While the world focuses on the US's position in the Mid East and Central Asia, and its very public attempts to secure its strategic interests in those two geostrategically vital regions of Eurasia, in a less noticed feat this week, it's also securing the third key region - Eastern Europe and particularly the former Soviet Union...(see analysis by Stratfor below) From the Draft Political Resolution: "The US strategy is to dominate the global economy by blunting the development of its various economic competitors, particularly the European Union, China and Russia. To do this, it is trying to strangle the development of their economies through the control of the access to oil. This requires more than economic power, however. The US must also position itself geopolitically throughout the world to accomplish these goals. The establishment of US-controlled regimes in the Middle East and Central Asia, the encirclement of China, and the undermining of Russia in its historical sphere of influence are all part of this strategy. The US has already made clear its intention to further develop its nuclear arsenal, raising the specter of nuclear pro-liferation and war." ----------------- ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. 1. Click Here! Click Here! ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/league-discuss/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [log in to unmask] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ Return-Path: <[log in to unmask]> Received: from rly-xk05.mx.aol.com (rly-xk05.mail.aol.com [172.20.83.42]) by air-xk04.mail.aol.com (v98.19) with ESMTP id MAILINXK43-5984069a71fba; Tue, 30 Mar 2004 11:58:36 -0500 Received: from smtp-relay.dca.net (smtp-relay.dca.net [216.158.48.66]) by rly-xk05.mx.aol.com (v98.5) with ESMTP id MAILRELAYINXK52-5984069a71fba; Tue, 30 Mar 2004 11:58:07 -0500 Received: from APrabhakaran (adsl-207-245-72-142.cust.oldcity.dca.net [207.245.72.142]) by smtp-relay.dca.net (Postfix) with SMTP id 20FDC314AA0 for <[log in to unmask]>; Tue, 30 Mar 2004 11:57:29 -0500 (EST) Reply-To: <[log in to unmask]> From: "Arun Prabhakaran" <[log in to unmask]> To: "Jen Cox" <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Premium Global Intelligence Report - March 29, 2004 Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2004 11:58:01 -0500 Message-ID: <[log in to unmask]> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.6604 (9.0.2911.0) Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1165 X-AOL-IP: 216.158.48.66 Stratfor.com 3/29/04 1254 GMT -- UNITED STATES -- The prime ministers of Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania will meet in Washington, D.C., on March 29 to mark their official entry into NATO, which will expand to 26 members with the seven new members. Weapons manufacturers expect to make billions of dollars in new arms sales to these countries as they bring their military forces up to NATO readiness levels. ---------------------------- Full Analysis NATO: Expansion and Power Consolidation Summary Seven European states -- Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia -- have joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. For all seven countries, NATO membership andpending accession to the European Union are about leaving the East and joining the West. However, in the long run, the expansions of both groups will ensure that Europe as a whole will be a much more reliable U.S. ally -- even as Europe splits along a new dividing line. Analysis NATO's second post-war expansion became reality March 29, when the world's strongest military alliance accepted Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia as members. The previous expansion, in 1999, brought Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary into the NATO fold. This expansion consolidates Western gains on the territory of the former Soviet empire, but more importantly, the expansion of NATO -- and the impending expansion of the European Union -- will form Europe into the most reliable ally the United States has ever enjoyed in the region. From a geopolitical standpoint, NATO's expansion is a huge coup for the West as a whole. Although the 1999 expansion extended Western power toward the east, it did so in a very haphazard way -- Hungary, for example, shared no boundaries with its NATO allies. The 2004 expansion consolidates and rationalizes NATO's eastern border, bringing in a swathe of states that will stretch that dividing line fom the Gulf of Finland in the north to the Black Sea and Adriatic Sea in the south. This also will be NATO's last eastward expansion for at least a decade. The next likely membership candidates will not be Moldova or Ukraine -- two former Soviet republics that have expressed an interest in joining -- because their militaries are simply too ramshackle and pervious to Russian intelligence to make them viable members. Instead, nonmember countries that already are within NATO's territorial fold are likely to queue up; Croatia, Macedonia and Albania are the most likely candidates, in that order. European neutrals Austria and Finland also have, at times, expressed a desire to join and would be shoo-ins should they ever commit to an application. Moscow, of course, views NATO's expansion and consolidation with trepidation. Just as the United States fears the emergence of a single Eurasian power bloc as a rival, Moscow (rightly) sees NATO as a vehicle for American power that has now absorbed all of thebuffer states Russia established on its eastern flank in the aftermath of World War II. But the real news is not about Russian insecurity or cultural advance or retreat; it is about U.S. power projection. The NATO expansion is only the first of the major European institutional advances to occur in 2004. On May 1, 10 states -- Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Malta and Cyprus -- will join the European Union as well, with Bulgaria and Romania widely expected to follow in 2007 or 2008. With the exception of tiny Malta, Cyprus and Slovenia, all of these states are strongly pro-American in their geopolitical outlook, primarily because of the 50 years they spent as part of the Soviet empire. For them, EU accession is about economic divorce from Russia, while NATO membership is about being sheltered by the U.S. nuclear umbrella as a hedge against Moscow. The admittance of these states into the Western structures gives the United States a huge leg up -- not just against Russia, but also over the "old Europe" states of France and Germany, which have striven to turn the EU into a global power-player that is independent of the United States. That effort has always been difficult, considering the traditionally pro-U.S. stance of the United Kingdom, Denmark, the Netherlands and Italy. With the addition of a swathe of new pro-American Central European states, it will become impossible. The net effect will be the emasculation of the European Union as a political entity, although as an economic force it can and will counter U.S. economic domination. That frees the United States to use NATO -- which it has always dominated -- as a political and military tool at the times and places of its choosing. France and Germany will certainly attempt to preserve their sovereignty by acting independently of Europe - - but as NATO and the EU expand, the United States is emerging as the continent's dominant political force. (c) 2004 Strategic Forecasting, Inc. All rights reserved. http://www.stratfor.com ...................................................................... STRATFOR INTELLIGENCE SERVICES **STRATFOR PREMIUM Stratfor Premium provides comprehensive global intelligence including daily analyses, special reports, situation reports, regional net assessments and Stratfor's sought-after Annual and Quarterly Forecasts. Click here for details: http://www.stratfor.com/prem **STRATFOR BASIC Stratfor Basic offers daily analysis, situation reports and ongoing coverage of global events. Click here for details: http://www.stratfor.com/basic **GROUP DISCOUNTS Corporate or multi-user volume discount packages are available. 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