Daily Life in America - circa 2011 (long but worthy..)

[Petrodollar Warfare]

(a friend wrote this interesting piece, any comments?)

Daily Life in America - circa 2011

March 20, 2011 6:21 am


“Sam?”……the disembodied voice intoned somewhere in his subconscious.

“Sam.”……He knew that voice starting to swim into realization. He tried to wrap it into a dream he was having and fade back into deeper sleep. It seemed he was dreaming about an antelope herd dashing out across the prairie along a highway almost as fast as his car….such a speed to run! But they seemed at once to move right through the huge transparent mouth of Jean-….

“Samah!” The insistence caused his eyes to shoot open wide.

“What, Jean-Luc?!” Samah Shahrokh came fully awake with slight irritation reflecting his desire to go back to sleep.

“Sam, you remind me often to alert if I sense some ‘unusual’ events taking place on the Finance and Newsnets,” the reply came from a disembodied head floating next to his bed.

“And you know how hard it is for me to forget things,” he added with that lopsided, digitally-generated grin of his.

Jean-Luc, was a holo-incarnation of Captain Jean-Luc Piccard from the old ‘Star Trek’ series Sam loved as a kid growing up in the early 1990s. When he first set up his new system Piccard was the first pick from the thousands of Navigator options given in the menu.

“Well that’s true, but what is it now?” Things seemed relatively quiet last night when he quickly scanned across the various nets before going to bed late. Of course, ‘quiet’ had become so much a relative term these last few years.

Instantly, the single user, holographic projection flat-screen popped into place over the desk next to his bed. He stood up and stretched, then looked over the various icons and crawlers that came up with across the default 1-meter screen presentation. Several of the icons were flashing yellow. It always enthralled him to look at that display as the various data and images played across a screen seeming to hang in midair. However, Sam decided first some wake-up therapy was in order before paying any attention to whatever Jean-Luc was so insistent about. Besides, he hadn’t stated a security warning.

Sam couldn’t know that would only be a temporary condition.

“I need some coffee first,” he said to no one in particular.

He roused and reached out and put his right thumb on the small, oval pad next to the bed. Then, rubbed his face with his hands, hoped to wipe away some of the sleep that still slowed his mind.

The new Dell Diamond 10K-500G was Sam’s newest supercomputer priced around 42,000 Chinese RMB, but it was worth every goldgram he could scrape together. The 3.1 TeraHz artificial diamond machine came loaded with 500 GB of central memory and 2.5 Tera Bytes of organic storage. It was an amazing little “desktop.” The newest diamond processors were getting cheaper for the Homeland Security services now that artificial diamond prices on the open market were down to .5 goldgrams (gg) per produced carat. Every one flawless to a degree of purity 100 times higher than the most flawless natural. Perfect enough for the most intricate masking and doping ever conceived for the descendants of von Neuman’s machine.

He could hear the liquid fluorocarbon coolant injection system whirring behind the locked fireproof wall panel where the machine was actually installed. Even though each processor carried an unconditional warranty and was fairly reliable, the inset wall panels were still recommended for the newer diamond processors. Their internal temperature reached over 800 degrees when computations for decrypting high volume Internet traffic approached 90 teraflops. If by chance the coolant system failed, the processor could melt the case around it. Even if the unit is shut down immediately.

The Dell warranty would replace everything as long as the machine was in a recommended panel. Otherwise, the subsequent fire and damage were the responsibility of the owner.

When Sam set up his new system the System Navigator was configured to pay strict attention to a variety of ongoing items of interest. The thought vaguely slipped through his mind again that he couldn’t remember lately when Jean-Luc had been so insistent. Something definitely must be going on this morning. But coffee first!

Sam walked across the room, down the hall and into the kitchen. Lights came on automatically as he softly padded down the hall in his bare feet. He needed some rich, Moroccan coffee before he started ‘digesting’ what was happening across the globe on the News and FinNets.

The coffee was there waiting on the warmer in his favorite Global Homeland Security (GHS) forces cup. Jean-Luc had already instructed the machine to grind the beans and activate the coffee maker. The Navigator was tied into every appliance and room in the unit and used Sam’s infrared signature to track the owner’s movements through the various spaces.

As he came out of the kitchen he gazed out the large, bullet-proof picture window off the living room. From his 3rd floor unit, far off, just above the horizon to the west, he could clearly see the looming chunk of the Rocky Mountains known as Pikes Peak.

“OK. Let’s see what’s going on in the world. Full screen display” Sam said more to himself than Jean-Luc as he swung around into the main room with the coffee in hand. Instantly, the larger 2-meter work image projection popped into existence in front of the workstation swivel chair Sam flopped into without spilling a drop of the steaming coffee.

Sam was happy that his math skills, programming and analytical talents had gotten him this far. He thought his decision to go to work for the USS Global Homeland Security and leave his native Lebanon had worked out well so far. He made vastly more money in GHS headquarters than he ever could in Beirut. He tried to stay apolitical and detached, to just be an observer, which usually was very hard. Lebanon had only joined the USS reluctantly and after much civil strife at the government’s decision. There were still mixed feelings in his mind about how USS was exerting their power, but he kept those feelings below the surface enough to complete his quarterly security interviews and retain his GHS clearance.

What he liked most was living out here on the High Plains in one of the newest S3 communities on any continent. Self-Sustaining Secure communities were sprouting up all over the globe for those with sufficient financial assets. S3s were becoming very popular as the large metro areas remained so vulnerable along the coasts of the US and around the world.

Those areas were quickly being abandoned by the well off, mostly government and defense workers for the USS, and the executives of various companies. S3 communities were totally self-sustaining with power generation, greenhouses and local markets for most goods. When the world distribution system was operating, Wal-Mart 30 miles up the road had all the other stuff anyone could need. During any disruption, the S3 community provided necessary supplies and energy. He was within 45 minutes of USS/GHS Space Command and NORAD, in Colorado Springs, with a contractual 2-hour report time if work demanded re-location to these facilities.

Security in the S3s was impeccable. Full video surveillance outdoors, fingerprint pass and access within the community and the most advanced firewall security known on the internal CommNets. Even more so than the major metro areas, an S3 was about as protected as one could get with all the conveniences. Everything was fully monitored except inside the residence. Of course, one’s own Navigator kept track of things there. With a FISA Insta-warrant, the Navigator and his records could be searched by the authorities. But if one didn’t break the law, then their privacy was guaranteed! Why were the Luddites so upset?

He supported several in his family on the purchased goldgrams he saved in Gold-backed Internet Currency - GBIC. He received much better bang ‘for’ the Global Notes he was paid in by GHS. His family in Beirut could take the goldgrams out in a favorable currency, or the metal, depending on monetary conditions.

“OK, thank you, Sam. First level voice stress, infrared and biometric verified.” Jean-Luc affirmed, completely assured the body in the room was still the certified owner. Even though the Navigator monitored Sam’s dwelling unit at all times, Jean-Luc was configured to constantly verify the user was his user. Jean-Luc started his report.

“First, Terra Forces in Central Asian RS7 attacked 3 different pipelines last night in quick succession,” Jean-Luc intoned in his reportorial voice. “One in Ali Bayram, Azerbaijan, another in Aktau, Turkmenistan, and the third in Gyzylarbat, Turkimenistan. Preliminary damage estimates suggest several months to repair. Initial assessments suggest charge pulse devices were used which disrupted the structural integrity for 25 kilometers in both directions where the devices were detonated. Some of the pulses reached refinery and distribution centers as well. Officials are reporting “security surveillance gaps” and repair problems due to budget problems. FinNets regarding the Energy market are volatile in different sectors.”

Hmmm….Sam thought everything with the Terra Forces had been under control since the United Security States of North America and Central Europe had set up 2 new security bases and conscripted several thousand locals in Resource Sector 7. There was one in Afghanistan and the other, Turkmenistan, where the new pipeline was located. GHS may have misjudged Terra’s sophistication in the region.

“Well, where does that put USS current deployments,” Sam asked idly. Sam began to think through how the deployments of the USS against Terra Forces States had begun.

Since late 2007, new global geopolitical alignments had shifted dramatically. The new alignments were based around protection of the remaining major gas and oil field deposits throughout the world. They eventually became motivated around new financial alignments as well, created after the collapse of the old United States dollar and the rise of the new Global Note, as well as the GBIC, on the FinNets of which there were now thousands of intranet-interfaced channels as well.

The Global Note (GN) was based on a “basket” of capital-backed currencies, the strongest now being the new Chinese yuan (renimbi) and the euro. The push-pull of the GN between the USS and Terra States was the center of finance action right now. However, more and more commerce and exchange was done directly in goldgrams through the rising power, the GBICs (Gold-backed Internet Currency). Terra States actually made more use of the GBIC for their financing; they had to. They could no longer afford weak currencies to survive against the monster currencies created by the most powerful states. That had been a hard lesson.

GBIC was more stable and secure. With the multi-levels of privacy and security it was nearly impossible for either side to disrupt the GBIC networks as well. Plus, neither side really wanted to. It was too hard to operate in the highly volatile fractional currency environment, even for the USS. It would still be awhile before all governments let go of the ease and convenience afforded the non-backed currency. Though most of the smaller fiat currencies were now going the way of the gas-guzzling Humvee.

Politically-controlled, fiat currencies had one convenience that was really a major drawback for much of the world, only realized in recent years. It allowed governments to wage distributed global war through deficit spending and debt creation. Capital Backed Currency and GBIC naturally reined in the worst effects of any leadership intent on destroying the world. War had to be paid for by those who waged it, instead of their grandchildren. Even so, existing governments still managed to do a lot of waging.

Because the United States had essentially gone bankrupt in the previous decade, the force and reach of their military power was too great to be allowed to erode. Some nations that originally sided against the US in the Iraq war had come back into the fold. Many others were simply forced there by being large creditor nations to the US. The US was propped up in order to use its military to keep the whole world from the chaos of an enormous power vacuum it would otherwise leave. That was the public face put on by the four USS media super conglomerates, at least.

The theory began to unravel when former President Bush’s “War on Terror” transmuted into the “War on Terra.” Bush had solidified a wedge with the first pre-emptive, “mini-nuke” strike against Iran in 2006. Supposedly, the target was against a ‘hidden’ WMD/missile site. Congress had no recourse but to impeach him, given the outrage of the US citizens and the rest of the world, but the damage was already done.

Another automated-voting-machine disaster had secured Bush his second electoral victory in 2004. It was quite an accomplishment for one President. However, public opinion still had some effect back then. On the day he resigned and left office in 2006 he stated, “I am proud to have sacrificed my Presidency for the protection and Freedom of people living in the greater United States and in the United Security States we have established for our common interest.”

“Sam, I have detected something you should know about.” Jean-Luc had interrupted his train of thought. Still no security alert statement.

“Hold on, Jean-Luc,” Sam was slightly annoyed. His Navigator seemed to be very intrusive this morning. “Now where was I?” Sam went back into his retrospective.

The world then continued to split and form into the USS of Finance Control and Resource Sectors in 2008 and Terra States regions in 2009. The USS located its headquarters in Brussels after expanding the site of the old NATO headquarters then superceded by the USS/GHS. Various groupings of consuming nations had split and shifted alliances based on the political opportunities and crises of the moment. A few nations such as Sweden still tried to stay neutral and work with both sides.

The first institution to collapse had been the United Nations, which in late 2006 was disbanded in chaos. Bush’s startling preemptive “mini-nuke” attack on Iran in 2006 caused the UN to condemn the US government in the Security Council’s emergency session. The US quickly vetoed the action then disbanded the entire organization, and President Cheney ordered the disfavored diplomats off US soil. Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz had declared the world body no longer “relevant to global security.”

After gutting and refurbishing the old UN building in Manhattan, the original Halliburton, Inc. had moved into the complex. The newly created Halliburton/Bechtel/Conoco conglomerate was now the largest energy infrastructure and distribution firm in the world after taking over the Iraq and Iran oil fields. The enormous firm had first rights on all new contracts for oil and gas energy in any country that signed the USS treaty.

“Sam! I have several serious alerts coming in on the on the Terra States subnets. The volume of heavily-encrypted traffic has been over 60 Tera-bytes in the last two hours.” Even though the Navigator was a machine, it was almost as if Sam detected a sense of urgency in the voice. But that was impossible. It was his imagination at work. Even the more advanced Navigators and pseudo-AI (Artificial Intelligence) released recently still sounded phony when trying to mimic the range of human emotion, especially subtle emotions, such as urgency. Still no security alert.

Sam said nothing so Jean-Luc pressed ahead. “There appears to be excessive resistance activity occurring in the Far East in Resource Sectors 3 and 11. News Vidstreams and wire services are stating a number of political assassinations have occurred in the last six hours throughout those regions. There are currently 27 streams and 18 key channels operating right now. Do you wish to view a selection?”

By now Sam forgot the cup of coffee still steaming on the table. What was going on? But he was too fully engaged in the analysis of past events in order to gain perspective. He had to have a reference to analyze what he would see and hear when he turned his attention back to the day’s events. The information flow, he felt, was going to be enormous. He had to be mentally ready.

The Terra States essentially were created out of the remaining third-world, energy and mineral resource producing states. Most of them were not previously of enough interest to a USS pre-occupied with the larger resource areas. Many had remained outside of United States control after the US attacks on Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Iran. None too late either. The Saudi government decayed into a level of rot and corruption unknown in modern times. It was relatively easy then for the USS to find a case for yet another joint task force to “maintain stability in the region” by occupying the oil-rich western areas of Saudi Arabia.

The Middle East military attacks effectively allowed taking control of its vast remaining oil wealth. Terra States also included many segments from “old Europe” such as France, Germany, Northern Europe, Russia, and those of the Commonwealth of Independent States and Eastern Europe. Most of them created out of the crash of the Soviet Union back in the early 1990s.

That sudden shift of the world’s political structure from the last century was pushed hard by the confirmation of global “Peak Oil.” Just as there had been huge geopolitical restructuring and movement of borders at the turn of the 20th century, so it was true again in the 21st. Acquisition of oil was the reason the first time around. Depletion of oil was the reason now.

Peak Oil was a concept developed in the 1940s by Dr. M. King Hubbert, a renowned American geophysicist. Also known as the “Hubbert Peak,” it denoted the point where half of the world’s reserve pool of oil was used up. In May of 2008 geologists and petroleum engineers had confirmed that after a 4-year plateau, global Peak Oil had occurred in 2007. The globe was now on the irreversible downward slope towards oil depletion, with reductions in global oil supply estimated to be decreasing at 2.0 to 2.5% per year.

Together with the failed attempt by the US to maintain global hegemony for the US dollar, as the world’s reserve currency, Peak Oil initiated the start of global chaos.

The early opening shot in this endeavor had been the 2003 war in Iraq, which was currently in its ninth year of violent “security operations.” America had tried to solidify its gains early. It became apparent that the many nations in the global leadership and their intelligence/defense structures, behind closed doors, had seen this coming for many years and developed various plans.

However, these geostrategists had not factored in that OPEC would, against the threat of the US, find the audacity and switch to the euro for international oil sales. Norway’s accession to the euro currency in late 2006, and subsequent redenomination of the Brent crude oil marker to the euro pricing system, produced unexpected momentum towards the euro by various OPEC states and Russia. Unlike Iraq, which Saddam Hussein had switched to the "petroeuro" in 2000, there were simply too many countries in OPEC for the US to attack all at once. Of course Russia still had a large nuclear arsenal, which made it impervious to US attack. Threat and bluster failed this time. The OPEC switch became the coup de grace for the US dollar. OPEC fell apart a couple years later, but the damage was done. The dollar almost collapsed after the 2005 Syrian invasion, but it was the following preemptive mini-nuke strike on Iran in 2006 that caused OPEC to collectively switch to the euro for all international oil payments, immediately collapsing the US dollar.

The Dollar Crash, precipitated by the exposure of the US plan to enforce dollar hegemony on the rest of the world along with control of petroleum resources, set off a string of repercussions around the world. The marginal economies of various countries crumbled first. Any country executing the majority of their trade either with the US or other countries in dollars, or pegging their currencies to the dollar, quickly succumbed.

As the crash proceeded, nations holding dollars as their reserve currency began dumping them with abandon to buy euros or gold. When the price became more than $3000 dollars per ounce of gold, it also forced the end of gold trading in dollars. It then switched to the euro currency.

Others attempted to sell their own currency to buy the dollars other nations were selling to try and prop up the dollar. The hoped for effect was to stop their own rising currency from going any higher against the dollar. Japan, in short order, debased their currency to the tune of almost 110 Trillion yen with little effect. This short term strategy was to keep the value of their own currency low enough so that the exports to the US or other dollar based currency would not become prohibitively expensive. This did not work either.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve, on its own mysterious flight path under Chairman Alan Greenspan, continued trying to flood the economy with liquidity and had followed Japan in lowering the central bank rate to 0.25% to “stimulate” economic activity to avoid a “rapid disinflationary effect.” Greenspan-speak for deflation. This had only sped-up the fall into the same liquidity trap Japan fell into in the 1990s. The US economy began crumbling in many different directions from the huge debts of the government and private sector as creditors called in the loans. But then the loans simply went to “non-performing” status. US Treasury Notes were essentially rejected as reserve instruments and ultimately removed from the financial markets.

Thus, this phase had a short shelf life. With over $150 Trillion dollars in cash, credit, securities and derivatives afloat in the world, the giant scheme of massive debt manipulation finally collapsed like the house of cards it was.

In exchange for all that debt the US had acquired decades of enormous assets that were now about to be written down in bankruptcy. Most of the world had spent years stockpiling goods in the US in exchange for paper and electronic blips. They realized too late they really had no call on the US. Worst of all, deficit spending had built the US an enormous military. The Defense Department made it clear that attempting to call on a US-based asset was an act of war, and could be met with violent regime change. The US Navy pursued control of the world sea lanes for oil transport. That was all that really mattered, for the US had no oil to speak of anymore.

That put enormous pressure on Europe and China creating severe economic friction throughout the world. The only thing that saved them was that the EU central banks were able to back the euro with 15% gold reserves, while the dollar was backed by nothing at this point. The EU hastened its stockpiling of gold and silver reserves, hoping to shore up the euro further. China also saved the Renimbi/RMB by quietly buying up gold throughout the world ahead of the crash and stockpiling both it and oil supplies for just such an eventuality. When the end came, they immediately nationalized all the gold in China and used it to keep the Renimbi afloat.

The Dollar Crash, coupled with the fact that the world was now on the down slope of the oil depletion curve, changed the global political structure overnight. Consuming nations that had stridently opposed the United States Imperial aims in the War on Terror now had become new, albeit reluctant, allies--which the United States used to force the creation of the Resource Security and Economic Sectors and the USS--in the War on Terra. Due to then obviously imperial aims of the USS, the Terra States formed in opposition in January 2009.

The Terra States were lead by China and many others in the Asian block. China had become the chief global competitor for petroleum after the United States. Similar to the US, China had less than 2% of global oil reserves—a pittance with which to drive her new engine of wealth creation. India had joined with China after software programming had been almost 100% automated by the creation of Model Driven Architectures and the Unified Modeling Language. MDA/UML caused the collapse of the global outsourcing business for millions of tech jobs throughout Asia and India. Many other Asian and 2nd tier nations followed suit out of sheer survival needs. A huge source of revenue for Asia disappeared virtually overnight. India was also a huge importer of energy now.

Several Latin American countries shifted in and out of the USS and Terra States based on how duplicitously either side had last exploited their government and natural resources. Most Latin America countries remained terrified of the USS and particularly the United States. The terror ensued from the previous so-called “War on Drugs” that had escalated into another arm of the War on Terror in those countries, most notably around the oil pipelines in Columbia. Also, decades of IMF and World Bank manipulation of their economies and foreign adventurism into sovereign politics had not helped them look affectionately towards Europe and North America.

The most visible episode was the “mysterious” plane crash killing President Chavez of Venezuela in April of 2005 after the 3rd attempt to have him recalled failed. It was an open secret in Washington, DC, and foreign capitols that it was a CIA/NRO engineered “accident.” Chavez had remained openly critical of the US in particular and the whole concept of the US hegemony based on military domination. He continually accused President Bush and the Neoconservatives of plotting to overthrow his government.

His death launched Venezuela into civil war only to be stabilized by troops trained in Haiti after the next US puppet was installed on that island and propped-up with hundreds of millions in ‘aid.’ Once the new Venezuelan regime was in place, there was no dissenting voice raised anymore in OPEC meetings by their representative. However, that was not enough to stop the OPEC shift to the euro. President Augusto P. Carmon, like many predecessors in other countries, was a useful US puppet who kept the lid on things by allowing the economy to grow just enough with only near-confiscatory taxes, unlike Chavez who had tried to tax and socialize everything. Most importantly, Mr. Carmon de-nationalized Venezuela’s oil industry for the major US oil conglomerates, something Chavez would not have agreed to.

“…..with the terminal control facility on the Caspian Sea port outlet of Sirgmanz also destroyed.” Jean-Luc’s monotonous voice started to bring Sam back into focus. He then jolted his head around when he realized how he had wandered off the events Jean-Luc was trying to relay this morning. “….the Distilling Breach facility in Silansk was totally destroyed with…”

“Just hold the reports while I think a minute,” pleaded Samah.

“Piccard out.” Sam normally loved Jena-Luc’s little ‘Star Trek’ segues, but now was not the time.

Though vastly outgunned by the USS, the Terra States turned to effective use of distributed rebellion through thousands of low-tech, rebel cells. It had become easy to find recruits since the US first attacked Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003, then Syria and Iran in quick succession in 2005 and 2006. Those attacks were followed by a USS policy termed “full-spectrum-dominance security zones” set up in South America, the Middle East, West Africa, Central Asia and on the Korea peninsula in 2007-2008.

With the advent of the USS, huge numbers of Terra State recruits showed up in training camps all over the globe. The initial terrorist groups attacking the West starting in the late 1990s and into the new century had been mostly disaffected Islamic extremists, but the attacks were now being conducted by diverse groups comprising of ethnic, religious groups and various secular rebel cells, despite the US and USS press still labeled every opponent to its dominance as a “terrorist” and practitioner of “evil.” The four USS media super conglomerates disavowed using terms such as ‘rebels, ‘resistance’ or ‘nationalist’ fighters. The term “terrorist” was the preferred descriptor.

The rebel’s origins in the Middle East and segments of the third world in the latter part of the last century had now grown to virtually every poor nation. Some even had alignments with homegrown US organizations that sprang up to rebel against the increasing imperial, authoritarian and fascist nature of the USS treaty countries. The US itself was now sprouting Terra cells all over the country aligned with regional militias trying to end “the NeoCon/USS threat of total world domination.” The purpose stated was to “restore American dreams of Freedom and Liberty,” as their seized recruiting pamphlets put it.

American and USS leadership didn’t help much. After taking office from the impeached President Bush, President Dick Cheney continued in the same vein. Cheney was faced with impeachment and outright rebellion by Congress when he threatened to mini-nuke the capital of Nigeria for converting to the ‘petroeuro’ system in the fall of 2007 under the “economic domino theory of containment.” But he backed off and managed to stay in power until his term ran out.

Upon leaving office though, he still managed to be highly controversial. When he stepped aboard the Marine One chopper on the White House lawn to head back to Wyoming, he struck an eerie Nixonian pose, raised both hands in a Victory sign and yelled, “The American and USS way of life is not negotiable. What I did made us safer. What I tried to do would have made us safer.”

Upon taking office President Colin Powell was forced to push through the New Conscription Act of 2009 whereby USS signatories had imposed conscription on each of their populations. The previous PATRIOT Conscription Act of 2005, signed into law by President George W. Bush had immediately resulted in large protests in highly isolated “First Amendment Zones” and rioting in some of the large metropolitan areas. But the Office of Homeland Security, working with the National Guard and local law enforcement eventually put down the riots and restored order. Americans generally were becoming too overwhelmed and weary to fight their government.

Colin Powell had run as a Democrat after he had finally resigned just before George W. Bush’s impeachment hearings. He said later that the UN briefing he had given in 2003 to help launch the Iraq War, “…was the most embarrassing and harmful thing I ever did. I am truly sorry to the American people that I briefed that pile of fabrications and BS.” He was elected in a landslide. Americans always liked Colin Powell. They thought he could reverse the increasing tide of domestic authoritarian control that had been loosed in the country.

However, by then no one could stop the huge corporate-military-intelligence juggernaut that was already in place. The power of the structure had simply grown beyond anyone’s control to reverse course. It could only be slightly altered in course direction. The only option ever offered was no option. It was always couched in terms of protecting what was left or complete destruction of the western hemisphere and its associated players on other continents.

Secretary of Defense Wesley Clark began by calling up 2 million draftees. Citizens, male and female, from 18 to 36 years of age were drafted to try and staunch the flow of active duty and reserves out of the US Military. The US had stretched the military to the breaking point and beyond with its new global adventurism and empire. When the added demands of the USS were factored in, it almost broke. Public discussion about Depleted Uranium and evidence suggesting adverse side-effects from U.S. soldiers who had served in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Iran were usually derided as ‘conspiracy theory’ by the Pentagon and media conglomerates. Under the New Conscription Act of 2009 the US inducted about one million new draftees per year to feed into the USS.

The implementation of PATRIOT Act II in mid-2005 in the United States and, quickly thereafter, the Homeland Security Enhancement Act, stifled most massive opposition. The HSEA was passed by an unwilling Congress, after the first dirty bomb event in Seattle killed one-hundred sixty people. Experts determined the bomb comprised of 200 lbs of explosive and 100 lbs of spent Depleted Uranium (DU) particles as a terror inducing weapon that affected approximately 2,800 citizens who were in the immediate area of the explosion. This left south Seattle around SeaTac airport uninhabitable for a couple years during a massive clean-up project. Despite incentives such as no money down/zero interest loans for real estate in the decontaminated area, many people still feared that Depleted Uranium (DU) dusk particles would produce cancer or other health problems, and moved elsewhere.

Syria was quickly accused of the dirty bomb attack by the Pentagon’s new Office of Special Policies (OSP), despite almost worldwide skepticism, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld justified the unilateral US attack on Syria with the statement: “Remember, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." The Director of the CIA, George Tenet, was forced into quick retirement when he was privately overheard referring to the OSP as the “Office of Special Propaganda.” Regardless, other nations of the USS quickly passed their own versions of domestic security acts in order to” protect freedom.” Few average citizens dared criticize or protest the government given their ability to track, monitor and quickly destroy opposition no matter how peaceful.

Thus, large riots and protests had not ensued with the new HSEA. Enduring massive unemployment from the economic shocks of the Dollar Crash had helped. At least the military meant wages and shelter for hungry families. In addition, the populations of the USS had been thoroughly propagandized by the government directed news media. The stubborn citizens were intimidated by the ‘black’ agents of the old Homeland Security Agency, used in conjunction with multiple federal law enforcement agencies to suppress dissent. These agencies were complimented by the new USS FinCen Revenue Service (FCRS), the replacement Service of the broken and obsolete Internal Revenue Service.

The IRS was abolished in late 2006 to assist in the ruse that the US government was benevolent, making the citizens believe that their financial affairs were no longer monitored through their own reporting. The National Emergency Sales Tax Act was substituted for the Income tax at a rate of 19%. This tax policy was first implemented in Iraq following the 2003 Iraq war.

Since financial control of the population had been leveraged by the IRS, the subterfuge of “taxing to raise revenue from personal income” concept was jettisoned in order to improve popular opinion of the faltering government. Sam recalled that many citizens argued when a government can create money by fiat alone, taxing income to “raise revenue” was a flawed process. It was also argued that the previous Sales tax structure was used mostly to control some of the inflationary effects of the low interest rates of the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee (OMC). The Federal Reserve kept waving easy credit in front of the nation to get the citizens to go further into debt buying consumer products and services of dubious or little value.

Now, through the FCRS the government continued monitoring the citizen’s affairs through the network worms they ran in all Federally connected banks, credit cards and credit agencies. They also maintained constant surveillance through NSA on the Internet and corporate intranets they cracked into. Most of the population forgot or never knew that early funding of the original ARPAnet was picked up and expanded by NSA, before the internet protocol and switching technology was released to the public more than 40 years ago. Their knowledge of the technical operation of the internet was more than “intimate.” All data collected was archived for analysis through enormous organic storage facilities located underneath an NRO site on the Dulles Parkway in Virginia. It was rumored the facility contained over 100 Petabytes of storage.

Sam once asked the Director of GHS about these capabilities and was informed this was “need to know” information that was not relevant to his duties at the Global Homeland Security HQ.

The internal authoritarian moves of the United Security States had spawned numerous nationalist and patriotic underground rebellions in many of the treaty countries. Since the US Congress and President Cheney had suspended the Constitution under The National Economic Stabilization and Recovery Act (NESARA) of 2008, America herself had become the hotbed of internal resistance movements. Some were even connected to the Terra States, for which the media conglomerates described as “terrorists who hate freedom.”

“Constitutionalist militias” were formed from the ranks of the massively unemployed population still remaining after the Dollar Crash in early 2006. Roving bands of homeless people, often living out of SUVs that had escaped repossession, were roaming the country looking for work and stealing gasoline whenever possible. Their fear, anger and frustration made them ripe pickings for the militias. The Resistance to Fascism (RTF) militia had even spawned a revival of Gillo Pontecorvo's classic movie from 1965, “The Battle of Algiers,” among rebel groups and militias worldwide.

Sam’s deep train of thought was suddenly jolted back to the present by the flashing of several red indicators on the display in front of him and the sound of Jean-Luc’s disembodied voice. “Sam, there is a problem. I have just detected a Vidstream from the Terra States’ minister’s meeting in Jakarta. There is a major news……”

Sam interrupted the Navigator demanding. “Who is it from?! What is it about?!”

Jean-Luc continued, “The President of the Terra States, Said Musadin has just issued a broadcast calling for the ordered and quick removal of USS forces from Central Asia and around the world.”

“Put it onscreen,” ordered Sam, now feeling a deep sense of foreboding. He rocked back a bit, thinking he sensed what was coming. The last decade had taught everyone on the planet to think more of how fragile civilization is on a near-daily basis. ‘Calm’ had become a very relative term.

President Musadin’s visage appeared in front of him. Musadin was a handsome and rugged-looking man of 55 years, with well chiseled, dark features. He was a highly educated as a politician and as a nuclear physicist. He hesitated for a moment while looking into the camera. It appeared he was in his principal office with the Terra States symbol hanging behind his large glass desk.

“The Terra States regretfully have come to an impasse with the Leadership of the United Security States,” he began in measured, even tones.

“Our nations have been pushed and shoved into tighter and tighter constraints. In the past two decades the posture emanating from North America and portions of Europe has been to practice what they refer to as Democratic Imperialism on us that shows little interest in the significance of our rights, or in Democracy. Post neo-colonialism has failed to recognize our nature in developing our societies.”

“That failure also illuminates the apparent expectation of the USS that at some point we would simply capitulate and turn over our remaining resources and hope for our own economic future.” He paused momentarily.

“That cannot and will not continue to happen,” another pause while President Musadin looked up and away from the camera briefly. Then he focused right back into the lens.

“There has begun a series of debilitating actions against the USS-controlled resource and distribution facilities around the world by patriotic and other groups, both infiltrated and resident in their home countries.” Now he seemed to gain strength.

“No sphere of influence or regional power other than the USS possesses the necessary might to oppose the concentrated use of their force. We do not intend to. Nor is there any center to this opposition that the USS can simply eliminate by concentrated application.” Sam watched for any inflection that would indicate more about the President’s state of mind.

“The demonstrations in the Caspian and Asian regions earlier today were but a prelude. The USS can launch a massive search and destroy effort if they wish, but they will not find these devices. There are approximately 200 of the 1100 major USS energy and resource facilities targeted with various non-nuclear and nuclear devices in place capable of incapacitating those facilities either temporarily or permanently. The successful destruction of those facilities will be the signal for other groups to complete their plans against many of the others. Once those facilities are incapacitated, from one quarter to one third of the USS energy and strategic resource supply will simply halt.”

“The populations of our countries have brutally learned to live at a much lower level of existence than those that initiated or adhered to the USS sphere of control. The danger of, and for, the USS is that they have spent too far ahead of their true wealth to arm, secure and control their voracious appetites.”

“Intentional and unintentional calculation has brought more dependency on the petroleum lifeblood for the veins of USS at the expense of their fellow global citizens. The USS populations are not prepared, particularly in the northern tier climates, to live at the same low level as many of the Terra State populations. The USS must begin earnest negotiations to stop the tyranny….”

The bright flash tone on the screen immediately interrupted all other comms on the display. The icons on the screen indicated heavy encryption was engaged and all security protocols were locked into the receiving client station. The GHS Security Director popped up on the screen in front of Sam.

“This is a joint directive from USS command. All sector personnel are to report immediately to their command and duty stations. This is not a drill. Upon arrival, further orders are…” Sam was not listening.

He blinked at the screen and the Director’s face. His mind went into information overload and then blank at the same instant.

By all that was holy! What have we done?! What is happening? How could Terra hope to win? Could the USS survive such a resource attack? He must get to GHS headquarters.

He jumped from the seat, spilling the coffee on the floor and ran down the hall to start dressing. Jean–Luc would have the cleaning robot out immediately to clean up the spill.

How had this happened? Why was this happening? How did we ever get to such an impasse? He started thinking about his family in Lebanon. He must communicate with them. But no there was no time. He must get to his post. My God, how did we get here?


By J.W.
Former Naval Security Group (NSG)/National Security Agency (NSA), Theater of Operations: Pacific Rim and Far East

[hatrack]

1. Shades of "Oryx And Crake"!

You ought to read Atwood's latest - assuming you haven't already! ;-)

[brokensymmetry]

2. Outstanding!

I wonder - would it violate the rules if this were cross-posted in the energy and natural resources section?