also want to deport the migrants from Africa that are living in tent camps and cardboard boxes everywhere. Another good move. These people aren’t self-supporting, and are acting to destroy what’s left of French culture. Then again, Le Pen herself is no prize. She wants to continue the welfare state, and increase regulations and taxes. The French have zero good alternatives, at least if you care about either free minds or free markets. But that’s true everywhere in Europe. The very concept of liberty is dead in Europe.

Nick Giambruno: Why should Americans care about this?

Doug Casey: Well, just as the breakup of the Soviet Union had a good effect for both the world at large and for Americans, the breakup of the EU should be viewed in the same light. Freeing an economy anywhere increases prosperity and opportunity everywhere. And it sets a good example. So Americans ought to look forward to the breakup of the EU almost as much as the Europeans themselves. Unfortunately, most Americans are quite insular. And Europeans are so used to socialism that they have even less grasp of economics than Americans. But it’s going to happen anyway.

Nick Giambruno: What are the investment implications?

Doug Casey: Initially there"s going to be some chaos, and some inconvenience. Conventional investors don’t like wild markets, but turbulence is actually a good thing from the point of view of a speculator. It’s a question of your psychological attitude. Understanding psychology is as important as economics. They’re the two things that make the markets what they are. Volatility is actually your friend in the investment world.

People are naturally afraid of upsets. They"re afraid of any kind of crisis. This is natural. But it"s only during a crisis that you can get a real bargain. You have to look at the bright side and take a different attitude than most people have.

Nick Giambruno: If you position yourself on the right side of this thing, do you think you can profit from the collapse of the EU?

Doug Casey: Yes. Once the EU falls apart, there are going to be huge investment opportunities. People forget how cheap markets can become. I remember in the mid-1980s, there were three markets in the world in particular I was very interested in: Hong Kong, Belgium, and Spain. All three of those markets had similar characteristics. You could buy stocks in those markets for about half of book value, about three or four times earnings, and average dividend yields of their indices were 12–15%—individual stocks were sometimes much more—and of course since then, those dividends have gone way up. The stock prices have soared.

So I expect that that"s going to happen in the future. In one, several, many, or most of the world’s approximately 40 investable markets. Right now, however, we"re involved in a worldwide bubble in equities. It can go the opposite direction. People forget how cheap stocks can get.

I think we"re headed into very bad times. Chances are excellent you"re going to see tremendous bargains. People are chasing after stocks right now with 1% dividend yields and 30 times earnings, and they want to buy them. At some point in the future these stocks are going to be selling for three times earnings and they’re going to be yielding 5, maybe 10% in dividends. But at that point most people will be afraid to buy them. In fact, they won"t even want to know they exist at that point.

I’m not a believer in market timing. But, that said, I think it makes sense to hold fire when the market is anomalously high.

The chaos that’s building up right now in Europe can be a good thing—if you"re well positioned. You don"t want to go down with the sinking Titanic. You want to survive so you can get on the next boat taking you to a tropical paradise. But right now you"re entering the stormy North Atlantic.

*  *  *

There’s more turmoil ahead as French voters decide the EU’s fate on April 23—and it could be catastrophic for global currency and stock markets. We expect the fallout to be far worse than 2008. Most investors can’t handle that sort of chaos. But Doug Casey and his team know how to turn it into huge profits. They’re sharing need-to-know information about the coming global economic meltdown in this time-sensitive video. Click here to watch it now.

The Useful And The Useless

Authored by Robert Gore via Straight Line Logic blog,

The battle lines are forming.

You’re standing on the prow of an ocean liner cutting through the icy waters of the North Atlantic. A huge iceberg looms dead ahead. You’ve seen it for some time, but now it’s too close, and the liner too big and fast, to avoid the collision. You quietly make your way to the lifeboats, knowing they’re the only chance for saving yourself and your loved ones. Below decks, an orchestra plays a waltz and oblivious revelers dance.

Most people don’t foresee the world’s inevitable collision with the iceberg of unsustainable fantasy. When it happens, they’ll respond predictably, with panic and cowardice. Those who’ve seen it coming and moved to the lifeboats will experience their own roiling emotions, attenuated by recognition of the logic behind the disaster. While the forewarned have dreaded impact, many will also welcome it, in the way one welcomes an unpleasant medical procedure: let’s get it over with. The motive is not malice, but conviction born of experience that actions have consequences and there’s no escaping them. After seemingly inexplicable and interminable delay, consequences shall arrive, amplified by the tawdry stratagems that promoted delay.

It will come as a surprise to many, but governments cannot suspend reality. Their arsenal, when things break down, comes down to their arsenal: the capacity to coerce. Violence or its threat enables governments to exact compliance. Proponents of government power invariably see themselves exercising it. Once the ship hits the iceberg, it will be obvious that governments’ guns are not wands, freeing citizens from the necessity of producing as much or more than they consume. They cannot compel innovators to innovate or producers to produce. While coercive power comes from one end of a gun, none of the powers that produce progress (and the gun) magically materialize at the other end.

It is said that America is a society divided. True enough, but the important question is: along what lines? Crisis and social breakdown will provide clarification: it’s governments and their beneficiaries versus producers. In other words, those who don’t do useful things versus those who do.

Huge shifts in social mood and direction are presaged. President Trump’s election presages the coming division. Among the analyses of the election, few noted an obvious dividing line. Trump’s supporters by and large do useful things, or are angry because they’re prevented from doing useful things. They build, engineer, manufacture, plant, grow, operate, maintain, repair, transport, and sell the things we find useful or essential. When we ram the iceberg, their skills, brains, and adaptability will be sorely needed.

Politicians and bureaucrats and the millions dependent on them for their fake jobs, income, food, shelter, transportation, and medical care will find little demand for their skills, such as they are. The useful may well conclude that keeping them alive is more trouble than it’s worth. There will be those who are too young, old, or infirm to produce, but whom the useful will support out of friendship or kinship. However, it would be surprising if they felt anything but contempt for the faceless hordes demanding that someone, anyone, take care of them.

Take away the undeserved from the undeserving and you get a tantrum. Steal the earned from those who earned it and you get righteous rage. One’s a firecracker, the other a volcano. The game has been to impress upon the useful a moral obligation to support the useless, but the volcano’s about to blow, burying that obscene morality in lava and ash. Given the staggering levels of accumulated debt and promises, the useful know their talents, skills, hard work, productivity and futures have been mortgaged for the useless. This is the salient and intractable social division. No reconciliation is possible between the useful and those who believe themselves entitled to their enslavement. The Trump fissure will become a yawning chasm when the Good Ship Profligate Government collides with the iceberg.

Centralization serves the needs of government and its dependents. Honest production and exchange require little government, perhaps none at all. Those who believe current arrangements should persist have to believe that the useful who support those arrangements will provide more and more while receiving less and less. The implicit premise has to be that when it all finally breaks down, the useful can be brutally subjugated—but kept producing—while receiving nothing more than their subsistence. Slavery cannot support the police state necessary to impose it, much less a modern economy. Those who believe any outcomes other than destruction and death are possible are delusional. If those are the outcomes they anticipate and desire, they’re homicidally and suicidally psychopathic.

Governments will have their surveillance apparatuses, police, militaries, prisons, torture chambers, concentration camps, killing fields, and the like. The useful will have their minds. Totalitarian accounting is daunting. All that money going out for suppression, so little coming in from a populace whose best and brightest have been imprisoned or murdered, or who produce the minimum necessary to survive. The day comes when the policeman, soldiers, and guards can’t be paid with anything of value and all hell breaks loose. Or, less colloquially, centralization gives way to decentralization.

To what depths governments will descend and how long they will survive as agents of repression is unknowable, but their dissolution is foreordained. They cannot commandeer the resources necessary to sustain the current level of tyranny. The useful will vote with their feet and if that’s not possible, bullets will be their ballots. They will establish enclaves and protect themselves from the tantrums, chaos, and depredations of the useless. (Useful in such a context may require nothing more than a willingness to work hard.) The useless depend on the useful, who of course don’t need them at all. The useful will eventually triumph, if the species survives (not a sure thing). Tragically, the butcher’s bill is likely to be exorbitant.