Clinton Does Fulfill some Campaign Promises The main point of my E-mail is in relationship to the current events in Kosovo and Serbia. Like you, I have been concerned about risking Nuclear War, and Clinton, Albright, & NATO's motives for the swift military actions against Yugoslavia. Granted, I do not like the suffering of refugees, nor ethnic cleansing, but something here is amiss. I have also been concerned at the dangerous depletion of our advanced weapon stockpiles over such a distant region of the world. We the American people are not getting the full story on Yugoslavia. Clinton seems unable to identify our American interests there as a cause for war, outside of being "nice". Yet we may commit ground troops there soon. Several nights ago I watched a report on Rwanda in 1994. 800, 000 people were killed in short order. I was struck at the neglect of the US on this matter. I was also struck with the forewarnings that Albright allegedly received regarding the Nairobi, Kenya bombings and her neglect there. What strikes me is that there was very little geniune compassion from either Albright or Clinton on the decisions relating to these serious matters. The compassion with which we are being appealed regarding Kosovo therefore seems extremely disproportionate. Larger numbers are killed in hotspots around the world with less fanfare. Many of the atrocities seem unverified exaggerated and merely rumor, though I am sure that many thousands have indeed suffered gravely. I find that various accounts of Clinton's biography reveal that he can often have very little genuine compassion. He is a faker. But why would he fake this one? How was he able to lead NATO into this risky endeavor? I was in Brussels, Belgium last October and met with some people who mine ores in Rwanda. I was struck by the vast world class mineral wealth beneath the lands of Rwanda and how perhaps the people who occupied the lands, were "in the way". Journalist Michael Isikoff mentioned in his latest book on Clinton, that as a young man Clinton was saved from the Vietnam Draft through the interventions of then Governor of Arkansas, Winthrop Rockefeller. There is evidence that sometimes Clinton still meets regularly with a certain David Rockefeller. There appears to be a number of Rockefeller connections to William Jefferson Clinton. We may be correct in our suspicions that there is someone behind the scenes that has coached and groomed Clinton for the Presidency, and furthermore sustains his continued existence, against all odds. Clinton could have been preserved into power just for the occasion of the next few months and year. He probably feels that he cannot be impeached or harmed signicantly for failure. To the point: What ever became of Roger Tamraz? The Oil man that gave money to the DNC and had personal visits to the President? He lived in Egypt and Lebanon. Did Hillary visit with him or his confederates while in Egypt during the commencement of the Yugoslavian war just a few weeks ago? Oil is a great motivation for World War. The Japanese and Germans in WWII slaughtered for access to it. Oil motivated Desert Storm. Our Nation is in debt over $5 Trillion dollars. Many of our Allies have purchased hundreds of millions, even billions of our debt via Treasury Notes, Bonds and other monetary instruments. For Desert Storm, we were obligated to act as a protective umbrella to the nations whom we owed, acting to protect their interests. Today, many if not most of the NATO nations also own much of our national debt, and feel that we are obligated to protect and prosecute wars on their behalf, for their interests. Furthermore, if Clinton is beholden to say a David Rockefeller, he is personally in debt and must obey. Suppose both debts could be answered by starting a war? Suppose Clinton is willing to play high stakes poker, risking our national security, angering both the Russians and the Chinese, for a cause that if successful would please both obligations and bring him future financial rewards as post President? Suppose Clinton was willing to recklessly use his position, power and office, as the leader of the free world, to place both our national security (risking Nuclear War) and our men and women of the armed forces into harms way for personal gain? What about the pipeline from the Caspian Sea through Turkey? Has it's western junction been considered? I was gazing at a map of Albania the other day and I could see it is possible for a pipeline corridor from Istanbul West through a mountain pass over Yugoslavia and into Europe, via Germany. Wouldn't this be more environmentally friendly than using an ocean Tanker? However Yugoslavia would need to be stabilised. And what if a Tanker crossed the Black Sea from Georgia, would it not be safer with unstable Yugoslavia out of the way? The Rockefellers knew of the Caspian reserves even at the beginning of this century. Perhaps they have been scheming to access it all along. What if Clinton is really pleasing his handlers and NATO nations by causing a war against parties who have been too difficult to negotiate terms for pipeline passage. The Kosovo refugees in this cold calculation of Billions of dollars, are merely chips on a poker table. Never mind that they have suffered without food, or have been killed, or have no shelter. Something on this scale would explain the strange behaviors of this war. It would explain why we the US seem so willing to spend approximately $4 Billion to fight it. The level of compassion urged toward this war, by the media as propaganda, is merely a cold smoke screen. Yet I am saddened by the hundreds of thousands of innocent people, displaced, hungry and many dead, who are suffering as the results of a regional strategic chess game. If this is really what Clinton and his associates are up to, they are ruthless. Best Regards, Marshall Houston Portland, Oregon ============= http://www.seattletimes.com/extra/browse/html97/tamr_092297.html Copyright � 1997 The Seattle Times Company Monday, Sept. 22, 1997 Tamraz: Visits `put my peers in their place' by Associated Press WASHINGTON - Contributing $300,000 to the Democratic Party to socialize with President Clinton was worth it to millionaire oilman Roger Tamraz, who said the donation made oil-industry executives view him as a major player. "It was a good investment," Tamraz said yesterday on ABC's "This Week." "If it allows you to be in the club of the big boys, it's fine." In testimony before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee last week, the oilman said his donation gained him entry to the White House over the objections of Clinton's national-security aides. Tamraz is the subject of a federal grand-jury investigation into his donations. And he is an international fugitive, wanted in Lebanon on a charge of embezzling $200 million from a collapsed bank he headed. He denies the charge. "Do you know that in Japanese golf companies you pay $400,000 just to become a member of the golf (club) so that you bump into the Toyota chairman and the Sony chairman? It doesn't mean they'll play with you, but you're there," he said. Tamraz spoke of two brief encounters with Clinton at the White House. At a March 1996 dinner for about 120 big Democratic donors, he asked the president to support his Caspian Sea oil-pipeline project. In June that year, he spent three hours at the White House. Asked yesterday the purpose of attending the social events, Tamraz replied: "Who refuses to go to the White House and to sit with the most powerful man in the world and to eat popcorn and to see him relax and to know he doesn't come from the divine right of kings?" "There are other pleasures to going to the White House," he said. "One of them is to put my peers into their place, so they know that we have an even field." ============ http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/azeroil.htm STEPHEN KINZER, "A Perilous New Contest for the Next Oil Prize," New York Times, September 21, 1997 BAKU, Azerbaijan -- In donating $300,000 to Democratic Party organizations during the 1996 campaign, an ambitious businessman named Roger Tamraz sought access to President Clinton and other senior officials so he could ask them to support his project for a new oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea. Last week Tamraz's efforts to buy access to the White House emerged as a key issue in Washington's campaign finance investigations. But in the drama now unfolding around the Caspian, Tamraz is a bit player and $300,000 a laughably small sum. The big players are nations including Russia, Iran and the United States, companies like Amoco, Pennzoil and Exxon and lobbyists with names like Kissinger, Haig, Baker and Brzezinski. They and every shark east of Suez have recognized that over the next decades, the greatest of games will be played around the Caspian. Forget mutual funds, commodity futures and corporate mergers. Forget South African diamonds, European currencies and Thai stocks. The most concentrated mass of untapped wealth known to exist anywhere is in the oil and gas fields beneath the Caspian and the lands around it, regions at best dimly familiar to even the mostassiduous newspaper readers. The stakes are enormous; the value of the vast reserve, capable of fueling the industrial world for years to come, is measured in trillions of dollars, and foreign companies are expected to invest $50 billion or more merely to extract it. The strategic implications of this bonanza hypnotize Western security planners as completely as the finances transfix oil executives. Once Caspian oil begins flowing, they dare to dream, they will never again have to kowtow to OPEC or maneuver to prevent oil-thirsty nations from dealing with Iran and Iraq. With that relief, however, will undoubtedly come new troubles, for the competition involves not only governments and oil companies, but also warlords and clan chiefs who control or move through the remote regions where the pipelines needed to bring the treasure to market might be built. Depending on where the lines are laid, power over the West's energy supply may fall to Chechen rebels, irredentist Armenians, government-connected cliques of Russian or Turkish gangsters, Iranian mullahs, Kurdish guerrillas or mercurial chieftains of the Avars, Lezgins, Swanetians and other Caucasian ethnic groups that nurse ancient grievances of which the outside world knows almost nothing. "All the options are complicated, and none is trouble-free because they all either pass through politically unstable areas, involve high costs because of distance and terrain, or are politically risky because they offend the sensibilities of one or another of the regional powers," Rosemarie Forsythe, an American diplomat who specializes in international energy issues, wrote last year. That there is oil beneath Azerbaijan has been known for centuries. The 13th-century explorer Marco Polo reported that springs here bubbled with black goo that was "good to burn." Between 1880 and 1910 the Rockefeller, Rothschild and Nobel families made fortunes here. In World War II Azerbaijani oil fueled the Red Army, and Baku, the Azerbaijani capital, was a great prize that Hitler tried but failed to capture. Over the entire Soviet period, however, only modest amounts of oil were produced here as the Soviets preferred to develop fields in Siberia and other parts of Slavic Russia rather than invest in peripheral Muslim republics. But certainly they did not realize that beneath the Caspian is not a pool or lake of oil, but an ocean. The proven reserves beneath Azerbaijan's portion of the Caspian total 17 billion barrels, the equivalent of the North Sea field. Geologists believe that at least 20 billion to 30 billion barrels more remain to be found. The other oil-rich corner of the Caspian belongs to Kazakstan, with proven reserves of 10 billion barrels and perhaps three times that not yet found. Some specialists in Baku believe these figures may be low. Estimates of total reserves in the Caspian and the lands around it run up to 200 billion barrels, enough to meet the entire energy needs of the United States for 30 years or more. After declaring independence from the crumbling Soviet Union in 1991, Azerbaijan and Kazakstan fell into turmoil from which they are now beginning to emerge. Foreign oil companies began large-scale investment in the region in September 1994, when the Azerbaijani state oil company signed what was called the "contract of the century," a $7.4 billion agreement with a consortium of 10 companies from the United States, Britain, Norway, Russia, Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Four more contracts have since been signed, with French, Italian, Japanese and Iranian companies among the new arrivals. Mobil paid $1.1 billion for a stake in Kazakstan's biggest oil field, followed quickly by Russia's state-owned oil conglomerate; Malaysian and Chinese interests are negotiating for the second-largest field. In neighboring Turkmenistan, U.S. and British companies have bought permission to search for oil in an 8,000-square-mile tract along the Caspian coast. The first consortium, Azerbaijan International Operating Co., is already drilling in the Caspian and expects to begin producing oil before the end of this year. The main competition now is over pipeline routes, and the outcome will have far-reaching political as well as economic effects. Whoever controls the route or routes will be able to count on steady income from transit fees and to exert pressure on both producing and consuming countries. "If you can't get the oil out, it's no good to anyone," an American oil analyst in Baku said. "But every way of getting it out presents its own set of problems." The first flow of oil is to be sent through an existing pipeline that runs north from Baku through Chechnya to the Russian port of Novorossisk on the Black Sea. Russian leaders would like to expand this line so it can be used for the far larger flows to come, but to do so they must cooperate with Chechnya's secessionist rebels. Russian and Chechen leaders finally reached an accord this month on splitting the transit fees, but reflecting their mistrust, the Russians immediately announced that they want to build a new alternative route through North Ossetia, a region that is marginally more stable politically. The only existing alternative pipeline does not run through Russia at all, but westward from Baku to the Black Sea port of Supsa in Georgia. It passes through potentially explosive regions of Georgia, but Georgian officials say they can guarantee its security. Once the oil reaches Supsa, however, what should be done with it? One option is to ship it in tankers across the Black Sea, through the Bosporus into the Mediterranean. But Turkish officials strenuously object to such heavy tanker traffic because of the environmental risks. The Turks propose to build a 650-mile pipeline from Supsa across eastern Turkey to their port of Ceyhan on the Mediterranean. But some oil executives worry about the time and expense of building such a pipeline, and they cannot ignore the risk that Kurdish guerrillas in eastern Turkey might try to attack it. Another possibility would be to ship or pipe oil from Supsa across the Black Sea to Bulgaria or Romania, sending it by pipeline from there to a Greek port. Azerbaijan's president, Heydar Aliyev, has even suggested that he would consider a pipeline through Armenia if the two countries can settle their dispute over the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region. When oil planners look at maps, however, they cast their eyes on a tantalizing alternative: simply tie Baku to the existing pipeline network in neighboring Iran and send the oil south to the Persian Gulf. This proven route leads to ports already equipped for shipping oil and avoids the baffling range of political, ethnic, national and religious conflicts bubbling across the Caucasus. But the United States, which rejects virtually all cooperation with Iran, strongly opposes it. Some influential figures in Washington are quietly suggesting that it may be time to reappraise policy toward Iran, particularly after the election there in May of a relatively moderate president, but they have not had any visible success. An even more daring possibility is to run a pipeline from Turkmenistan south to the open sea through Afghanistan, where the ruthlessly fundamentalist and anti-Western Taliban movement is in control. At least one U.S. company, Unocal, has reportedly held pipeline talks with Taliban officials. Sitting at the heart of this conundrum is the president of the Azerbaijani state oil monopoly, Natik Aliyev. From his window in a stately old Baku office building, Aliyev, no relation to the president of his country, can gaze out on the Caspian and ruminate on the black gold beneath it. "There are so many interlocking interests in this region, not to mention among outside powers and the oil companies themselves," Aliyev mused. "Our job is to balance them and still protect our own interests. Believe me, we don't underestimate the importance or complexity of it all." ======================= http://www.wps.ru/digest/oilgas.html#TIT1.1 THE RUSSIAN OIL AND GAS REPORT No.2, January 13, 1999. FORMER US SECRETARY OF STATE HENRY KISSINGER JOINED SUPPORTERS OF BAKU-DJEIHAN ROUTE Former Us Secretary of State, one of the most influential social scientists of America, Henry Kissinger seems to join supports of the oil pipeline route Baku-Djeihan. This was the opinion of the observers in Baku about his statement, saying that he considers this route "politically expedient" as the main route for the Caspian oil transportation to the West. The oil problems were the main theme of Kissinger's visit to Baku and Tbilisi, which was subsidized by the American oil companies. Quite recently Kissinger together with another Secretary of State James Baker (in the past he was the advisor of the Azerbaijani international operational company) and former British premier Margaret Thatcher (advisor of British petroleum) spoke for construction of the main export pipeline through Russia and Ukraine, hooking it to Druzhba pipeline. It is believed that the current negotiations of Kissinger in the Transcaucasia reflect the change of the positions of the influential circles of American establishment. This is not accidental that during his meetings with the managers of the oil companies and Geidar Aliev Kissinger permanently stressed that he "likes the route Baku-Djeihan", but with the reservation that everything "depends upon the economics of the project". The fate of the pipeline has to be defined by spring. Despite the "political expedience", confirmed by the Ankara declaration in autumn of 1998, participants of the project are embarrassed by its expensiveness ($3.5 billion) and unsolved problem of the Turkish Kurdistan, which the pipeline has to cross. After their meetings with Kissinger representatives of Tbilisi believe that Washington will support the Western Georgian route Baku-Supsa, but refrain from it not to irritate their ally, Turkey. On the eve of Kissinger's visit to Tbilisi the first tons of oil were delivered from Azerbaijan to Georgia through the new pipeline. Several days later the oil was delivered to the terminal in Supsa. It is planned to pump 18-20 million tons of oil through this pipeline annually. It is interesting that right after Kissinger Georgian parliament speaker Zurab Zhvania flew to the US with the 12-days visit by the invitation of the American oil tycoons. He plans to conduct negotiations with the oil business leaders in Dallas. Before his departure to the US Zhvania did not hide that his visit was completely financed by the American part, and the goal of his visit is to convince the American businessmen of reliability of Georgia. Vremya MN, January 12, 1999, p. 6 ================== Commando force to guard new Caspian pipeline By Lawrence Sheets TBILISI, April 16 (Reuters) - Showing off a commando force backed by warplanes and helicopter gunships on Friday, Georgia declared it would ensure security for a new pipeline for Caspian crude which opens this weekend. The $560 million pipeline, running 830 km (516 miles) from the Azeri capital Baku to Georgia's Black Sea outlet at Supsa, is seen by analysts as an important step in diversifying export routes for Caspian basin crude. Georgia also sees it as pivotal for developing the Caucasus country of 5.5 million as a key transit state between Asia and Europe, and not just for oil. Defence Minister David Tevzadze presented a special force of camouflage-clad crack troops to visiting foreign dignitaries and army brass on Friday morning during a military training exercise near the capital Tbilisi. Russian-made Sukhoi warplanes screamed overhead as Kalashnikov-carrying soldiers scrambled from helicopters onto a smouldering simulated battlefield. ``Georgia is ready to defend the pipeline. These troops can go into action in just a few hours,'' Tevzadze told Reuters. The line will carry Azeri crude oil mainly for the BP Amoco-led Azerbaijan International Operating Company consortium which paid for its rehabilitation and upgrading. It crosses through territory rife with strife and political unrest in recent years. In Azerbaijan, it comes within 30 km (20 miles) of front lines between Armenian and Azeri forces who have been at odds for over a decade over the disputed Karabakh region. Shooting and skirmishes are common. Western Georgia, through which it crosses, has been a hotbed of strife ever since independence in 1991. The area is home to armed groups who do not recognise the government of President Eduard Shevardnadze. Civil wars were fought between backers of the 71-year-old former Soviet foreign minister and militants loyal to the now late nationalist former president Zviad Gamsakhurdia in 1992 and 1993. Last October it was the scene of a military mutiny led by a rogue commander, Akaki Eliava who briefly marched with his troops on the country's second city, Kutaisi, and demanded Shevardnadze leave office. Eliava is still on the run. ``There is definitely concern in the West over the security of the pipeline,'' said Zeyno Baran, a research associate at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies. But U.S. government officials, who have backed the new route, capable of handling 100,000 barrels per day at present as a good way to diversify Caspian export routes, say they have full confidence in Georgia's ability to guard the pipeline. Extraordinary security measures never before seen in Georgia have been taken for Saturday's opening ceremony, in which the first tanker will begin filling at Supsa. A many miles-wide area around Supsa has virtually been sealed off in advance of the event, in which Azerbaijan's President Haydar Aliyev, Shevardnadze, and Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma are taking part, along with high ranking officials from many other countries. Journalists covering the event, as well as participants, are not being allowed to carry mobile phones within about a 50-km (30-mile) radius of Supsa. Military helicopters buzzed over Tbilisi all day on Friday. 12:26 04-16-99 Copyright 1999 Reuters Limited. ============= During the retaliation against Bin Laden Unocal was forced to leave. Was this missile attack secretly designed to remove competing Oil Interests? Marshall ====================== Bombings Worry Overseas Businesses Terrorist Expert Says Anxiety at 'Top of Scale' By MICHAEL WHITE .c The Associated Press LOS ANGELES (Aug. 21) -- Pinkerton Global Intelligence Services was swamped Friday with calls from U.S. corporations looking for ways to protect their overseas employees and property from possible retaliation by terrorists targeted in U.S. missile strikes. ``It's chaos today,'' said Frank Johns, a terrorism expert and managing director of Pinkerton Global, a branch of Pinkerton Service Corp. ``Awareness increases with anxiety, which is at the top of the scale.'' The cruise missile attacks Thursday on suspected terrorist sites in Sudan and Afghanistan and the Aug. 7 terrorist bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania have prompted companies to review security measures and, in some cases, halt work. Unocal Corp. suspended work on a proposed natural gas pipeline that would cross Afghanistan to connect gas fields in Turkmenistan with markets in Pakistan and India. ``It was actually in response to the action Thursday, and there also has been renewed fighting in the country,'' said Terry Covington, a spokesman in Unocal's Houston office. ``I believe the consortium feels ... it needs to review the status of the project.'' Construction had not begun on the project. Unocal, as leader of a seven-company consortium building the line, had conducted preliminary talks with the fundamentalist Taliban and the Northern Alliance, two groups battling for control of Afghanistan, she said. Last weekend, Unocal closed a small office in Pakistan and evacuated four U.S. employees after the State Department issued an advisory warning that Americans could be at risk there, Ms. Covington said. Atlantic Richfield Co. has been in communication with its overseas employees about possible risks, but a spokesman declined to elaborate further about precautions the company has taken. ``In general, yes, we've alerted our people, but I can't say exactly what we're doing,'' said Al Greenstein, spokesman at the company's Los Angeles headquarters. Arco has about 600 employees, including 12 American and Canadian workers, at a southeastern Pakistani oil field that produces about 25,000 barrels of oil a day. The company has taken ``appropriate measures'' to protect the work force there, as well as at smaller operations in Qatar, Dubai and Tunisia, Greenstein said. Arco operates an oil field in Algeria already under tight security because of a conflict between Muslim insurgents and the government. Terrorists typically prefer to attack official government installations, such as an embassy, because of the greater symbolic value, said Ian Lesser, a Rand Corp. senior analyst specializing in terrorism. But as embassies and consulates beef up security, businesses could become more attractive targets, he said. ``Terrorists will always look for relatively soft targets and to the extent that security at official U.S. installations gets better, businesses should take appropriate measures,'' he warned. The difficulty in predicting a terrorist attack means there is a limit to what corporations can do to protect themselves, the Pinkerton's Johns said. Companies like Pinkerton can help clients find security weaknesses, create evacuation plans and anticipate situations in which a company might become vulnerable to attack. In one case earlier this week, he advised a client to cancel a planned trip to Pakistan. Johns declined to identify the company's clients, but said Pinkerton represents more than 80 percent of the U.S. companies on the Fortune 1000 list. ``We try to do for them what the CIA and FBI do for the government: anticipate and point out what we think are the most important security incidents over next 24 hours,'' he said. AP-NY-08-21-98 1849EDT Copyright 1998 The Associated Press.
