JACK MELKONIAN: IT TOOK 78 YEARS TO BUILD UP MEI AND IT’S BEING DESTROYED WITHIN
NICOSIA, November 10 (Noyan Tapan). The great-great nephew of the two
founders of the Melkonian Educational Institute (MEI) is in Cyprus
to join the fight to save the 78-year old school founded by members
of his family, the Cyprus Mail reported.
MEI is under threat of closure from June 2005, after the Armenian
General Benevolent Union (AGBU) decided the loss-making school should
close finally.
The move has prompted outrage amongst the Armenian community in
Cyprus and abroad, which suspects financial motives on the part
of the AGBU as the MEI is sitting on an estimated million worth of
commercial property.
Swiss-based businessman Jack Melkonian has decided to join in the
legal battle to save the school and questions the motives of the AGBU.
“I am very concerned about what is happening because this was a
donation made by our family. It was a long time ago – three generations
back – but nevertheless as a family we are concerned because there
have been a lot of rumours. I have come here to see with my own eyes
to see what is happening,” he told the Cyprus Mail in an interview
on November 9.
It was his great-great uncle Garabed, who died in Cyprus in 1934 who
made the donation that allows the school to exist. Melkonian said his
family has a copy of a deed which clearly states that a trust should be
set up, the proceeds of which were to keep the school going. “There
is no mention in that deed that the school should not exist. In
fact my great-great uncle was rather concerned that the school stay
open. The amount donated at that time corresponded to the budget of
Luxembourg. It was a very large amount of money so if it had been set
up as a trust, the interest should have covered the expenses of the
school,” he said. “It also says clearly that if for any reason the
AGBU cannot take care of the school or that the AGBU closes down,
that this fund should be transferred to another institution that
could take care of the school which in my opinion clearly says that
the continuity of this school was very much an issue”.
Melkonian said he has approached the AGBU on several occasions and
written to each member of the board individually. He said he was told
that they possess another document, which cancels out the wishes of
Garabed Melkonian. It’s a document, he said, nobody else seems to
have seen. He has asked for a copy of the document before travelling
to New York at the invitation of the AGBU, but so far it has not been
forthcoming, he said.
“I have nothing against the AGBU as an organisation, it is
wonderful. We have great esteem for it but we are more concerned
about the people who are running the AGBU at the moment who have
taken this decision.”
Melkonian said his family was puzzled over the trust fund that was
designed to support the school. “Even if the money has been exhausted,
the school and the land are still here and there are a number of
members of the Armenian community that are willing to support the
school to set up a new fund. There is also an income from the business
centre on the land. The revenue of that centre is almost half the
running costs of the school.
“That money seems to flow to the States and we don’t really know what
they are doing with it. They are claiming the maintenance of the school
costs them .2 million of which already half should be covered from
this. There is still .5 million from what was donated originally so
we think there is no need to close this school for financial reasons,”
he added.
Melkonian said the AGBU seemed to have forgotten that although it is
supposed to be a financial organisation, it is also supposed to have
a human side and questioned how such a far-reaching decision as the
closure of the MEI could have been taken by a mere handful of people.
“The Melkonian is a monument to 20th century Armenian history. It
took 78 years to build it up and it’s being destroyed within one year,
which is a great mistake. With a little work the school can be saved.”

Abandoned Armenia faces extinction
By Jeremy Page
One in three has left the impoverished state of Armenia since it gained
independence and the young are leading the rush
The Times/UK
November 13, 2004
SVETLANA SIMONYAN wants her children to come home. Her daughter,
Narine, was the first to leave Armenia, moving to Russia with her
husband in 1998. Artur, her eldest son, headed for Volgograd in
2000. His brother, Armen, followed in 2002 â~@~T the last of the
Simonyan children to join a decade-long exodus that has made Armenia
one of the worldâ~@~Ys fastest disappearing nations.
â~@~They couldnâ~@~Yt find work. They just couldnâ~@~Yt afford to
live here,â~@~] said Mrs Simonyan, wholives with her disabled husband
in the village of Sasunik, a former state grape farm an hourâ~@~Ys
drive from Yerevan.
She does not blame her children. They were just three of an estimated
one million people â~@~T a third of the population â~@~T who have left
Armenia since it gained independence from the crumbling Soviet Union.
But she, like many Armenians, worries that the relentless outflow
threatens the existence of the state that her people struggled for
so long to create.
â~@~If there are no systemic changes in Armenia, we could face a
catastrophe,â~@~] says Vardan Gevorgyan, a sociologist. â~@~We will
not disappear as an ethnic or cultural group in the world, but we
will cease to be an effective republic.â~@~]
Already more Armenians, four million, live outside the country than
inside after successive waves of emigration going back centuries. They
send back more than $1 billion a year â~@~T nearly double the
Governmentâ~@~Ys entire budget.
The extent of the demographic crisis, however, depends on which
statistics you believe. And that depends on your politics. This
year, the results of a 2001 census recorded a population of 3.2
million. â~@~Iâ~@~Yd like to take those numbers at face value,â~@~]
says Vartan Oksanyan, the Foreign Minister. â~@~Emigration numbers
have dwindled. The economy is doing better. There are more jobs.â~@~]
But opposition politicians and many sociologists put the real
population as low as 2 million. They say that the discrepancy is
due to the number of emigrants still registered as Armenian citizens
because they are living illegally abroad.
The village of Sasunik is a perfect example. Hajkaz Gulanyan, head
of the local government, says that its official population is 3,300,
but in reality it is just 2,400. Over the past five years a quarter
have left â~@~T some to Germany and the Netherlands but most to Russia,
which Armenians can enter without visas.
â~@~It may sound a little harsh, but it seems we are a nation
of emigrants,â~@~] he says over coffee in his dilapidated
headquarters. â~@~Personally, I donâ~@~Yt think you should live
just where you can find work and food to eat. You should stay in
your homeland.â~@~]
The exodus is especially painful for Armenians because of their long
history of suffering.
In the past century alone, between 500,000 and 1.5 million Armenians
were killed by the Turks and up to 200,000 Armenians died in the Soviet
Army in the Second World War. Tens of thousands more were killed in
the war with Azerbaijan in the early 1990s. Also, an earthquake in
1988 claimed more than 25,000 lives.
Most of todayâ~@~Ys émigrés are young, male and educated, the ones
the country needs to survive. The result is a vicious demographic cycle
â~@~T fewer marriages, a lower birth rate and an ageing population
which exacerbate the poverty that drives people away. Roughly 56
per cent of the population are female, compared with 51 per cent in
1979. Half the population lives on pensions and government handouts.
â~@~Our most important resources are our human resources, and today
we are losing them,â~@~] says Hranush Kharatyan, the Governmentâ~@~Ys
adviser on demography. â~@~If nothing changes, we expect a disaster
in the next 40 to 50 years.â~@~]
She says that the only solution is to eradicate government corruption.
â~@~Young people must be free to develop businesses, to become
government officials and to know that if there is a trial, it will be
fair,â~@~] she says. Only then will emigrants start to return for good.
There are examples of successful â~@~repatriatesâ~@~], such as the
Foreign Minister who left America in 1992 with a masterâ~@~Ys degree in
international law and diplomacy. â~@~There was an inner force within
me to return to Armenia, to be here in historic times. I wanted to
be present at its creation,â~@~] he says. Two years later, his wife
and two children joined him. â~@~Weâ~@~Yre here to stay,â~@~] he says.
But for the moment, that is the luxury of successful émigrés. Back
in Sasunik, Mrs Simonyan has a visitor. Hamlet, her husbandâ~@~Ys
nephew, has taken a holiday from his job in Moscow to see his wife
and children, who stayed behind.
He would like to come back, he says. It is tough living in Moscow,
where Caucasians are often abused by police. But it is still better
than Sasunik, where people scrape by on $500 a year from growing
grapes. He can earn four times that in Moscow. â~@~What can I
do?â~@~] says Hamlet as he plays with his children in a house with no
electricity, no gas, and running water for only an hour a day. â~@~
Itâ~@~Ys Armeniansâ~@~Y destiny to live outside their homeland.â~@~]
–Boundary_(ID_RWdBu21CfpNzTHfPxlL7nA)–

Armenian rep in Azerbaijan “to lay foundation” for energy cooperation
Space TV, Baku
13 Nov 04
[Presenter] Armenia has already approached Azerbaijan to cooperate
in the energy sector, Levon Vartanyan, chief of department at the
Armenian Energy Ministry, has said in Baku.
[Correspondent, over Vartanyan’s video] Levon Vartanyan has said
that Armenia is always ready for cooperation with Azerbaijan in the
energy sector and this issue is being debated at the government level
in Armenia.
[Vartanyan, shown speaking in Russian with Azeri voice-over] At present
we are ready [for cooperation]. We know that the Naxcivan Autonomous
Republic has certain problems with the supply of electricity. We are
ready for cooperation with the Azerbaijani Republic on this issue. We
would like the restoration of relations that had once existed.
[Correspondent] A quote from Vartanyan: The current political situation
between our countries is unstable. However, this situation may change
at any moment. Therefore, power engineers should maintain cooperation,
whereas politicians should tackle problems, Levon Vartanyan said. Asked
about the proposals in his portfolio, Vartanyan said that he was in
Baku to lay the foundation for future cooperation. Let us first lay
the foundation for cooperation and then discuss specific proposals,
he said.
The Armenian representative said that they would like to supply
Naxcivan with Armenian electricity on a barter basis, on the basis
of contracts for the sale and purchase.
Sulhiya Sirinova, Fuad Atakisiyev for Space.

Dutch Arrest Alleged Kurdish Rebels
By TOBY STERLING
AP Online
Nov 13, 2004
A nationwide anti-terrorism operation netted 38 suspected members of
a Kurdish rebel group Friday, including “militant trainees” being
prepared at a rural campground for fighting in Turkey and Armenia,
officials said.
The detainees are all alleged members of the former Kurdistan Workers’
Party, or PKK, a rebel group which now calls itself KONGRA-GEL and is
branded as terrorist by the United States and the European Union. The
group seeks to carve out an independent Kurdish state in the mountains
of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey.
More than 200 police were involved in the second major operation
in the Netherlands in a week, after special forces used tear
gas to end a standoff with alleged Islamic radicals in The Hague
Wednesday. Prosecutors said the two operations were unrelated.
Nine arrests were made Friday in raids in The Hague, Rotterdam,
Eindhoven, Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport, and the town of Capelle aan
den Ijssel.
Most of the arrests came in a sweep of an alleged paramilitary training
camp near Boxtel. Police seized night vision goggles, packages of
clothing intended to be sent abroad, instruction materials, passports
and identity cards, prosecutors said.
“More than 20 people were being trained for armed conflict
… including terrorist attacks” a statement by prosecutors
said. “Trainees were taught special war tactics.”
There were also indications that “a number of the trainees were
destined for Armenia,” it said.
Other detainees allegedly arranged money transfers, passports and
passed along information to PKK members in Turkey and Armenia,
prosecutors said.
The detainees, whose names were not released, included 33 men and
five women.
Prosecution spokesman Wim de Bruin said the group had been under
observation for several months and that “the course was nearly
finished.”
“We wanted to prevent the group from leaving the country and putting
to use the knowledge they had gained,” he said.
Boxtel’s mayor, Jan van Homelen, said the suspects were PKK members.
The PKK, which recently renamed itself KONGRA-GEL, ended a five-year
unilateral cease-fire in June and has carried out a number of attacks
recently, most in Turkey’s predominantly Kurdish southeast.
It has been on Europe’s list of terrorist organizations since
April. Dutch prosecutors said those arrested Friday will likely be
charged as members.
“Apparently there’s been a training center there for a long time,
and that’s why it was decided to step in,” Van Homelen said on
national television.
Van Homelen said as far as he knew, the suspects did not use weapons or
explosives in their training, which he described as “more theoretical.”
Prosecutors said the suspects said they were Kurdish but were
considered Turkish nationals by the Dutch state.
On Monday, The Hague’s district court blocked the extradition of
alleged PKK leader Nuriye Kesbir to Turkey for her suspected role
in a series of bombings in the 1990s. The Justice Ministry said it
would appeal the decision.

Cairo ‘Barely’ Held Arafat’s Ceremony
Zaman
11.13.2004 Saturday
Due to a lack of organization, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s funeral
ceremony ended as fiasco in Cairo yesterday.
A Finnish Representative, an Arab Foreign Minister and top levels of
a Turkish delegation including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul and opposition Republican People’s Party
(CHP) leader Deniz Baykal as well as Organization of Islamic Conference
(OCI) Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Islamoglu had trouble entering the
tent set up for the ceremony. After a hustle, the dignitaries were
finally let in. Delegates from Germany, Malaysia and Armenia missed
the ceremony altogether due to heavy airport traffic.
Slovak Foreign Minister Eduard Kukan, who was visiting Turkey, was also
included in the Turkish delegation to Cairo. The Palestinian Ambassador
to Ankara, Fuat Yasin, also missed the funeral ceremony. Yasin
expressed his sorrow saying, “This is a big scandal. This is such a
bitter thing.”
While Turkish top levels were lucky ones to gain entrance to the
ceremony, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fisher missed the ceremony,
as his plane was kept waiting in the air for an hour. Similarly,
Armenian delegation also missed the ceremony due to airport traffic.
The Finnish Representative, meanwhile, was not permitted to enter
the ceremony since he “did not have an identity tag”.
When the Egyptian protocol, caught unprepared by the funeral, forgot
accreditiation, protocol officials of guest delegations and their
chief bodyguards were not let into the ceremony. World leaders in
the procession who had followed Arafat’s casket for nearly 400 meters
were surprised when they were told, “the ceremony is over here.” Some
leaders waited in the cars while others chatted in groups.
11.13.2004 Cumali Onal Cairo

Former Burbank truck driver arrested
San Francisco Chronicle, CA
Nov 13 2004
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A former Burbank truck driver was arrested in
Armenia and returned to Southern California four years after a vicious
freeway road-rage killing in Universal City.
Shahen Keshishian, 32, one of the FBI’s most-wanted, was arrested this
week by Armenian authorities at his apartment in Yerevan, authorities
said Thursday. FBI agents and Glendale police in Armenia on unrelated
business located Keshishian.
Armenian authorities made the arrest, for overstaying his visa,
and Keshishian was immediately handed over to U.S. authorities.
“I am just so elated,” police homicide Detective Martin Pinner said
after returning Wednesday with Keshishian. “This arrest, I do believe,
came as a result of policemen talking to policemen, and massive
cooperation with other agencies in two different countries.”
The FBI said the arrest was a warning to criminals who have fled
the country.
“This arrest should send the message to individuals who flee to Armenia
and other countries that it’s not a safe haven,” FBI spokeswoman
Laura Eimiller said.
Keshishian was charged with murder for allegedly running down freelance
film editor Michael Craven, 44, of suburban Canoga Park with a black
Chevrolet Suburban on April 29, 2000. The killing came after a road
rage confrontation along the Hollywood Freeway.
Craven had been driving on the freeway after dinner with a friend
when the Suburban pulled up and eggs were thrown. One of the drivers
had apparently cut in front of the other.
Authorities say Craven pulled to the side of the freeway just south
of Barham Boulevard to confront the suspect, and the Suburban driver
stopped behind him. A passenger in the Suburban then threw a beer
bottle at Craven’s Jeep.
Craven was then run over.

DefenceTalk.com
Nov 13 2004
Defence & Strategic
The Division of the Balkans and the Black Sea Region
Willard Payne
Nov 12, 2004, 15:45 |
An Invitation to Invasion
With the decision, led by the Organization of Security and
Cooperation in Europe, headquartered in Vienna, to recognize the
division of Yugoslavia and the newly independent states and the
creation of Moldova with the break-up of the Soviet Union, all done
in the name of the “New World Order”, it set in motion a chain
reaction which will lead to further instability and conflict beyond
what the world has seen already. One of the few dissenting voices was
that of the then US Secretary of State James Baker, who stated
publicly in 1991, that he refused to recognize the independence of
Slovenia, “under any circumstances”. There was also the Belgian who
was Secretary- General of NATO in 1990 I believe his name was Willy
Claes, who mentioned that the threat to the West and to international
security was Islam. Within a year he was removed by a scandal never
to be mentioned again, as if he never existed. I always suspected it
was arranged by those in the OSCE who wanted the staged crisis in the
Balkans as a showcase for the New World Order which I assume they
thought could be solved by a diplomatic show, something Vienna loves
to orchestrate. And there was a British expert who observed, with the
willful division of Czechoslovakia, that Eastern and Central Europe
are in danger of descending into tribalism. There is no greater abyss
to march into.
There was another interested party in these proceedings, Islam. In
the first half of the 1990’s, the initial phase of the Balkan front,
during one of the winters when there was a pause in the fighting due
to the weather, an article mentioned Serbia having the best weapon
contacts in the region. This is the factor Vienna failed to take into
consideration, being so caught up in the illusion of their grand
design. The impact of weapon dealers and outside influences and in
this instance representing a region which also has long festering
disputes with the West and would immediately realize the convenience
of using the Balkans and Black Sea region to keep the West busy which
in turn would reduce the West’s military presence in the
Mediterranean not to mention Central Asia, the main front. An article
stated Serbia was receiving weapon support from Libya. Iran also
evinced an interest by establishing formal relations with Croatia in
1992 and announcing since then that Croatia was their entry into
Central Europe. Some in the West realized the hidden meaning. Germany
has since sent to Poland Leopard tanks and the US helped Poland to
upgrade her air force. Iran has also established a very busy embassy
in downtown Sarajevo, which puts them in an extremely strategic
position to monitor and assist the Islamic fighters, who have arrived
there to do more than just help Bosnia and to assist in coordinating
the Islamic war effort with nationalistic forces. A few months ago
Iran’s, extremely eager Defense Minister Adm. Ali Shamkani paid a
call on Warsaw most likely to look over Poland’s new equipment. His
visit is an indication Iran views everything from Macedonia to
Moldova and beyond as up for grabs and that a lot of groups,
nationalists, are readily available, from any religious ritual, to
express their hatred not only of Vienna but also those who support
Vienna. This may partly explain Iran and Saudi Arabia’s reason for
using Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups in their current threats
against Rome.
Unfortunately Europe has a long Imperial history of promoting wars in
the Balkans to use as a military playground, a display of
international prominence. This has kept the entire region in a cross
fire of conflicting spheres of influence and now is showing signs of
alienating the people the OSCE attempted to impress and manipulate.
When NATO decided to use Pres. Slobodan Milosevic once again, as they
did in 1994, when Milosevic’s support of the Bosnian Serbs helped
justify the NATO bombing campaign that year, the year I believe World
War III began, NATO marched further into the abyss with the bombing
of Serbia/Kosovo in 1999. NATO simply ignored the UN which gave a
further indication this was not the same organization that was
established 50 years previously to convince nations in and around the
north Atlantic to no longer go to war with each other, as Europe had
been doing for the 1,000 years since the death of Charlemagne.
The bombing alienated Greece, which for centuries had close relations
with Serbia since the two follow the same Orthodox ritual. There is
also regional identity, which may explain why a year or two later,
Greece and Turkey conducted a joint peace mission to the Middle East.
It was now Southeastern Europe as opposed to the rest of Europe
welcoming the invitation from Islam under Persian direction.
It was either late in 2000 or early 2001when the news mention Turkey
and Iran were comparing intelligence information but the announcement
did not say about where. During February a six-month ethnic Albanian
rebellion began and nearly defeated the Macedonian government. It was
admitted in the news the Macedonian military was little more than
well-armed policemen who were no stranger to corrupt privileges. The
head of state was actually on the phone, in a panic, to the head of
the European Union. During the fighting, the former British
negotiator Lord David Owen stated publicly NATO should leave the
region. What was so significant about his statement is that he used
to be one of Britain’s lead negotiators in the early 1990’s during
the first part of the Balkan crisis and now he seemed to realize the
trap NATO and the West had fallen into. The US dispatched its new
National Security Advisor Dr. Condoleezza Rice to the Ukraine on a
non-agenda crisis trip because the Ukraine was eager to arm Skopje
with virtually anything, which could have widened the conflict.
Articles admitted Ukraine was actually controlled by a weapons mafia.
Though mountainous and poor, with only two million people and an
average monthly salary of $155.00 per person, Macedonia sits astride
a strategic crossroads on the Balkans peninsula encompassed by
neighbors on all sides who ruled it in the past or coveted its
territory. Throughout its history it was occupied by Greeks, Romans,
Bulgarians, Byzantines, Serbs and Islamic Ottoman Turks, who ruled
for 500 years, but never eradicated Christianity. Its disintegration
along the ethnic fault lines, that are only to clear on the map
today, could trigger a new carve-up of the Balkans, propelling the
one-third Albanian majority towards union with Albania to the west or
Kosovo to the north.
The Macedonia majority, a family of southern Slavs, would be tempted
to seek shelter for their abbreviated state in the protection of
Serbia or Bulgaria, larger societies whose language and religion they
share. As “domino” theory predicts, the ethnic Albanian majority of
Kosovo and reluctant Serbs in Bosnia would see any failure to knit
together a multi-ethnic society in Macedonia as justification to
seize their own destinies back from the hands of Western powers.
Such a chain reaction, the European fears, would mean a reversion to
the Balkan cauldron of the early 20th century, an unstable
nationalist jigsaw of disputed borders and latent conflict, a recipe
for seething anarchy requiring permanent supervision. Preserving
territorial integrity has been the foundation of Western foreign
policy since Yugoslavia began its violent breakup in 1991, but a
policy often in retreat. This is why Iran and Turkey decided to help
the West find reasons to remain committed because it is a drain on
military resources.
When Macedonia declared independence its choice of name so angered
EU-member Greece, whose northern province carries the same ancient
label, European recognition, was held up for three years. A Greek
blockade of petroleum and other supplies showed how easy it was to
bring the dependent, landlocked country to its knees. Recent violence
and demonstrations have shown that the issue of stability is far from
settled and no one stands to benefit more from further instability
than Iran and the Jihad.
Moldova, formed in 1992, with the collapse of the Soviet Union into
15 nations, Moldova was part of the second group of Soviet successor
states. It comprised the nine that formed part of non-NATO Europe.
This also included four Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS),
Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova. Do not be ashamed to be
confused, they are in a constant state of flux and they are by no
means by themselves though I suspect that is what they preferred.
Individual international recognition controlling what was left of the
state economy and a thriving undeclared underground black economy.
This is basically what virtually every nation that has surfaced after
the Soviet Union became and in Moldova’s case history Russia had to
establish regional peacekeeping forces, the 14th Army under Lt. Gen.
Alexandre Lebed to limit the fighting between Moldova and the
breakaway trans-Dnestr region, mostly inhabited by ethnic Russians
and Ukrainians. Russia provided arms and troops to the insurgents,
helping them to defeat the Moldovan army in several battles, notably
that for Bendery in June 1992. A cease-fire was signed the following
month by Pres. Boris Yeltsin of Russia and Moldova’s Pres. Mircea
Snegur.
For the next 12 years international efforts to resolve the crisis
have failed with the current controversy revolving around a language
and now energy dispute with the usual cycle of regional interest.
What has enlarged the conflict is the greater war against terror in
other words Islam. The US and other nations adjacent to Moldova have
provided military facilities for operations in the Middle East so
stability is obviously of paramount importance while at the same time
Iran has been signing substantial economic agreements, memorandums of
understanding, with every nation in the Black Sea region. The
economic dimension of the Jihad will be felt very heavily here. If
Iran has enough military successes in the region the entire economic
dialogue will be dictated by Tehran.
International initiatives have encountered withering criticism from a
range of international and local analysts and Moldovan
nongovernmental organizations fearful that the OSCE plan would turn
Moldova into a satellite of Russia. Prospects for a breakthrough
appear slim. The Transnistrian authorities are reluctant to lift
their authoritarian controls or abandon lucrative smuggling
activities that have left Transnistria isolated but for its lifeline
to Russia and its leaders banned from traveling to Western countries.
Meanwhile, a significant exodus of adult Moldovans is taking place
owing to endemic corruption at the elite level and the contraction of
the economy. The country’s population is a scant 39.5% of the size it
was in 1990. Many people swapped professional jobs at home for menial
ones in Western Europe in order to earn enough to support their
families.
With the corruption at the top and the serious regional rivalry
around them the chances for these countries surviving from Macedonia
to Moldova, under their current boundaries, or any other, is
virtually non-existent. Moscow probably concluded a long time ago
that peaceful solutions to the arrogant, self-contained nationalities
exist only in a dream world. The nightmarish consequences, which will
become more apparent before the end of the year, will result in the
re-establishment of the Russian hegemony whose hard currency of
financing comes from, as always the West, principally Berlin. The
Berlin-Moscow spectrum and the serious industrial concern behind it,
realizes this crescent of crisis can only be solved militarily.
During the war reliable local leaders will assert themselves and if
they have enough local military support will survive to represent
their provinces in the post-World War III climate.
Of course the post-war climate will not be one of universal peace but
one of militaristic stability. The Jihad would have run its course. I
cannot see more than two years of all out fighting starting with this
one. When Tehran realizes it cannot defeat Moscow they will make a
deal which will end at least most of the fighting. They will probably
call it a new partnership with Moscow being the most prominent.
About the author: Willard Payne is a consultant and analyst in
international affairs, specializing in extreme situations. He is a
member of US Naval Institute and President’s Circle of Chicago
Council on Foreign Relations. Willard holds a degree in history from
Western Illinois University and currently he is running Night Watch
Information Service, a broad range news-analysis service.
URL of this article:
–Boundary_(ID_de1synzvgIZ0uPBSzbJAvA)–

Ve3d.com
IGN Insider
Nov 13 2004
The Pirates of Pirates!
Part two focuses on William Kidd and Jean Lafitte.
November 12, 2004 – If you checked in with us yesterday, you saw the
kickoff of our Pirates! feature. In it we detailed Stede Bonnet and
Blackbeard, two of the pirates you’ll be sharing the seas with when
Firaxis and Atari ship Pirates! later this month.
We continue the feature today by taking a look at pirate/pirate
hunter William Kidd and Jean Lafitte.
William Kidd
Captain Kidd’s story serves as a cautionary tale, warning of the
dangers of privateeringand of the blurry line between that occupation
and outright piracy.
In December, 1695, a privateering vessel named the Adventure Galley
was launched at Deptford, England, on the Thames River. The ship was
to sail around Africa and destroy pirates operating in the Red Sea
and to harass French shipping there. She was commanded by William
Kidd, an experienced captain and privateer.
The Galley’s maiden voyage was beset by ill luck and delay. Upon
departure Kidd promptly lost almost half of his crew to the English
navy’s press gangs and was forced to make up the missing men by
recruiting the dregs and scum of New York harbor. It took five long
months for Kidd to make the voyage around Africa, and on arrival he
immediately lost another fifty men to a tropical disease.
By the time he reached the Red Sea the surviving crewmen were almost
in open mutiny and Kidd was ready to resort to almost any means to
keep them in line. Unfortunately, most of the French shipping had
been driven out of the area, and all Kidd encountered were neutral
vessels. But Kidd was desperate, probably fearing for his life, and
he attacked and captured a number of neutrals, believing (or hoping)
that ambiguities in their ownership and papers made them legitimate
prizes.
On January 30th of 1698, Kidd encountered the Quedah Merchant. Owned
by Armenians and flying under false French colors, the Merchant was
one of the richest prizes ever taken at sea. Kidd was enormously
pleased with his good fortune – until he discovered that the Merchant
had an English captain, which made his attack an act of outright
piracy. In horror, Kidd ordered that the ship be freed, but his crew
angrily refused. Instead, they sailed the ships to the African island
of Madagascar and divided the plunder (surprisingly, they gave Kidd a
full privateer captain’s portion of 40 shares). Then all but a
handful of men deserted Kidd for another pirate in the area.
Convinced that he was an innocent victim of the actions of his
mutinous crew, Kidd took the remainder of his men back to New
England, where he hid some of his treasure before reporting to the
local authorities. The authorities made Kidd reveal where he had
hidden the treasure, then shipped him back to England in irons.
After rotting in prison for a year, Kidd was put on trial. He was
quickly found guilty of piracy and sentenced to be hanged.
Even then his bad luck didn’t desert him: the rope broke and it took
his executioners two tries to kill him.
(Incidentally, this is the only known instance of a pirate burying
any substantial amount of treasure. Most everybody else spent their
loot as quickly as they got it.)
Jean Lafitte
Jean Lafitte was born sometime around 1778. He and his older brother,
Pierre, went to sea at an early age; somewhere off the west coast of
Africa the two quarreled with their captain, and began new careers as
privateers. An extremely brave, skilled, dashingly-handsome and
personable young man, Jean Lafitte quickly earned himself a
captaincy. After a good run in the Indian Ocean, the Lafittes moved
on to the Caribbean, where they established a base of operations on
Grand Terre, an island in the mouth of the Mississippi. Lafitte ran a
tidy little criminal empire in the Louisiana bayous. His men ranged
far and wide over the Caribbean while he and his brother fenced much
of the loot in New Orleans, where they became something akin to folk
heroes.
When the US took possession of New Orleans, the new Governor tried to
have the rogues arrested, but without success. With intimate
knowledge of the swamps and bayous of Louisiana – as well as the
enthusiastic support of the locals of New Orleans – the Lafittes were
virtually untouchable.
In 1812 the US declared war on England. An admirer of the United
States, Jean Lafitte offered his services to the US Governor in
return for full amnesty for him and his men, but the Governor
declined the offer. When the British invasion was imminent, the
Governor launched a surprise attack against Grand Terre, driving
Lafitte and his men into the dismal swamps.
Lafitte’s men wanted to join the British to exact revenge against the
Americans, but Lafitte stood firm. Staking his freedom and his life
on one last throw of the dice, Lafitte decided to meet in person with
General Andrew Jackson, the newly-arrived commander of New Orleans’
defense.
A former Tennessee lawyer and politician, “Old Hickory” was known as
a brilliant soldier and an honest, straightforward man. Much to
everyone’s surprise the general and the pirate got along famously,
and Jackson quickly accepted Lafitte’s offer.
The events of the Battle of New Orleans are well-known. Lafitte and
his men acted as guides for the US forces, allowing them to launch
surprise attacks against the approaching British, delaying their
advance until the American defenses were in place below the city. In
the final battle Lafitte led an independent force of sharpshooters
against a regiment attempting to outflank the American position,
while his other men worked the American artillery, earning Jackson’s
admiration for their coolness under fire. The American position was
unassailable, and the British Army was driven back with heavy losses,
securing New Orleans for the United States. General Jackson was true
to his word, and Lafitte and his men received full pardons.
— Firaxis

NBC4.TV, CA
Nov 13 2004
Four-Year Manhunt Leads To Suspect In Road Rage Case
Police Find Suspect In Armenia
POSTED: 6:16 pm PST November 12, 2004
UPDATED: 6:47 pm PST November 12, 2004
LOS ANGELES — An investigation into the death of a motorist four
years ago took Los Angeles police to the other side of the globe.
Michael Craven was 44 years old when he was killed in a traffic
incident. His death came six weeks before his son, Jesse Craven,
graduated from high school.
“The person who was always there isn’t,” Jesse Craven said. “He was
the person (who) was always there filming my games. He was at every
event.”
Police said an enraged motorist ran over Michael Craven after
stopping on the side of the 101 Freeway in April 2000. Police said
the suspect fled to Armenia.
“It was disconcerting to think that he could be out there hurting
someone else,” said Jesse Craven’s mother, Kathleen Barich.
The family was notified Thursday night that authorities had tracked
down the suspect.
“My view of law enforcement — United States justice and the West
Hollywood Division — has completely (increased),” Jesse Craven said.
The suspect, a commercial driver, was taken to the Mid-Central Jail
in downtown Los Angeles. Bond was set at $1 million. A court
appearance was scheduled for Nov. 24.

Jews, Scots, Armenians, Dutch
by Gary North
Lew Rockwell, CA
Nov 13 2004
You have heard this phrase: “He can buy from a [ ], sell to a [ ],
and make a profit.
Here are the most likely choices:
Jew
Scot
Dutchman
Armenian
Why? What do these seemingly disparate groups have in common, other
than money?
Let’s begin with the least known group.
THE ARMENIANS
In 1962, I had a Jewish roommate, Roger Hartman. I didn’t know much
about Judaism back then. Roger had grown up in the area around
Fresno, California – not exactly a cosmopolitan region. His family
had later moved to San Francisco, as I recall. He told me why: “When
the Armenians moved in, the Jews moved out.” I don’t know if he
really meant this specifically about his own family, but the phrase
was obviously common among Jews in the area. Armenians are highly
competitive in commerce. They are famous as rug merchants, but their
skills go way beyond importing rugs.
I knew less about Armenians in 1962 than I do now. I’m now married to
one. But I never did forget Roger’s comment. There was, and is, a
large Armenian population in the Fresno area. The most famous
Armenian-American author, William Saroyan, was born in Fresno in
1908. My father-in-law grew up in Kingsburg, not far from Fresno.
Side note: Armenians are easily identified by their names – more
easily than any other national group. Their names usually end in -ian
or -yan. My father-in-law was an exception: Rushdoony, not
Rushdoonian. He told me why. His family had roots back to royalty in
Armenia. When the Turks conquered the country nine centuries ago,
they forced a name change on everyone, so that they could be easily
identified. They added the -ian sound. My father-in-law’s family
escaped the restriction because of the family’s royal lineage.
Anyway, that’s what he told me. As someone who read a book a day for
60 years, he knew about such things.
The Armenians are the entrepreneurs of Western Asia. This has been
true for centuries. I found it interesting that in the old “Upstairs,
Downstairs” series, when the script writers wanted to portray a rich,
aggressive, unscrupulous, social-climbing businessman, they chose an
Armenian. It may have been too politically incorrect to select a Jew,
but the decision was nevertheless believable. The character was
looked down on by the upper crust. They referred to him as a Jew, he
said. This upset him; he was proud of his Armenian heritage.
In the Soviet Union, Armenians were called the Christian Jews. There
was considerable hostility and discrimination in Moscow against
members of both groups. But, like Jews, Armenians climbed their way
to the top of the Communist Party’s hierarchy. Anastas Mikoyan was
the most prominent of them. He was the Commissar of Food Supply and
then Minister of Trade under Stalin. He was elected president in
1964, a ceremonial post. He survived. He never missed a trick. He
introduced Eskimo Pie into the USSR – one of the more productive
things ever done by a senior Soviet bureaucrat. His brother Artem
designed the MiG jet fighters. Under Gorbachev, Abel Aganbegyan
served as senior economic advisor. Yet Armenia was the smallest of
the Soviet republics, both in population and geography.
There is another shared feature with Jews. In 1915, the Turks
committed the first genocide of the twentieth century. They killed
about a million Armenians. This policy was systematic. Most people
have never heard of this event. (On the persecution, see the great
but little-known 1963 movie by Elia Kazan, America, America.)
Because World War I was going on, the Armenian genocide received
little publicity. It was concealed because the Germans and the Turks
were allies. Word did not get out, except for survivors’ accounts.
War news dominated the Western press. Also, Turkey was crucial
internationally because Turks controlled the Dardanelles, the narrow
access to the Black Sea. The Turks could seal off access from the
Russian Navy’s only warm water port. British foreign policy had long
been favorable to the Turks because of this geography: the balance of
power. So, there was no outcry from the West after the War, despite
Turkey’s former alliance with the Germans. The lesson was not lost on
Hitler, who wrote:
I have issued the command – and I’ll have anybody who utters but one
word of criticism executed by a firing squad – that our war aim does
not consist in reaching certain lines, but in the physical
destruction of the enemy. Accordingly, I have placed my death-head
formations in readiness – for the present only in the East – with
orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion,
men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus
shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after
all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?
The famous British historian Arnold Toynbee did much of the research
on the Armenian genocide for Lord Bryce’s 1916 collection of
survivors’ accounts. My wife’s grandfather, who had a photographic
memory, has two articles in the book. It was an official publication
of the British government, but it had no political effect.
THE DUTCH
When we think of the Dutch, we think of “Dutch Treat.” This term
applies to dates in which the woman pays her share of the evening’s
expenses. Whether the practice originated in Dutch-American circles,
I do not know, but the phrase has stuck.
The Dutch are frugal. They are legendary for this frugality. They are
good farmers, especially dairymen. They are not equally famous in
commerce, although there are highly successful Dutch-affiliated
companies. The Herman Miller Company is dominant in business chair
manufacture. The Dutch are regional: Grand Rapids, Michigan, is an
urban enclave.
In the seventeenth century, the Dutch rivaled the British in world
trade, yet their country was tiny, dug out of the sea by means of
dikes and windmills. They had money, and they had great artists. They
were also ruthless colonialists in Indonesia. They took no guff. They
fought a naval war with Cromwell’s England: two Calvinist powers
going at each other with fleets. The war continued under Charles II.
New Amsterdam became New York City in 1664.
It is one of those historical anomalies that they arrived, seemingly
out of nowhere, in the early seventeenth century. They were masters
of commerce. Their central bank actually preceded the Bank of England
(1694). They had a well organized stock exchange. They also had help
from Jews, who had been kicked out of Spain by Queen Isabella in
1492, and had fled to Antwerp and Amsterdam, where there was greater
religious liberty for them.
The Dutch reputation for frugality as consumers is an extension of
their former reputation as hard-bargaining traders. The same
legendary frugality is associated with the Scots.
THE SCOTS
In the eighteenth century, the Scots replaced the Dutch as the
world’s traders. While the English gained this reputation, the Scots
had the edge. Union with England came in 1707. From then on, the
Scots took advantage of the British colonial empire. Again, like the
Dutch a century earlier, they came out of nowhere. In 1650, Scotland
was poor, a backwater of Europe. By 1750, the Scots dominated trade
and philosophy. David Hume, Lord Kames, Adam Smith were Scots. By
1850, Scots around the world dominated invention and
entrepreneurship. From James Watt to Andrew Carnegie, the Scots
pioneered manufacturing and mass production. Arthur Herman’s book,
How the Scots Invented the Modern World (2001), tells this remarkable
story.
By 1950, the Scots were still influential as individuals, but not as
a self-conscious, well-connected group. Ronald Reagan was one of
them, and he attended a traditional Presbyterian Church, as a good
lowland Scotsman should. But we do not think of Reagan as a Scot.
While Sean Connery represents them, they are not organized
sufficiently to be represented.
THE JEWS
Like the Dutch in 1600 and the Scots in 1700, Jews in 1900 came out
of nowhere – or its cultural equivalents, Russia and Eastern Europe –
to dominate the movie industry and radio in the first half of the
century, and the economy in the second half.
The Rothschilds made their fortune under Napoleon, and other banking
houses of the late nineteenth century were Jewish-owned. But the
Morgan network was dominant in America in 1890, not Jewish investment
banks. The Rockefellers became competitors by 1910. Kuhn Loeb was not
in this league. The only Jewish-owned commercial bank of any
consequence in New York City was the Bank of the United States, which
went bankrupt in the Great Depression when the gentile bankers who
ran the Federal Reserve System refused to bail it out. The other big
banks were protected.
Jews are not legendary as tight-fisted consumers. They are not Scots
or Dutchmen. Jewish extravagance has in fact elicited envy in Europe,
especially before and after World War I. Two phrases tell the story:
“He Jewed me down.”
“A Jewish brother-in-law deal.”
Both phrases reflect retailing. “He Jewed me down” is the complaint
of a gentile wholesaler trying to sell to a Jewish retailer. “A
Jewish brother-in-law deal” reflects the consumer’s quest for a
discount. Thus, we return to the original phrase: “A Jew can buy from
a [ ] and sell to a [ ], and make a profit.”
If someone said, “He Jewed me up,” it would sound strange. That would
be the complaint of a consumer against a retailer who charged too
much. But Jews are not famous for charging too much. They are famous
for the Jewish brother-in-law deal.
Here, we see the entrepreneurial flair at work: “Buy low, sell
higher, but lower than the competition.” Recently, I bought a new
Sony digital voice recorder from Abe’s of Maine. The shipping box had
a New York City return address. Now, Abe may be a clever gentile
cashing in on a group reputation, but when it’s Abe’s of Maine, the
public gets the idea that wherever you go, you can get a Jewish
brother-in-law deal. Except in Fresno.
Jews are prominent in academia, law, and medicine. This has long been
the case in medicine. Jews for centuries served as physicians for
Christian and Muslim rulers. “My son, the doctor” was basic to Jewish
family advancement and even survival. Similarly, when the Czar opened
up residence in Moscow to members of the state’s symphony orchestra,
Jewish children all over Russia were seen carrying violins. A violin
was the ticket out of the ghetto.
Jews are famous for comedy. This is an odd fact about modern Jews.
Humor was frowned on in Orthodox Jewish circles for many centuries.
(“Orthodox” was a pejorative term applied to Talmudic Jews by liberal
and secular Jews in the early nineteenth century. A Talmudic rabbi
and scholar, Samson R. Hirsch, decided to accept the term and run
with it in the mid-nineteenth century.) Yet by the days of
vaudeville, Jews were prominent comedians. The most famous Russian
comic in America, Yakov Smirnoff, is a Jew. But he did not know he
was Jewish until his parents told him, when he was 13, in 1964. They
were afraid of persecution. (“What a rotten country!”) They emigrated
in 1977. Somehow, in less than half a century, Jews became
professional comics. I have never seen a book on how and why this
happened. It was as if Jews have a humor gene that had to be
suppressed by the rabbis, and when the rabbis’ influence waned, Jews
started making people laugh.
By the way, in the collection called The World’s Shortest Books,
Famous Jewish Farmers has to be included, right next to Famous
Gentile Violinists.
WHAT’S THE CONNECTION?
Half a century earlier in each case, it would have been impossible to
predict the group’s imminent dominance.
All four groups have this in common: a strong sense of the covenant.
The covenant is an Old Testament idea: Abraham’s covenant with God,
marked by circumcision. Membership in the religious community is
basic to the survival of the group.
Family and cultural ties are common to most groups, especially prior
to the Industrial Revolution. But the covenant ideal meant that God
had singled out a group to represent Him, and that He promises to
make it prosper if members obey Him. Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28
are the central passages.
The lowland Scots after 1550 were Presbyterian Calvinists if they
were anything. This meant the doctrine of predestination and also a
vision of world expansion, a theology called postmillennialism. But
it took 150 years for this outlook to produce the Scottish
transformation. Why so long? I have no idea. Herman’s book begins in
1697, which is too late to answer the question.
The Dutch did not call themselves Presbyterians, but the church
structure and the theologies are so similar that it takes a
specialist to distinguish them. In the seventeenth century, there
were more Dutch postmillennialists than there are today (i.e., more
than none).
Both theologies rested on the idea of God’s covenant, which
encompasses family, church, and state. Both theologies produced an
outlook of “them vs. us, and we can beat them.”
One of the best short books on business leadership is Max DuPree’s
Leadership is an Art (1989). DuPree ran the Herman Miller Company for
many years. His father founded it. DuPree actually uses the word
“covenant” to describe the business’s key factor. He does not mean
contract. While I think the use of “covenant” is misused here,
because covenants in the Bible relate to family, church, and state,
his main point is correct: contracts are not enough.
Covenantal relationships enable participation to be practiced and
inclusive groups to be formed. The differences between covenants and
contracts appear in detail in “Intimacy” (p. 25).
The Armenians are not covenant theologians. Their tradition is that
of Eastern Orthodoxy – more mystical than judicial. Armenia was the
first nation to adopt Christianity, in either 301 or 303. They were a
warrior people for a long time, standing in the gap in 451 A.D. to
repel the Persians. The battle of Avarier is not as famous as an
anti-Persian battle in the way that Thermopylae is, but it was
important. They were invaded again and again, and they lived for 900
years under the Turks, except for the thirteenth century under the
Mongols. (My father-in-law told me that his father told him that in
the margin of the community’s heirloom Bible, there was a notation:
“Today, the Mongols passed through.”) Persecution held them together.
They have had a sense of religious solidarity, and this persisted
even after they arrived in Protestant-secular America.
Their economic success is more difficult to explain than the success
of the other three groups. This may be for lack of interest on the
part of historians and economists: fewer books on them.
The Jews were traders for centuries. Religious ties made possible a
network of international communications and transactions. They also
had their own courts and legal precedents, called “responsa.” Owning
land was difficult except in separate communities. Capital in
diamonds or gold was portable, unlike land.
The Dutch had to learn other European languages in order to trade.
They also became skilled sailors. The country is tiny. It has few
natural resources. If they wanted to prosper, they had to trade. They
did. But they had a sense of destiny about them, which led them to
fight the Spanish in the late sixteenth century, gaining independence
in the early seventeenth. In 1689, after their defeat by the British
Navy, one of their rulers, William III, became the king of England.
“If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.” His wife inherited England for
him. Maybe this was the original Dutch Treat.
There is another factor: separation. This means cultural separation,
but it can also mean confessional. In America, the Dutch still set up
parent-run private schools that are formally Calvinistic. When I
lived in the border town of Lynden, Washington, in 1976, there were
more children enrolled in the Christian schools than in the public
schools. The Dutch pay for their cultural and confessional
separation. Theology was sufficiently well defined that, at the
border on Sunday morning, you would see Dutch-American Calvinists
heading to Canada to worship, and Dutch-Canadian Calvinists heading
for the U.S. They were polite, hard-working, well-fed people on both
sides of the border. And on both sides, we “gentiles” labeled their
mentality: “If you aren’t Dutch, you aren’t much.” On neither side
was it wise to mow your lawn on Sunday. On the American side, only
one gas station was open for business, on a rotating basis with the
competition, to serve the needs of gentile tourists.
CONFIDENCE ABOUT THE FUTURE
Members of all four groups have seen themselves as hand-picked by God
to dominate trade. They have regarded themselves as possessing an
advantage over everyone else, either in brains, trade, or the ability
to prosper under the radar. This outlook came earliest to Jews, then
the Armenians, then the Dutch, then the Scots. Their sense of group
solidarity was not unique, but their sense of participation in a
covenant that promises economic success has been unique.
The Dutch and the Scots have lost their sense of inevitable
covenantal victory, but not their sense of frugality. They have
transferred to thrift what they once attributed to God’s covenant.
Adam Smith wrote Wealth of Nations (1776) as a manifesto of this
theological shift.
Innovation, uncertainty, cost-cutting, new markets, profit and loss:
here is the program of personal success for the entrepreneur. When
you belong to a group that will help you when you fall, which will
provide start-up capital to get you going, you have an advantage. The
Koreans have this outlook and group support in the United States. The
Koreans, more than any Asian immigrant group, are Christians:
specifically, Presbyterians. It is interesting that the dairy farming
Dutch in Southern California have sold their land to developers, who
in turn sold new homes to the Korean children of the family-run,
drive-through dairy stores of 1960. The Dutch then moved to Lynden.
That relocation process has been going on for three decades.
Without confidence in the future, the entrepreneur cannot function.
He becomes at best an investor in bonds or other fixed-income
ventures. He accepts statistically insurable risk in place of
unpredictable uncertainty. He becomes frugal, advancing himself by
means of the steady excess of income over outflow. He does not change
society through innovation.
CONCLUSION
If you can buy from a [ ], sell to a [ ], and make a profit, your
future is secure. Most people can’t.
As the free market erodes family ties, group solidarity, and
persecution, members of many groups can get in on the cornucopia. It
is clear that the Japanese have a similar mindset as the four groups,
but without the doctrine of the covenant. The Chinese are now
adopting it. The freedom to compete breaks down the barriers to
entry. But, as the free market moves westward, those who belong to
subgroups that have the same outlook as the Big Four enjoy an initial
advantage. Group solidarity fades in the face of open competition,
but this takes time. When an innovator has confidence in the future,
which includes confidence in the safety net of his family or his
confessional group, he has an advantage: less fear of failure.
Faith is then transferred to the free market itself. In Europe and
America, faith in the twentieth century was transferred from the free
market to the welfare state. The reverse process is true in Asia.
This is why Asia now has an advantage over the West: social and
racial solidarity coupled with increasing faith in the free market
and declining faith in the state, whether Communist or Fabian
socialist.
In the interim period, in between the coming of the free market and
the erosion of social and racial solidarity, confidence is on the
side of the family-based small enterprise. Asia is booming because of
this. China seems to have the unique combination. We shall see what
happens when the boom turns into recession after China’s central bank
stops creating fiat money like a drunken (non-Dutch) sailor.
November 13, 2004
Gary North [send him mail] is the author of Mises on Money. Visit