Nr. 10

 As investigative journalist and author, Greg Palast, has reported, the “End Game” memo, dated November 24, 1997 reveals a sinister mindset which underlies moves which have lead to the global financial crisis.

 Essentially it proposes forcing all 158 WTO member nations to eliminate the separation and protection of their banking from risky investment banking maneuvers, as the US Glass Steagall Act was intended until it was repealed.    As Palast writes ” The Memo confirmed every conspiracy freak’s fantasy : that in the late 1990’s, the top US Treasury officials secretly conspired with a cabal of banker big-shots to rip apart financial regulation across the planet “.  Palast further added that ” Until the bankers began their play, the WTO agreements dealt simply with trade in goods – that is, my cars for your bananas.  The new rules devised by Summers and the banks would force all nations to accept trade in “bars” – toxic assets like financial derivatives. “

 Nations which would refuse to go along, as Ecuador initially did, would have their exports blocked.

 Larry Summers was Timothy Geithner’s boss at the time as the Deputy Secretary of Treasury, and Geithner was the Assistant Secretary (International Affairs).

 The meeting with the top bankers resulted in a plan  ” conceived by the Big Bank Five : eliminate controls on banks in every nation on the planet — in one single move.  It was as brilliant as it was insanely dangerous. ” Greg Palast said.   

 Greg Palast added that “…every single nation (was) bullied into signing”.    The bankers re-drafted the Financial Services Agreement (FSA) and that had the effect that, as Palast explains it “…to force all nations to open their markets to Citibank, JP Morgan, and their derivative products.”

 Finally, Palast adds, that at then Secretary of Treasury’s Robert Rubin urging, President Obama would choose Larry Summers to run the Federal Reserve Board, which ”  unfortunately would mean that we are far from the end of the game”.

 Quite noteworthy is that every nation but one, namely Brazil, was bullied into going along with the plan.   

 Palast said that ” New President, Luis Inacio da Silva (Lula) refused. In retaliation, Brazil was threatened with a virtual embargo of its products by the European Union’s Trade Commissioner, one Peter Mandelson, according to another confidential memo (he) got (his) hands on. But Lula’s refusenik stance paid off for Brazil which, alone among Western nations, survived and thrived during the 2007-9 bank crisis. “

  It is also quite noteworthy that while Brazilians joyously celebrated their recently democratically elected President Lula, power center in Washington were attempting to smear Lula’s image by slanderously and dishonestly claiming that he was a “terrorist” and that he was leading Brazil to embark on a nuclear weapons program.    These were the outrageous accusations made by the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and later by the House Committee of International Affairs, Henry Hyde (R).     President George Bush later would award Henry Hyde the Medal of Freedom.

 Kenneth Maxwell, inter alia, wrote about the attempt to defame the Brazilian President in The New York Review of Books.    

See < www.indopubs.com/cc3.html >