Cuba has sent 25,000 doctors to developing countries - more than the World Health Organization (WHO). Currently, it has almost 2,000 doctors working in 14 countries.

George W. Bush is appointed President of the United States by 5-4 vote of the US Supreme Court. Bush and his family claim to be descendants of the House of Plantagenet which is descended from the Royal House of Judah.

General Richard B. Myers, chief of Space Command, states: “The American military is built to dominate all phases and mediums of combat. We must acknowledge that our way of war requires superiority in all mediums of conflict, including space. Thus, we must plan for, and execute to win, space superiority.”

The IMF requires Argentina to cut the government budget deficit from its current $5.3 billion to $4.1 billion by the following year.

In Tanzania with approximately 1.3 million people dying of AIDS, the World Bank and the IMF decide to require Tanzania to charge for what were previously free hospital appointments. They also order Tanzania to charge school fees for their previously free education system. The IMF and World Bank then act surprised when school enrolment drops from 80% to 66%. The IMF and World Bank have been in charge of Tanzania's economy since 1985 during which time Tanzania's GDP drop from $309 to $210 per capita, standards of literacy fall and the rate of abject poverty increases to envelop 51% of the population. When the IMF and World Bank took charge in 1985, Tanzania was a socialist nation.

In June 2000 the World Bank arrogantly reports, "One legacy of socialism is that most people continue to believe the State has a fundamental role in promoting development and providing social services."

There is rioting in Bolivia after the World Bank drastically increases the price of water. The World Bank claims this is necessary to provide for desperately needed repairs and expansion. Since privatization (England was the first country to privatize the public water supply) the quality has dropped and the prices have exploded.

In January Argentina devalues the Peso, wiping out the value of many common peoples' savings accounts. Dismayed that they can't rape the country further, James Wolfensohn, President of the World Bank, states, "Almost all major utilities have been privatized."

On June 21, Eric Newsom, assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, sends a letter to Richard Wilkinson, the director for the Americas at Britain’s Foreign Office, urging the British government to prohibit former inhabitants of the Chagos Islands from returning to any of the islands in the 65-island archipelago. The former inhabitants want to resettle two islands, Salomons and Peros Banhos, which are located about 140 miles from Diego Garcia where a major US military base is located. The letter claims that allowing the islands’ former residents to resettle their homelands “would significantly degrade the strategic importance of a vital military asset unique in the region.” He explains: “If a resident population were established on the Chagos Archipelago, that could well imperil Diego Garcia’s present advantage as a base from which it is possible to conduct sensitive military operations that are important for the security of both our governments but that, for reasons of security, cannot be staged from bases near population centers.... Settlements on the outer islands would also immediately raise the alarming prospect of the introduction of surveillance, monitoring and electronic jamming devices that have the potential to disrupt, compromise or place at risk vital military operations.” He also informs Wilkinson of US plans to expand the base. “In carrying out our defense and security responsibilities in the Arabian Gulf, the Middle East, south Asia and east Africa, Diego Garcia represents for us an all but indispensable platform. For this reason, in addition to extensive naval requirements, the USG is seeking the permission of your government to develop the island as a forward operating location for expeditionary air force operations - one of only four such locations worldwide,” the letter goes on to say.

In London on November 3, Lord Justice Laws and Justice Gibbs rule that the US and Britain’s forced removal of some 1,800 people from the Chagos Islands was illegal, thereby granting the islands’ former inhabitants the right to resettle the archipelago. The court also awards the Chagossians with the costs of resettling but does not order the government to provide them with compensation. The judges also find that the two governments deliberately misled the United Nations and their own legislative bodies when they claimed that the displaced population consisted entirely of seasonal contract workers from Mauritius and the Seychelles and had no right to remain there. Additionally, the ruling criticizes the two governments for not seeing to the welfare of the islanders after they were evicted. Within hours of the ruling, the British Foreign Office accepts the judgment but says that the islanders will only be permitted to resettle on the islands of Penhos Banhos and Salomon. No one will be permitted to return to Diego Garcia, the largest of the islands, where most of the Chagossians once lived. The US is leasing the island until 2016 and is operating a very large naval base there.

Commenting on the case, an unnamed US Defense Department official tells the Los Angeles Times: “The United States does have a strategic interest on Diego Garcia. But this is a matter between the British authorities and the individuals who brought the case. We have no comment on the merits of the case.” The official adds that Diego Garcia “has played a primary role in the support of naval and Air Force units operating in the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf.”

In December after a British court rules that the former inhabitants of the Chagos Islands have a right to return home, the US, which is leasing the archipelago’s largest island, Diego Garcia, says it will not allow the islanders to return to Diego Garcia and will not allow them to use the island’s airstrip. The cost of building an airstrip on one of the other islands would likely cost more than $100 million. Without access to an airfield, it will be difficult, if not impossible, for the islanders to resettle any of the islands.

A CIA report is released in September admitting that the CIA knowingly supported the Pinochet regime’s brutalities, and revealing that the head of Pinochet’s dreaded secret police (responsible for the assassination of an American in Washington DC) was a paid CIA asset.

On September 14, in Geneva, at the Conference on Disarmament, US Ambassador Robert T. Grey, Jr. says that US interest in weaponizing space will not spark an arms race and therefore efforts to establish the proposed Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space (PAROS) treaty would be “unwise,” “unrealistic,” and a waste of time. “The United States agrees that it is appropriate to keep this topic [PAROS] under review,” he says. “On the other hand, we have repeatedly pointed out that there is no arms race in outer space - nor any prospect of an arms race in outer space, for as far down the road as anyone can see.” The US and Israel are the only countries that oppose efforts to outlaw the weaponization of space. Members of the conference express concern that US intentions in space reflect its desire to achieve world hegemony. Grey adamantly denies that the US is motivated by such goals. “We reject allegations that actions or plans of the United States attest to a desire for hegemony, or any intent to carry out nuclear blackmail, or any supposed quest for absolute freedom to use force or threaten to use force in international relations.” He further asserts that this view has “no basis in reality,” because a limited National Missile Defense (NMD) would does “not give anyone ‘hegemony.’” He claims also that hegemony “is unattainable in any case” since the world is so diverse and complex.

In November Jean-Bertrand Aristide runs unopposed in Haiti’s presidential elections and wins with 91.5 percent of the vote. The opposition Democratic Convergence party does not participate in the elections in protest of the May 21, 2000 congressional and municipal elections which its members claim were rigged. The election turnout is disputed. Though some news agencies report a low turnout of between 5% and 10%, Aristide’s party, as well as five US-based NGOs - Global Exchange, the Quixote Center, Witness for Peace, and Pax Christi - estimate the figure at 61%, or 3 million of Haiti’s voters. These figures are also supported by USAID-commissioned Gallup polls taken both before and after the elections, but which are suppressed by the US.

On November 19, a nonviolent demonstration is held calling on the US Army to close its infamous School of the Americas, located at Fort Benning, Georgia. The school trained more than 60,000 Latin American military officers over the past 50 years, many of whom were since implicated in egregious human rights abuses. 1,700 of the protestors are thrown in jail, including an 88-year old nun.

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A group of Air Force officers gather at Schriever Air Force Base for 5 days to conduct war games. The games are centered on a scenario where the US is at war with a country resembling China and the battlefield is in space. Describing the games, MSNBC reports: “[T]he United States and its adversary deployed microsatellites - small, highly maneuverable spacecraft that shadowed the other side’s satellites, then neutralized them by either blocking their view, jamming their signals or melting their circuitry with lasers. Also prowling the extraterrestrial battlefield were infrared early-warning satellites and space-based radar, offering tempting targets to ground stations and aircraft that harassed them with lasers and jamming signals.”

January 11, the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization, chaired by Donald Rumsfeld, issues its report to Congress warning that the US military’s satellites are vulnerable to attack. The military has some 600 satellites that it depends on for photo reconnaissance, targeting, communications, weather forecasting, early warning and intelligence gathering. An attack on these satellites, or on those belonging to US businesses, would be disastrous for the US economy and military, the report says. The report argues that the US must establish a military presence in space to protect its assets from a “Space Pearl Harbor” and asserts that warfare in space is a “virtual certainty.” To counter this vulnerability, the commission recommends that the US develop “superior space capabilities,” including the ability to “negate the hostile use of space against US interests.” It must project power “in, from and through space,” the report says. The president should “have the option to deploy weapons in space to deter threats to and, if necessary, defend against attacks on US interests.”

The United States Government begins funding and training a 600-member paramilitary army of anti-Aristide Haitians in the Dominican Republic with the authorization of the country’s president, Hipolito Mejia. The funds - totaling $1.2 milllion - are directed through the International Republican Institute (IRI) on the pretext of encouraging democracy in Haiti. In order to evade attention, the paramilitary soldiers appear at their training sessions dressed in the uniforms of the Dominican Republic national police. The training - provided by some 200 members of the US Special Forces - takes place in the Dominican villages of Neiba, San Cristobal, San Isidro, Hatillo, Haina, and others. Most of the training takes place on property owned by the Dominican Republic Government. Technical training, conducted once a month, takes place in a Santo Domingo hotel through the IRI. Among the Hatians that take part in the program are known human rights violators including Guy Philippe and Louis-Jodel Chamblain.

Under the leadership of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the Haitian government engages in cooperative projects with Cuba and Venezuela. The Chavez government offers to provide oil at significantly reduced prices, and treaties between Haiti and Cuba result in a presence of more than 800 Cuban medical workers in Haiti. In an explicit challenge to US domination of the regional trade patterns, Haiti works with other island nations to create a regional trading bloc that “may be a bulwark against the FTAA and other [US-led] initiatives.” Haiti and other Latin American countries regularly discuss regional strategies to reduce US hegemony in the region.

The US convinces several European countries to suspend hundreds of millions of dollars in credit and aid and provide the IMF, World Bank, and European Union with “vague instructions” to deny other lines of credit to impoverished Haiti. The resumption of aid and credit is made contingent on Aristide coming to an agreement with the opposition party, the Democratic Convergence, which is controlled and financed by Haitian and US right-wing interests.

The US Government knowingly harbors Nguyen Huu Chanh, leader of the “Government of Free Vietnam,” an organization actively seeking to overthrow the Communist government of Vietnam. From his suburban office complex in Garden Grove, California, he plans and directs attacks against Vietnamese targets. The Vietnam government considers Chahn its most-wanted terrorist and has asked the United States to halt the plotter’s activities.

In April, Lt. Col. Donald Miles, spokesman for Air Force Space Command in Colorado Springs, tells MSNBC.com: “Space is the ultimate high ground. The high ground has always provided an advantage, whether it’s a hill, a balloon, an observation aircraft or air superiority. You take that to the next level, and we’re talking about space superiority.” MSNBC also interviews Paul Stares, an expert on space at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University, for an article it is preparing on US plans to weaponize space. Stares is very critical of these plans, arguing that it will spark a new arms race and ultimately increase the vulnerability of US military and commercial assets in space. “It is currently not in the US interest to develop an anti-satellite system,” he says. “We have more to lose than gain from developing such a system. So you really have to wonder at the end of the day whether this is a path we really want to encourage others to go down.” Other experts interviewed by MSNBC have similar opinions. Michael Krepon, president of the Henry L. Stimson Center, also says that by weaponizing space, it would encourage others to do the same.

In May, Spanish Armed Forces conduct Operation Balboa, a military exercise involving a simulated attack on the western part of Venezuela. The attack is in response to a scenario where a popularly supported group has proposed “actions against the interests of the legally constituted government” and against properties of the US. The UN Security Council calls on the Venezuelan Revolutionary Force (VFL), which is operating in the western part of the country, to end its belligerent actions and come to an agreement with the national government. When the VFL fails to make peace, the Council authorizes the creation of an allied Joint Combined Force - led by the US and its allies - to rescue the foreign residents. According the “General Rules of Simulation” and the “Specific Exercise Plan for Operation Balboa,” the goal of the mock operation is to “destroy the enemy air force’s potential, support the ground troops, occupy the northwest part of [Venezuela] to recover the [petroleum] capital, blockade the main ports in the occupied territory, and secure land communications to maintain logistic flow and military control of the area.” 36 Lieutenant Colonels, other Spanish Air Force officials, as well as officials from other countries, participate in the exercise. Intelligence about Venezuela used in the exercise is provided by the US and NATO.

At this point in Argentina unemployment is running at 20% of the working population when the IMF demands an elimination of the deficit. The IMF has some ideas of how this could be achieved, by cutting the government's emergency employment program from $200 a month to $160 a month. They also ask for an across the board 12-15% cut in salaries for civil servants and the cutting of pensions to the elderly by 13%. By December, middle class Argentinians sick of literally hunting the streets for garbage to eat, start to burn down Buenos Aires.

Operation Northwoods documents are declassified detailing the US military’s past plans to commit terrorist attacks in the US and blame them on Castro’s government in order to create public support for a war against Cuba. The documents are dated March 9, 1962 and are written by the Department of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff Representative on the Caribbean Survey Group for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The papers suggest several possible events that the US could fabricate, including the sinking of boats of Cuban refugees, hijacking planes, blowing up a US ship, and even orchestrating violent terrorism in US cities. One of the document’s authors notes, “casualty lists in US newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation.”

One week prior to the WTC attack, the Zim Shipping Company moves out of its offices in the WTC, breaking its lease and costing the company $50,000. No reason has ever been given, but Zim Shipping Company is half owned by the State of Israel (The Rothschilds).

On September 5th, Mohamed Atta and several other alleged hijackers make an unexplained visit onboard one of pro-Israeli lobbyist, Ashkenazi Jew, Jack Abramoff’s casino boats. No investigation as to what they were doing there has been allowed.

It's discovered that US drug agents’ communications have been penetrated. Suspicion falls on two companies, AMDOCS and Comverse Infosys, both owned by Israelis. AMDOCS generates billing data for most US phone companies and is able to provide detailed logs of who is talking to whom. Comverse Infosys builds the tapping equipment used by law enforcement to eavesdrop on all American telephone calls, but suspicion forms that Comverse Infosys, which gets half of its research and development budget from the Israeli government, has built a back door into the system that is being exploited by Israeli intelligence and that the information gleaned on US drug interdiction efforts is finding its way to drug smugglers. The investigation by the FBI leads to the exposure of the largest foreign spy ring ever uncovered inside the United States, operated by Israel. Half of the suspected spies are arrested when 9-11 occurs.

On September 11th the attack on the World Trade Center is orchestrated by Israel with the complicity of Britain and America as a pretext for removing the liberty of people worldwide in exchange for security, just as what happened with the Reichstag fire in Germany where the citizens were deceived into giving up liberty for security. They also will use the attacks to gain control of the few nations in the world who don’t allow Rothschild central banks; less than 1 month after the attacks, US forces attack Afghanistan, 1 of only 7 nations in the world who don’t have a Rothschild controlled central bank.

5 Israelis are arrested for dancing and cheering while the World Trade Towers collapse. Supposedly employed by Urban Moving Systems, the Israelis are caught with multiple passports and a lot of cash. Two of them are later revealed to be Mossad. As witness reports track the activity of the Israelis, it emerges that they were seen at Liberty Park at the time of the first impact, suggesting a foreknowledge of what was to come. The Israelis are interrogated, and then eventually sent back to Israel.

The owner of the moving company used as a cover by the Mossad agents abandons his business and flees to Israel. The US Government then classifies all of the evidence related to the Israeli agents and their connections to 9-11. All of this is reported to the public via a four part story on Fox News by Carl Cameron. Pressure from Jewish groups, primarily AIPAC, forces Fox News to remove the story from their website. Two hours prior to the 9-11 attacks, Odigo, an Israeli company with offices just a few blocks from the World Trade Towers, receives an advance warning via the internet. The manager of the New York Office provides the FBI with the IP address of the sender of the message, but the FBI does not follow this up. The FBI is investigating 5 Israeli moving companies as possible fronts for Israeli intelligence.

Following the World Trade Center attack, anonymous letters containing anthrax are sent to various politicians and media executives. Like the 9-11 attack this is immediately blamed on Al-Qaeda, until it is discovered that the anthrax contained within those letters is a specific type of weaponized anthrax made by a US military laboratory. The FBI then discovers the main suspect for these anthrax letters is Ashkenazi Jew, Dr. Philip Zack, who had been reprimanded several times by his employers due to offensive remarks he made about Arabs. Dr. Philip Zack, was caught on camera entering the storage area where he worked at Fort Detrick which is where the Anthrax was kept. At this point, both the FBI and the mainstream media stopped making any public comments on the case.

Professor Joseph Stiglitz, former Chief Economist of the World Bank, and former Chairman of President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers, goes public over the World Bank's Four Step Strategy, which is designed to enslave nations to the bankers; summarized below:

• Step One: Privatisation. This is actually where national leaders are offered 10% commissions to their secret Swiss bank accounts in exchange for them trimming a few billion dollars off the sale price of national assets. Bribery and corruption, pure and simple.
• Step Two: Capital Market Liberalization. This is the repealing any laws that taxes money going over its borders. Stiglitz calls this the, "hot money," cycle. Initially cash comes in from abroad to speculate in real estate and currency, then when the economy in that country starts to look promising, this outside wealth is pulled straight out again, causing the economy to collapse. The nation then requires IMF help and the IMF provides it under the pretext that they raise interest rates anywhere from 30% to 80%. This happened in Indonesia and Brazil, also in other Asian and Latin American nations. These higher interest rates consequently impoverish a country, demolishing property values, savaging industrial production and draining national treasuries.
• Step Three: Market Based Pricing. This is where the prices of food, water and domestic gas are raised which predictably leads to social unrest in the respective nation, now more commonly referred to as, "IMF Riots." These riots cause the flight of capital and government bankruptcies. This benefits the foriegn corporations as the nations remaining assets can be purchased at rock bottom prices.
• Step Four: Free Trade. This is where international corporations burst into Asia, Latin America and Africa, whilst at the same time Europe and America barricade their own markets against third world agriculture. They also impose extortionate tariffs which these countries have to pay for branded pharmaceuticals, causing soaring rates in death and disease

There are a lot of losers in this system, but a few winners - the bankers. In fact the IMF and World Bank have made the sale of electricity, water, telephone and gas systems a condition of loans to every developing nation. This is estimated at $4 trillion of publicly owned assets.

In September of this year, Professor Joseph Stiglitz is awarded the Nobel Prize in economics.

Jewish Defense League Chairman since 1985, Ashkenazi Jew, Irv Rubin is jailed for allegedly plotting to bomb a mosque and the offices of a Arab-American congressman. He dies shortly after slitting his throat in a suicide attempt, before he can be brought to trial.

On October 3, Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, makes the following statement to Ashkenazi Jew, Shimon Peres, as reported on Kol Yisrael radio: "Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that....I want to tell you something very clear, don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it."

US B-52 bombers use the military base at the island of Diego Garcia to launch attacks against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

On December 20,Chagossians file a class action suit against the US government suing for reparations and the right to return to their homes on the Chagos Islands. They were evicted from the islands in the early 1970s so the US could build a military base on the island of Diego Garcia. The suit accuses the US government, as well as numerous past and present officials, with trespass, intentional infliction of emotional distress, forced relocation, racial discrimination, torture, and genocide. The Chagossians are not asking the US government to abandon the island and say they are willing to work on the base.

In November, Venezuelan Rear Admiral Carlos Molina, along with a group of dissident officers led by Air Force Colonel Pedro Soto begin planning the overthrow of President Hugo Chavez. At some point before the coup, he leaves the group to join a more powerful faction of senior navy and national guard officers.

December 28, The San Francisco Examiner publishes an article speculating that the US may be planning a coup in Venezuela. The article also notes that Chavez has reduced inflation from 40% to 12%, generated economic growth of 4%, and increased primary school enrollment by 1 million students.

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Guatemala is ranked 120th out of 173 countries in the UN Development Index.

US involvement in El Salvador is being put forward by some in Washington as a model for a possible solution for Colombia’s 30-year civil war.

Venezuelan Air Force Colonel Pedro Soto makes a public statement calling on President Hugo Chavez to resign. Days later, Venezuelan Rear Admiral Carlos Molina, Chavez’s former national security advisor, appears on television to demand Chavez’s resignation. Molina is a well known figure and according to the Washington Post, “even the president’s supporters interpreted the break as an alarming sign of the depth of opposition to Chavez ... .” It is later learned that Soto and Molina both receive $100,000 from a bank in Miami for this denouncement. Two days after Molina's calls for Chavez’s resignation, two staff members of the International Republican Institute, Michael Ferber and Elizabeth Winger Echeverri, approach Molina. Recalling the encounter, Molina later tells the Washington Post: “They wanted to talk about human rights, democracy, their operation in Washington. I can’t remember what else we discussed.”

In March The International Republican Institute brings a group of Chavez opposition figures, including members of Venezuela’s largest labor and business groups, to Washington for a panel discussion on the threats to democracy in Venezuela. The group also arranges a series of meetings between the Chavez opponents and members of Congress and the administration.

Venezuelan Rear Admiral Carlos Molina reportedly attends meetings with US officials during the weeks leading up to the April 11 overthrow of Hugo Chavez, according to several retired Venezuelan military officers and members of the post-coup provisional government. Admiral Molina however denies this in a post-coup interview with the Washington Post. According to Molina, he had not had any contact with US officials “for many months.”

On March 5, the CIA notes in its daily Senior Executive Intelligence Brief that “[o]pposition to President Chavez is mounting.” A heavily redacted copy of the document is later obtained by freelance investigative reporter Jeremy Bigwood. The lead sentence in one of the document’s paragraphs states, “A successful coup would be difficult to mount.” The remaining text of the paragraph - which appears to be an additional four lines in length - is whited out.

March 11, a CIA Senior Executive Intelligence Brief reports: “There is increased signs that Venezuelan business leaders and military officers are becoming dissatisfied with President Chavez, and he clearly is concerned and is trying to tone down his rhetoric. The opposition has yet to organize itself into a united front. If the situation further deteriorates and demonstrations become even more violent, or if Chavez attempts an unconstitutional move to add to his powers, the military may move to overthrow him.”

Between Late March and Early April, Venezuelan Vice Admiral Carlos Molina and Air Force Colonel Pedro Soto each receive $100,000 from a Miami bank account for denouncing Chavez.

On April 1, a CIA Senior Executive Intelligence Brief reports: “President Chavez is facing continued strong opposition from the private sector, the media, the Catholic Church, and opposition political parties angered by a host of laws he decreed in December. Reporting suggests that disgruntled officers within the military are still planning a coup, possibly early this month. An attempted coup would risk considerable violence and a severe crackdown by Chavez on any domestic opposition.”

April 6, the CIA files a Senior Executive Security Briefs stating: “[D]issident military factions, including some disgruntled senior officers and a group of radical junior officers, are stepping up efforts to organize a coup against President Chavez, possibly as early as this month.... To provoke military action, the plotters may try to exploit unrest stemming from opposition demonstrations slated for later this month or ongoing strikes at the state-owned oil company PSVSa.” The brief also notes, “The level of detail in the reported plans [censored] targets Chavez and 10 other senior officials for arrest - lends credence to the information, but military and civilian contacts note that neither group appears ready to lead a successful coup and may bungle the attempt by moving too quickly.” But is also says that “repeated warnings that the US will not support any extra-constitutional moves to oust Chavez probably have given pause to the plotters.” Senior Executive Security Briefs are one level below the highest-level Presidential Daily Briefs and are distributed to roughly 200 top-level US officials.

April 8, the CIA states in its daily Senior Executive Intelligence Brief, “Disgruntled officers are planning a coup, although the military and the opposition as a whole appear to prefer that Chavez be removed by constitutional means.” The document adds, “An attempted coup would risk considerable violence and a severe crackdown by Chavez on any domestic opposition.”

April 11, Chavez is overthrown in a military coup. However, the coup collapses after two days, and Chavez returns to power. Otto J. Reich, the US’ assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, is in contact with Chavez’s successor on the very day he takes over. The Bush administration claims Reich was pleading with him not to dissolve the National Assembly.

April 12, George A. Folsom, president of the International Republican Institute, applauds the ouster of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. “The Venezuelan people rose up to defend democracy in their country,” he says in a statement. “Venezuelans were provoked into action as a result of systematic repression by the government of Hugo Chavez.” Every major paper in the USA runs a story that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez had resigned as he was, "unpopular and dictatorial." President Chavez, demonized by the controlled western media, gives milk and housing to the poor and gives land not used for production by big plantation owners for more than 2 years, to those without land. His big crime however, is passing a petroleum law that doubles the royalty taxes from 16% to 30% on new oil discoveries, which affects ExxonMobil and other international oil operators. He also takes full control of the state oil company, PDVSA, which was nominally owned by the government, but actually controlled by international oil companies. President Chavez fully rejects the World Bank's Four Step Strategy and their plans to reduce wages of the people for the benefit of the bankers. President Chavez indeed increases the minimum wage by 20%, which increases the purchasing power of the lower paid workers and strengthens the economy. His minister, Miguel Bustamante Madriz, fully aware of the danger Venezuela poses to the bankers, states, "America can't let us stay in power. We are an exception to the new globalization order. If we succeed, we are an example to all the Americas."

April 16, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez alleges that “a plane with US registration numbers was at an army airstrip on Venezuela’s Orchila Island, one of five places he was held in captivity during his brief removal from power,” reports the BBC.

April 17, an unnamed US senior administration official says, “The United States did not know that there was going to be an attempt of this kind to overthrow - or to get Chavez out of power.”

April 18, US President George W. Bush warns Chavez to draw a lesson from the unrest that his country has just experienced and insists that he commit himself to democracy. “If there’s lessons to be learned, it’s important that he learn them,” Bush says in a meeting with Colombian President Andres Pastrana.

April 21, an official investigation by the Venezuelan government reveals that two high-ranking US officers joined the Venezuelan military commanders who backed the coup at Fort Tiuna, the largest military base in Caracas, where President Hugo Chavez was forcibly taken after being captured by soldiers supporting the overthrow of his government. By May 14, Chavez claims he has proof of US military involvement in the events that took place in April, claiming “he has radar images showing a foreign military vessel, a plane and a helicopter violating the country’s waters and air space during the failed coup,”

Webster's Third New International Dictionary (Unabridged), re-printed in 2002, provides a new definition of Anti-Semitism which has not been updated since 1956. It reads, "Anti-Semitism: (1) hostility toward Jews as a religious or racial minority group, often accompanied by social, political or economic discrimination (2) opposition to Zionism (3) sympathy for the opponents of Israel."

It is definition (2) and (3) that are added in the 2002 edition, just before the USA decides to invade Iraq under orders from Israel.

Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon orders the massacre in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank.

East Timor officially becomes an independent state on May 19

The DEA issues a report that Israeli spies, posing as art students, have been trying to penetrate US Government offices. Police near the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station in southern Washington State stop a suspicious truck and detain two Israelis, one of whom is illegally in the United States. The two men were driving at high speed in a Ryder rental truck, which they claimed had been used to, "deliver furniture." The next day, police discover traces of TNT and RDX military-grade plastic explosives inside the passenger cabin and on the steering wheel of the vehicle. The FBI then announce the tests which showed explosives were, "false positives," by cigarette smoke, a claim test experts say is ridiculous. Based on an alibi provided by a woman, the case is closed and the Israelis are handed over to INS to be sent back to Israel. One week later, the woman who provided the alibi vanishes.

David Rockefeller publishes his autobiography, 'Memoirs' in which he states: "For more than a century, ideological extremists at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure - one world, if you will.

If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it."

In October Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez claims to have foiled another coup plot to remove him from office. October 20, Chavez claims to have escaped an assassination attempt while returning from a trip to Europe.

In October the US ships 20,000 M-16s to the Dominican Republic. Though some US officials will later claim that the weapons transfer had only been agreed to at this time - not completed - there will be much evidence to the contrary. According to the Florida-based website, fuerzasmildom.com, which provides a detailed history and description of the Dominican military forces, the Dominican military receives a “donation of 20,000 surplus M16 rifles from the US Military Assistance Program” in October 2002. Additionally, according to one of the staff aides of US Senator Christopher Dodd, several Defense Department letters written in 2002 and 2003 appear to show that the weapons transfer had been completed. After Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide is ousted a year and a half later, his attorney, Ira Kurzman, will tell Fox News that the guns had been provided to the Dominican by the US “in an operation called Jade Project where they secretly trained Dominican army people.”

In November the US sends a formal request to Britain for permission to launch “offensive actions” from Diego Garcia against Iraq. Although the US already has a military base on the island, it can only be used for defense and training, unless Britain grants the US special permission. America wants its B-2 stealth bombers to run sorties from the island.

In December the “Coalition of 184 Civic Institutions” is established. It is comprised of Haitian NGOs funded by USAID and/or the International Republican Institute (IRI ), the Haitian-American Chamber of Commerce, as well as several other groups. The coalition’s leader is Andre Apaid, a US citizen born to Haitian parents who is the head of Alpha Industries,“one of the oldest and largest assembly factories in Haiti.” His factories - located in Haiti’s free trade zones - produce textiles and assemble electronic products for several US companies, including Sperry/Unisys, IBM, Remington and Honeywell, some of which are used in US Government computers and US Defense Department sonar and radar equipment. According to a report by the National Labor Committee, Apaid’s businesses are known to have forced their employees to work 78-hour work-weeks at wages below the minimum rate.

In December, Venezuela's employers begin to “strike” - referred to by some as an employers’ lockout. The strike ends after 63 days. Although some oil workers continue striking, oil output slowly returns to a level about half of pre-strike production. For the 2-month duration of the strikes, the only commercials on Venezuelan TV are pieces by the opposition attacking Chavez.

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This year's Human Development Index - which ranks countries according to life expectancy, educational attainment and adjusted real income - places Cuba in the 52nd position out of 175 countries. Of its closest neighbors, Haiti ranks 150th, the Dominican Republic 94th, Grenada 93rd and Jamaica 78th.

In February Stanley Lucas, who is the point man in Haiti for the Republican-dominated International Republican Institute based in the Dominican Republic, meets with Haitian rebel Guy Philippe and his men. Three months later the group will cross into Haiti and attack a hydroelectric power plant. Lucas has long ties to the Haitian military. After the toppling of Aristide’s government 12 months later, it will be learned that the group had been funded and trained through the IRI.

A friend of John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, allegedly tells Perkins that a private contractor recently asked him if he would be interested in fomenting strikes in Caracas and bribing military officers to turn against Chavez. According to Perkins, his friend has “led clandestine operations in many countries,” but never under the direct employment of any government.

The US invades Iraq on March 19th, the holy "Day of Purim," in the Jewish calendar. This Day of Purim is a day the Jews celebrate their victory over Ancient Babylon, which is now based within the borders of Iraq. Interestingly enough, the previous US-led invasion of Iraq ended on the Day of Purim ten years earlier with the slaughter of 150,000 fleeing Iraqis under George H.W. Bush.

Iraq is now one of 6 nations left in the world who don’t have a Rothschild controlled central bank. This war is mainly about stealing Iraq’s water supply for Israel and is being fought with the blood of the American military which the State of Israel control. Israel has always struggled for water, it had to steal the Golan Heights from Syria which provided Israel with one third of its fresh water 36 years before, yet still in Israel water extraction has surpassed replacement by 2.5 billion meters in the last 25 years. This means the water is far more precious to them than the oil reserves which are the second largest reserves of oil on the planet.

US President George W. Bush’s brother Jeb Bush makes a large contribution to the Cancun World Trade talks, defending the US’s tariff on orange juice which protects Florida’s citrus industry. In 1985, the US had imported half a billion gallons of orange juice from Brazil, and 20 million gallons from the rest of the world. These figures now stand at 150 million gallons and 100 million gallons respectively as a result of the tariffs. Another Bush family member, brother Marvin Bush, may be able to explain Jeb’s interest in these subsidies - he holds 30,000 shares in a business which is directly dependent on continued Brazilian tariffs to keep its business.

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed states in a speech, "Jews rule the world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them."

George W. Bush, during an official state visit to Auschwitz, utters the immortal words: "History tells us what's possible."

On April 28, the Haitian Press Agency (AHP) reports that diplomats at the Organization of American States are openly circulating demands for the removal of Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. “One document’s author suggested that it would be best if the situation kept deteriorating, saying that any aid should be blocked until 2005 in order to eliminate the party in power, Fanmi Lavalas, which will be of no help to the population, according to him.” Though the news report does not provide any names, one possible source for the remarks is Roger Noriega, the US permanent representative to the Organization of American States. Noriega is a known critic of Aristide.

May 6, Dominican police arrest five Haitians, including Arcelin Paul, the official Democratic Convergence representative in the Dominican Republic, who they believe are plotting the overthrow of Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s government. Also at this time, there is a US build-up along the Dominican border, where “900 US soldiers patrol jointly with the Dominican army, whom they have armed with 20,000 M16s.” Ben Dupuy, general secretary of the left-wing party PPN, tells the left-wing Haiti Progres, “There is no doubt these guys are true terrorists working with the CIA under Dominican protection.” Documentary filmmaker Kevin Pina, who has been covering Haiti for over a decade, calls this the “US funding of the Haitian ‘Contras.’” A September 2003 article in the magazine, Dollars and Sense, will comment: “Whatever we call them, there is an organized and well-funded armed group with ties to the Convergence, based in the Dominican Republic, which aims to overthrow the Aristide government. The Bush administration’s support for the Convergence and its refusal to denounce this violence, as well as the US military presence along the border, through which the ‘Manman’ army easily travels, clearly implicates the United States in this aim.”

On June 18, commenting on the US military base at Diego Garcia, former US Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger tells CNN: “It is critical to American security and has steadily grown more critical. Indeed, it is one of the wisest investment of government funds that we have seen over the last three or four decades. ... It’s always preferable not to have inhabitants around. It reduces any risk of intelligence operations against the base and the possibility of sabotage.”

In July Haiti uses more than 90% of its foreign reserves to pay $32 million in debt service to its international creditors, requiring Aristide’s government to end fuel subsidies and slash spending on health and education programs. Haiti’s debt is of dubious legality, however, as the London-based Haiti Support Group explains: “Haiti’s debt to international financial institutions and foreign governments has grown from $302 million in 1980 to $1.134 billion today. About 40% of this debt stems from loans to the brutal Duvalier dictators, who invested precious little of it in the country. This is known as ‘odious debt’ because it was used to oppress the people, and, according to international law, this debt need not be repaid.” The debt payment increases public dissatisfaction with Aristide’s administration.

Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide demands that France return the money Haiti had paid to its former colonizer in service of a dubious debt agreement the country had been forced to accept - under threat of re-colonization - in 1825. The exact amount, with interest added and adjusted for inflation, is $21,685,135,571.48. France will later back the removal of Aristide in February 2004.

October 9, the British High Court rules that the former inhabitants of the Chagos Islands have no grounds for bringing a claim against the British government and no realistic prospect of succeeding, even though a ruling in 2000 had determined that Britain’s mass eviction of the islanders in the early 1970s had been illegal. In his 750-page ruling, Justice Ouseley complains that the plaintiffs did not provide reliable evidence that individual Chagossians had been “treated shamefully by successive UK governments.” He did however acknowledge that the mass eviction was not just and that compensation received so far by the Chagossians was inadequate. “Many were given nothing for years but a callous separation from their homes, belongings and way of life and a terrible journey to privation and hardship,” he says. During the trial, the attorney general and British Indian Ocean Territory Commissioner claimed that the islanders had not opposed being removed from their homes and shipped to a foreign land with little or no assistance. They also denied allegations that the mass eviction had been implemented dishonestly or in bad faith.

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In January, Washington awards Chavez-coup plotter Gustavo Cisnero the Inter-american Economic Council’s “Prestigious Excellence in Leadership” award. On February 3, VHeadline.com reports that the Bush administration is planning another coup in Venezuela.

Rebels take over cities in northern Haiti and move towards Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, overrunning President Aristide’s local police forces and vowing to overthrow President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The rebels include various factions. The leading groups are led by Louis-Jodel Chamblain, a convicted murderer and former death squad leader under “Baby Doc” Duvalier, and Guy Philippe, also a known human rights violator.

February 28, Aristide is escorted on a US-charted jet to the Central African Republic. The details of this event are disputed.

US' version of events: Aristide contacts US ambassador James Foley on the night of January 28 and asks him three questions: “What did he think would be best for Haiti? Would the United States guarantee his protection? And could he choose his destination for exile?” At 11pm, Ambassador Foley informs Aristide that the United States can ensure his safe departure if he decides to resign and adds that this is what the Bush administration feels he should do. Aristide and his American wife decide that they will accept the American offer. Later in the night, Foley attempts to email the president but Aristide’s computer has already been packed. Some time after midnight, Ambassador Foley telephones the US Embassy’s second-ranking officer in Port-au-Prince, Luis Moreno, and asks that he escort Aristide and his wife to the airport. Shortly after 4 am, US Diplomat Luis Moreno arrives at the gates of Aristide’s residence in the suburb of Tabarre with a fellow US diplomat and six State Department security officers. Inside Aristide’s house the lights are on. Aristide meets Moreno at the door with his suitcases packed. “You know why I’m here,” Moreno says in Spanish. “Yes, of course,” Aristide is quoted as saying in response. Moreno asks Aristide for a resignation letter and Aristide promises to give one to him before he leaves the island. “You have my word and you know my word is good,” Aristide is quoted as saying. They then travel to the airport in separate vehicles, without any further conversation. They arrive at the airport and about 20 minutes before the plane arrives, Moreno again asks for the letter. Aristide provides the letter and then the two converse for the next few minutes. “I expressed sadness that I was here to watch him leave,” Moreno later tells The Washington Post. “Sometimes life is like that,” Aristide responds. “Then I shook his hand and he went away.” A US-charted commercial plane arrives in Port-au-Prince at approximately 4:30am. US authorities do not force Aristide onto the leased plane. He goes willingly. At 6:15am, the plane departs. “He was not kidnapped. We did not force him on to the airplane. He went onto the airplane willingly, and that’s the truth,” Secretary of State Colin Powell claims. “The allegations that somehow we kidnapped former President Aristide are absolutely baseless, absurd.”

Aristide's version of events: US soldiers arrive at Aristide’s residence and order the president not to use any phones and to come with them immediately. Aristide, his wife Mildred and his brother-in-law are taken at gunpoint to the airport. Aristide is warned by US diplomat Luis Moreno that if he does not leave Haiti, thousands of Haitians would likely die and rebel leader Guy Philippe would probably attack the palace and kill him. Moreover, the US warns Aristide that they are withdrawing his US-provided security. Aristide composes and signs a letter explaining his departure. The president, his wife, and his brother-in-law board a commercial jet charted by the US government. His own security forces are also taken and directed to a separate section of the plane. During the flight, Aristide and his wife remain in the company of soldiers. The shades on the windows of the plane are kept down. Soldiers tell him they are under orders not to tell him where he is going. The plane stops first in Antigua, where it stays on the ground for two hours, and then flies for six hours across the Atlantic to the Central African Republic. Aristide is unable to communicate with anyone on the ground during the entire 20-hour period he is on the plane because it is presumably not equipped with a telephone. Shortly before touchdown, Aristide is informed that the destination is the Central African Republic. Upon arrival, Aristide is escorted to the “Palace of the Renaissance,” where he makes one phone call to his mother in Florida and her brother. He is provided a room with a balcony, but is not permitted to move around, and he remains in the company of soldiers. His phone is taken away by African authorities and he is not provided a replacement or a landline. On the morning of March 1, he contacts US Congresswomen Maxine Waters and family friend Randall Robinson with a cell phone that is smuggled to him. In an interview with CNN, he says he considers the events a “coup d’etat” and a “modern” version of kidnapping.

Joseph Pierre's version of events: According to Joseph Pierre, a concierge at Aristide’s residence, whose account is reported in the French newspaper Liberation, Aristide is taken away early Sunday morning by US soldiers. “White Americans came by helicopter to get him. They also took his bodyguards. It was around two o’clock in the morning. He didn’t want to leave. The American soldiers forced him to. Because they were pointing guns at him, he had to follow them. The Americans are second only to God in terms of strength.”

On March 1, George Bush announces the US is sending forces to Haiti to help stabilize the country.

In June the British government issues an Order in Council, reneging on an earlier decision to the former residents of the Chagos Islands that they would be permitted to return some of the islands in the Chagos Archipelago. The royal decree prohibits any of the islanders from returning to any of the islands. The Chagossians had been forcibly removed from their homes in the early 1970s so the US could build a base on Diego Garcia. The government claims that according to a feasibility study, which did not consult the former residents, the costs of resettlement would be prohibitively high, with an initial cost of about £5 million and annual costs of between £3 and £5 million. The study also claims that the islands are “sinking.” British Foreign Office minister Bill Rammell tells John Pilger: “The tax-payer is being asked to pick up the financial tab. You have to make choices about how you spend money.”

Two years into an investigation of AIPAC’s possible role as a spy front for Israel, Ashkenazi Jew, Larry Franklin, a mid-level Pentagon Analyst is observed by the FBI giving classified information to two officials of AIPAC suspected of being Israeli spies.

AIPAC hires lawyer Nathan Lewin to handle their legal defense, the same lawyer who defended suspected Israeli spy Stephen Bryen in 1978. Larry Franklin works in the Pentagon Office of Special Plans, run by Richard Perle, at the time Perle (who was caught giving classified information to Israel back in 1970) insists Iraq is crawling with weapons of mass destruction requiring the United States to invade and conquer.

There of course are no WMDs, Perle dumps the blame for the bad intelligence on George Tenet.

With (at least) two suspected Israeli spies inside the office from which the lies which launched the Iraq war originated, it appears that the people of the United States are the victims of a deadly hoax, a hoax that started a war using the blood and money of American citizens for the purposes of Israeli oppression.

The leaking of the investigation of AIPAC to the media on August 28th, 2004 gives advance warning to other spies working with Franklin. The damage to the FBI’s investigation is completed when US Attorney General John Ashcroft orders the FBI to stop all arrests in the case. Like the Stephen Bryen case and the hunt for, "Mega," this latest spy scandal seems destined by officials who have their own secret allegiances to protect, barring a massive public outcry.

Police near the Nuclear Fuel Services plant in Tennessee stop a truck after a three mile chase, during which the driver throws a bottle containing a strange liquid from the cab. The drivers turn out to be Israelis using fake identifications. The FBI refuses to investigate and the Israelis are released.

Two Israelis try to enter Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base, home to eight Trident submarines; the truck tests positive for explosives.

The National Director of the ADL, Abraham H. Foxman, publishes a book entitled, "Never Again? The Threat Of The New Anti-Semitism," in which he states that the New Testament's "lie," that the ancient Pharisees were responsible for the death of Christ, has been responsible for anti-semitism throughout the millennia and thus the New Testament of the bible is, "hate speech," and should be censored or banned.

On May 13, Riggs Bank agrees to pay $25 million in civil penalties for failing to report hundreds of millions of dollars in suspicious financial transactions by foreign customers in violation of US anti-money-laundering laws. Most of the transactions concerned the embassies of Saudi Arabia and Equatorial Guinea. On December 31, The Wall Street Journal reports that a government investigation into activities at Riggs Bank may be hampered because of its “longstanding relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency.”

August 26-27, after a 2-day conference in the resort town of Montego Bay, Jamaica, energy officials from a number of Caribbean countries agree to a proposal by Venezuela to form a new oil company that would distribute crude and refined oil products to Caribbean countries under preferential terms. A commission led by Venezuela will devise a plan for the new company, to be called PetroCaribe, and a follow-up meeting will take place in the Bahamas in November. “PetroCaribe should be a catalyst for the introduction of alternative approaches to market access ... and correction of the various pricing inequities that prevail in some markets,” the officials say in a joint statement issued at the conclusion of the conference. Many of the countries are concerned that high energy prices will devastate their economies and lead to social unrest. Another initiative proposed by Venezuela during the conference is the establishment of a fund to provide grants for health, education, and housing programs in the Caribbean. Countries participating in the talks include Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Cuba, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.

In October, Rodrigo Rato, the new managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), urges oil producing countries to save the extra revenue generated from high oil prices. Venezuela, the world’s fifth largest oil exporter, shuns the advice and continues to use its oil revenue to fund literacy, health, and other social programs. In addition to the money that Petroleos de Venezuela, the country’s state oil company, contributes to the government, the company directly funds and administers another $3 billion in social projects.

November 23, Peter Kornbluh, a senior analyst at the National Security Archive in Washington, tells Newsday that documents recently acquired by the National Security Archive provide “substantive evidence that the CIA knew in advance about the coup, and it is clear that this intelligence was distributed to dozens of members of the Bush administration, giving them knowledge of coup plotting.”

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On January 20, President Bush makes the following statement as part of his second inaugural address, "When our Founders declared a new order of the ages.....they were acting on an ancient hope that is meant to be fulfilled."

Chavez’s government signs a deal with China to expand its oil market into China in search of more lucrative deals. February 1, President Hugo Chavez announces that the Venezuela controlled oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela, may sell eight oil refineries owned by US companies. Four of them are owned by Citgo Corporation and are currently used to refine Venezuela’s heavy, high-sulfur crude oil for use in the US. This move is part of a strategy to reduce Venezuelan dependency on US oil markets. At his speech in Argentina, Hugo Chavez describes Venezuelan dependency: “Not one Venezuelan works at these refineries ... they don’t give us one cent of profit ... they don’t pay taxes in Venezuela ... this is economic imperialism.” Ivan Orellana, Venezuela’s representative to OPEC says that any “contracts found to be not in the national interest would be renegotiated.” The Venezuelan oil industry currently exports half of its oil to the US. This latest move is an indication to the Bush administration that the Chavez government is willing to test their relationship. US officials are worried about the implications of the sale for the American economy as 15% of US oil imports currently come from Venezuela. White House spokesman Scott McClellan says, “we have serious concerns. We have made our concerns known when it comes to President Chavez....”

Between February 1-3, Fox News runs a 3-part series on Venezuela, narrated by Fox News’ Steve Harrigan, suggesting that the Chavez government “is moving toward totalitarian rule” and is a potential threat to the US. Miami University political science professor Anibal Romero tells Harrigan that Chavez is a “dangerous fellow. He’s a confused person. He has radical instincts. He’s deeply anti-American ... and is prepared to do terrible things.” Harrigan acknowledges the president’s popularity among the country’s poor, but cites the opposition’s concerns that his popularity “does not give the president the right to do whatever he wants.” The “police, military and armed thugs have been tools used freely by Chavez to hang on to power during a coup attempt and a national strike in 2002. ... Chavez has packed the Supreme Court and the army with his supporters, seized control of the country’s wealth and introduced a penal code that criminalizes dissent. Anyone who opposes him faces violence or prison.” Chavez opponents also complain that he is clamping down on the press. Ana Christina Nunez, legal counsel for Globovision, the country’s only 24-hour news channel, says, “Our own journalists don’t know whether they can show whatever it is they are trying to cover.” Harrigan also reports that Chavez is “pushing the idea that anyone can grow what they want on someone else’s land” and that he “has declared war on large landowners.” “More than 1,000 of Venezuela’s urban poor have set up bamboo shacks” on land that has “belonged to a British company for a century.” They use the land “to raise their own products for income,” he reports. The British firm’s employees show Harrington on a map how these successive invasions are eating away at the British company’s land holdings and threatening to drive the company into “bankruptcy.” Joaquin Roy, a professor at Miami University, warns that what’s happening in Venezuela could be the first step of land takeovers that could threaten US interests.

February 8, Roger Noriega, US Assistant Secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere, says the US is concerned that an arms trade deal struck between Venezuela and Russia could destabilize the region. Venezuela has agreed to purchase about 40 Russian military helicopters and 100,000 rifles. CNN reports that Noriega told its Spanish-language service “that Washington [is] worried the arms may end up with groups such as Columbia’s Marxist FARC rebels.” Observers interpret this latest move by the Chavez government as another step in a strategy apparently aimed at decreasing Venezuela’s dependence on the US economy by strengthening ties with states such as China, Russia and Iran. Venezuela’s Vice President Jose Vincente Rangel defends the weapons trade deal with Russia. Rangel says that the deal is of no relevance to the US and that the deal is “a concern only for the Venezuelan people and the nation’s institutions.”

February 15, Robert Zoellick, the new deputy secretary of state, testifying before a Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing, describes the Chavez government as “a creeping authoritarianism” and says that Chavez is “do[ing] away with [his] opponents, ... do[ing] away with the press, ... do[ing] away with the rule of law, ... [and] pack[ing] the courts.” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says, “I think we have to view, at this point, the government of Venezuela as a negative force in the region.”

February 16, CIA Director Porter Goss, testifying before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, names five Latin American countries as “potential areas for instability” for 2005. First on his list is Venezuela, followed by Colombia, Haiti, Mexico, and Cuba. In Venezuela, according to Goss, President Chavez “is consolidating his power by using technically legal tactics to target his opponents and meddling in the region, supported by Castro.” In Colombia, Haiti, and Mexico, 2005 elections could bring instability, he says, while in Cuba, “a bad fall last October has rekindled speculation about his declining health and succession scenarios.”

February 20, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela accuses the US government of planning “new aggressions” against him. The aggressions, Chavez describes, include another attempted coup and an assassination attempt. Chavez warns US president George W. Bush that if an assassination attempt was successful the people of Latin America would assume that democratic rules “no longer apply.” Chavez warns that another consequence of his assassination would be an “interruption of the flow of oil to the US.” Chavez asks that Bush consider these consequences before making a decision about his assassination.

February 23, the US State Department says President Chavez’s allegations that they are planning to assassinate him are “ridiculous.”

February 25, Riggs Bank and two of its executives, Joe L. Allbritton, and his son, Robert, agree to pay a total of $9 million to victims of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet for the bank’s alleged role in laundering $1.6 million from Pinochet’s bank account in London to the Riggs branch in Washington in 1999. Joe and Robert Allbritton will pay $1 million while the bank will pay the remaining $8 million. The suit was brought against the bank in a Spanish court by Madrid prosecutor Baltasar Garzon. In Spain, anyone can be tried for genocide, torture, or other human rights abuses that are committed against Spanish citizens. In exchange for the payment, the Spanish court has agreed to drop criminal charges against current and former directors and officers of Riggs.

US District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina approves a plea agreement requiring Riggs Bank to pay a $16 million criminal fine for its failure to report suspicious transactions by former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and leaders of Equatorial Guinea that occurred between 1994 and 2003. The judge calls the bank “a greedy corporate henchman of dictators and their corrupt regimes.”

March 1, Venezuelan Navy Commander Armando Laguna announces that the Navy has detected a small fleet of US military vessels off the coast of Curacao in the Caribbean. The Venezuelan Armed Forces are monitoring the vessels, but Laguna says that the US vessels are conducting routine procedures and there is no reason to be alarmed. The presence of the US military has led to rumors about a US invasion, and another coup. William Lara, National Assembly Deputy, and leader of Chavez’s MVR party, says that the US vessels are part of “a plan to intimidate and provoke.” Concern for the vessels is sparked by the fact that the US military did not notify the Venezuelan Navy of their presence as Laguna says they “traditionally have been doing.”

March 4, President Hugo Chavez declares that the US-sponsored project, the Free Trade Agreement for the Americas (FTAA), is dead. Chavez says that a new model will be put in place to increase trade between Venezuela, Argentina, and Brazil regardless of the US government’s position. Chavez says that eventually a new organization similar to NATO will be established for the countries of South America.

In Late April, Venezuela and Cuba sign a number of deals, deepening economic ties between the two countries. One of the deals made is that the two countries will construct a joint shipyard in the western Venezuelan state of Zulia where naval ships will be built and repaired. The Cuban government also agrees to purchase from Venezuela food products such as canned sardines, gelatin, puddings and marmalades, chocolate drinks, condensed milk, as well as work clothes, including 400,000 pairs of boots. Additionally, Venezuela says that the 53,000 barrels of oil it began selling to Cuba on preferential terms in 2000 has been increased to 90,000 barrels per day. In exchange, Cuba will increase the presence of Cuban doctors working in Venezuelan slums and rural hamlets from 13,000 to 30,000 by the end of 2005, in addition to providing training to 40,000 new Venezuelan doctors.

On 7 July the London Underground Network is bombed. Israel’s Finance Minister, Binyamin Netanyahu is in London on the morning of the attacks in order to attend an economic conference in a hotel over the underground station where one of the blasts occurred, but stayed in his hotel room instead after he had been informed by Israeli intelligence officials attacks were expected.

On June 29, 13 Caribbean countries, led by Venezuela, sign the Petrocaribe Alliance, an energy cooperation agreement that will allow member nations to purchase oil from Venezuela under preferential terms. The agreement, signed during a one-day regional summit in Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela, calls for the establishment of a regional refinery network overseen by Venezuela that will produce and ship oil to member nations. The agreement is signed by Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Belize, Cuba, Dominican, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, San Cristobal and Nieves, Santa Lucia, San Vicente and the Granadinas, Surinam, and Venezuela. Two countries, Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, choose not to sign. The details of the pact will be decided in September.

August 24, Wayne Simmons, a former CIA operative, appears on the Hannity & Colmes show to offer his assessment of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. He calls Chavez “a college-educated, militarily trained, lethal murderer, treacherous letch, who has ... threatened not only the United States and the West, but armed himself with the revolutionary armed forces of Colombia.” “He specializes in murder, mayhem, extortion, and so on,” he adds. Simmons also accuses Chavez of being “in bed with Castro” and alleges that he is part of “the Bolivarian neo-communist regime movement that ... will not be satisfied until they have penetrated every government from Ecuador to Panama, Colombia, and so on... .” When asked by Colmes whether the US should “assassinate him,” Simmons replies, “Well, listen, if a stray bullet from a hunter in Kentucky should find its way between ... this guy’s eyes, ... no American should lose any sleep over it.” Colmes then asks if “assassinating a leader of another country [would] be the Christian thing to do,” to which Simmons responds: “Listen, this is not about Christians. I’m a Christian, as well, but I’m about protecting this country and protecting Americans. ... I absolutely would [support his assassination] - he should have been killed a long time ago. ... this guy needs to go.” When Hannity and Holmes insist that assassinating Chavez would be against the law, Simmons compares Chavez to Adolf Hitler warning that the Venezuelan president “absolutely has the possibility of becoming [a Hitler] in South America.”

On September 7, Caribbean leaders sign an agreement specifying the details of Hugo Chavez’s Petrocaribe Alliance. Under the agreement, Caribbean governments would purchase Venezuelan oil at market price. Whenever world market prices for oil surpass the $40 a barrel mark, Venezuela would offer to finance 40 percent of the cost to be payable over a period of 17-25 years at 1 percent interest. Further concessions would be granted if the price of oil surpasses the $100 mark. Governments will be permitted to pay a portion of their oil tab with services or goods such as rice, bananas, or sugar. “We have the opportunity to break from the path of imposed domination and servitude,” Chavez says during the talks. “The capitalist model ... imposed on us is not sustainable.” The talks are attended by representatives of Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Belize, Cuba, Dominica, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Surinam, St Lucia, St Kitts and Nevis and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

On September 30, President Chavez announces that Venezuela has moved its central bank reserves out of US banks and liquidated its US Treasury securities. The funds have been transferred to Europe and other countries, he says.

There are now only 5 nations on the world left without a Rothschild controlled central bank: Iran; North Korea; Sudan; Cuba; and Libya.

Physics Professor, Stephen E. Jones of Brigham Young University publishes a paper in which he proves the World Trade Center buildings could have only been brought down in the manner they were by explosives. He receives no coverage in the mainstream media for his scientific and provable claims.

November 8, for the 14th consecutive year, the UN General Assembly, in a record 182 to 4 vote, calls on the US to end its 4-decade-old embargo against Cuba. Voting against the measure are the US, Israel, Palau, and the Marshall Islands. Micronesia abstains, while El Salvador, Iraq, Morocco, and Nicaragua do not vote. (The Palau Archipelago was administered by the United States as the last UN trust territory until 1994. The Marshall Islands, taken by the US during World War II, became self-governing under US military protection in 1976, achieving free-association status in 1986. The combined population of Palau and the Marshall Islands is less than 80,000.) Before the vote, speaker after speaker in the General Assembly debate speaks out against the US sanctions, while Ronald Godard, a deputy United States ambassador, asserts that “if the people of Cuba are jobless, hungry, or lack medical care, as Castro admits, it’s because of his economic mismanagement.” After the votes are tallied up, many delegates in the General Assembly hall reportedly burst into applause. US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton, calls the vote “a complete exercise in irrelevancy.”

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The Edmond De Rothschild Banque, a subsidiary of Europe's Edmond De Rothschild family bank group in France, becomes the first foreign family bank to obtain approval of the China Banking Regulatory Commission and enter China's financial market.

The ADL ruthlessly leans on governments throughout the world to pass hate crime legislation, as they are worried about the Israel and Rothschild criminal cabal being exposed more and more on a daily basis, predominantly on the internet. Their job is to protect this criminal network and what better way to do it than by passing laws in which anyone who exposes a Jewish criminal becomes a criminal.

David Irving is sentenced to three years in jail in Austria, for denying the holocaust. It is important to note that the only historical event you can be arrested for questioning is the holocaust. This is because is has been a powerful weapon in brainwashing the goyim, that the Jews are so poor and persecuted when in reality they control the vast majority of international finance and international corporations throughout the world.

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