The Richest Man In Zimbabwe

       As Zimbabwe faces it's worst economic disaster in it's history due to decades of misrule by the country's only leader President Robert Mugabe, an elite group of businessmen are consolidating their power in the ruling Zanu PF. One of them is John Arnold Bredenkamp. He is the richest man in Zimbabwe and also the most powerful among the Zimbabwean business elite.

           Bredenkamp now aged 68 is a South African born white of Dutch ancestry. It has been reported that Bredenkamp holds South African, Zimbabwean and Dutch passports. His story goes back to the 1970s when he made his first big fortune. In 1976 he founded Casalee group which became the world's biggest tobacco firm outside the US. The company made huge profits selling Rhodesian tobacco abroad through the evasion of sanctions. Rhodesia at that time had been place under UN sanctions due to the Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) grip on power due to white minority rule. Despite the odds of international sanctions targeting the UDI regime in Rhodesia, Bredenkamp befriended Ian Smith, who was the Rhodesian PM at that time, to provide weapons and military supplies to the UDI regime which had been fighting the Rhodesian Bush war through a series of sanction busting schemes. However these actions by Bredenkamp which gained notoriety internationally was legal under the Rhodesian law. Bredenkamp brokered the export sales of Rhodesia, mostly tobacco, and used the proceeds to purchase weapons for the UDI regime. His sanction busting schemes often involved complex barter trades that helped the UDI regime to sustain itself for a longer period of time. 

               After Rhodesia's independence in 1980 which led to the birth of Zimbabwe and the rise of Robert Mugabe as it's president, Bredenkamp fled the country and moved his base of operations to Belgium. But in 1984 he made peace with the leaders of Zimbabwe and was allowed to return to Zimbabwe. Though President Robert Mugabe is claimed to be an anti white racist, Bredenkamp, of white descent, became Mugabe's biggest crony.

       In 1993, Casalee group of companies which had been involved in arms deals was sold by Bredenkamp to Universal Leaf Tobacco earning him over 70 million pounds. He then constructed a new group of companies called Breco. In 1998 he was involved in President Robert Mugabe's decision to send Zimbabwe's armed forces into neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo in the defence of Laurent Kabila's regime. At that time, Kabila, who successfully overthrew Mobutu Sese Seko from power in 1997, was at war with his former backers Rwanda and Uganda. That war which came to be known as Africa's deadliest left 7 million dead. However Zimbabwe's intervention was deeply rooted in the desire of the political and business elites of Zimbabwe to exploit Congo's natural resources, most notably diamonds. In return, the Kabila regime rewarded more than US$5 billion in mining concessions to businesses belonging to the closest advisers and family members of President Mugabe including Bredenkamp, according to a UN report on the looting of Congo's resources. Though he strongly denies war profiteering during the war, a lot of evidence shows that he is guilty. It has also been alleged that Bredenkamp purchased arms and supplies from Bulgaria for the Zimbabwean military during the height of the Second Congo war.

              

                  While he and the other members of Mugabe's inner circle lined their pockets from the war, huge financial burdens were created to fund the war. To pay for the war, Zimbabwe's central bank printed hundreds of trillions of Zimbabwean dollars. This ultimately resulted in the collapse of Zimbabwe's currency and the hyperinflationary problems facing Zimbabwe today. To avoid prosecution, as many of his business dealings have been considered shady, he used Zimbabwe as his base of operations to do business with other countries in Africa and the Middle East. It has been revealed that Bredenkamp is now a force behind the scenes in the ruling Zanu PF belonging to Robert Mugabe. According to the latest revelations, John Bredenkamp was involved in plot to overthrow Mugabe and replace him with former security minister and Speaker of the Parliament Emmerson Mnangagwa. It has also been alleged that Bredenkamp paid out $7 billion to the Mnangagwa campaign to help Emmerson Mnangagwa to become the deputy of the ruling Zanu PF. 

                   Despite John Bredenkamp's rise as one of the most powerful  in Zimbabwe, he has not got everything he wanted. As Zimbabwe's economic situation draws coverage from around the world so does the exposure of his corrupt business dealings. Just recently the US Treasury, accused John Bredenkamp of being a "regime crony". The US Treasury also accused John Bredenkamp of being a "well-known Mugabe insider whose group of companies has financially propped up the Mugabe regime" and froze his US based assets as well as banned him and three other cronies of Mugabe from doing business with the US. The British Foreign Office has also been working with the EU to consider several options against Mugabe's cronies including Bredenkamp.  

Finally in late 2008 Mr Bredenkamp's South African properties had been raided due to allegations that British arms giant BAE Systems paid out more than 40 million pounds to companies linked to John Bredenkamp between 2003 and 2005 in exchange for help to promote a 1.6 billion pound warplane contract for South Africa when Jacob Zuma's ANC party comes to power. So with the world's eyes focused on Zimbabwe due to it's economic and humanitarian collapse and the impending investigations of John Bredenkamp's dealings, what will be his next series of moves?

Why China Can't Dump The Dollar

As America's burgeoning debt levels soar, its mammoth trade deficits on the rise and a budget deficit that will hit U$1 trillion to U$1.5 trillion or 7% to 11% of it's GDP FY 2009, questions about the credibility of the US Dollar are on the rise.With China holding U$1 trillion worth of these dollar denominated debt assets, some politicians and economists fear that China might dump these assets due to the weakening dollar and slumping interest rates of these assets. Such a move could trigger the total collapse of the US real economy and send the world into a depression. But is that probable for China to do in the near future?

First of all if China dumps it's US treasury bonds and other dollar denominated assets, the US economy being an economy that China is very dependent on would implode. The global economy would also crash and world trade would collapse. Such a move by China, followed by the mentioned consequences above would have extremely adverse effects on the Chinese economy. As China's economy is very dependent on exports and trade especially with the US (which buys more than 21 percent of China's exports) China would also see it's economy go bust due to a collapse in demand for Chinese goods. As a result business bankruptcies in China would soar on an unprecedented scale. In 2008 some 65000 Chinese factories have closed down due to the fallout of the credit crunch in the West and if China aggravates the situation by dropping the dollar, the entire Chinese manufacturing industry will head for a meltdown. To make matters worse unemployment rates in China would also surge followed by job riots, a phenomenon that the Chinese ruling elites are afraid off. Surging unemployment could also mean the development of a social crisis in China. This is because hundreds of millions of rural Chinese citizens who have flocked to China's cities in a search for greener pastures are dependent on China's industrial powerhouse. As a consequence if these industries fail many of these workers would be laid off and they would the first to participate in social unrest movements such as riots, crime and the building of illegal squatters. Such a thing would be a nightmare for China's government officials.

Secondly if China decides to dump the dollar, where else could they park these hundreds of billions of dollars worth investments as the dumping of those assets would send economies and stock markets across the world crashing. So all of China's hard work, it's investments in it's economy for over 30 years would just vanish. China could also find it extremely difficult to trade with other nations as most export goods are invoiced in dollars. China will also see commodity prices surge as the dollar weakens tremendously. Such a thing could mean the end of massive food and energy subsidies in China. As a consequence China's inflation rates will skyrocket as the prices of food to consumer durables surge. And this will directly result in surging Chinese poverty levels, the destruction of China's middle class purchasing power and the obliteration of China's economic potential in the near future.

Thirdly, China could fall into a painful debt crisis if it's dumps the dollar. This is because during the past 30 years the Chinese government has given out hundreds of billions of dollars in loans to inefficient state owned enterprises and ordinary Chinese businesses. Because of that China has fallen into the trap of overproduction. With too many loans given to too many businesses producing the same goods or providing the same services which has encouraged overproduction, China drastically needs world trade soaring and strong global economic growth to keep these businesses operational. Keeping these businesses operational is the only way for China to recover those hundreds of billions of dollars in loans. If China dumps the dollar resulting in the collapse of world trade, many of those businesses and state owned enterprises that took government loans would fail. And that would result in the Chinese government and state owned banks being stuck with hundreds of billions of dollars if not trillions of dollars in non performing loans or bad debts. To make matters worse, state banks ( which hold a vast portion of China's 2 trillion dollars in household savings) will bear the full brunt of the debt crisis and may fail or require massive central bank intervention. Both of which will result in depositors and pensioners losing their deposits and retirement accounts. These problems compounded by skyrocketing inflation and surging unemployment could well produce an economic disaster.

Finally, if China decides to drop the dollar, the Communist party's grip on power would diminish. This is because a US economic collapse followed by China's own one will cause the Chinese people's tolerance of totalitarian state to fade away. Social crises, job riots, and anti government protests would follow on suite on a massive scale across China. As a consequence China's elite will have no choice but to either allow the riots to continue and see their power wane or launch a bloody crackdown which will cost China it's political standing in the world and increase the resentment of the Chinese people against their government. Not only that, with the turmoil taking place throughout China and the iron fisted one party rule on the decline, the Dalai Lama could use this as an opportunity to further his agenda and declare Tibet's independence from China, an autonomous province that serves as a buffer against India and its mountains being the main source of China's water supply. The Islamist separatist movement in Sinkiang province will also be emboldened and become much more aggressive causing China's rule of that autonomous province which is rich in oil and gas deposits to decline. At last China's ruling party's biggest nightmare could become a reality, which is Taiwan's declaration of independence from China. If China dumps the dollar and China's economy starts to decelerate, the most badly affected parts would be the southern provinces of China (Kwantung , Fujian, Hunan and Zhejiang) as it houses China's mammoth industrial powerhouse and Taiwan which is still considered to be a part of Red China. As a consequence Taiwan might use the period of turmoil on the mainland as an opportunity to declare it's independence, a move that could set off a chain of reactions, which include the revival of the Chinese civil war and a possible fragmentation of China due to the southern Chinese provinces breaking away from Beijing to join Taipei.

How The Iranian Revolution Accelerated The Collapse Of The USSR

While most historians and readers of history look at the Iranian Revolution as a disaster of US foreign policy where by the US lost a vital chess piece in the global contest for supremacy which weakened US power in the Middle East and the hostage crisis that followed, there were still silver linings.

Firstly a theocratic Iran under the leadership of the Ayatollah with the immense popular support from the Iranian people did act as a strong buffer against the southward projection of Soviet power. Iran under the Shah technically served as a buffer against Soviet expansionism too, but it was not as effective as Iran after the Revolution due to the Shah's unpopularity, the refusal to aid the Afghan resistance movements and the growing power of the Marxist movement inside Iran. A strong Iran as a buffer was needed to prevent the Soviets from conquering the oil fields of the gulf and from gaining a warm water port.

Secondly the Iranian Revolution of 1979 finally paved the way for the destruction of the growing pro-Soviet movements inside Iran. The CIA did give a list of communist suspects to the theocrats of Iran to silence, though the US broke relations with Iran on that same year. Therefore, it completely eradicated Soviet influence inside Iran.

Finally the Iranian Revolution of 1979 accelerated the growth of the emerging arc of crisis that was unfolding in Central Asia which directly contributed to the collapse of the USSR. When the theocrats of Iran came they dramatically increased financial aid to the Afghan resistance movement as well as absorbing most of the Afghan refugees from the war. As a consequence the Afghan resistance movement became stronger than ever and the Soviets became bogged down in Afghanistan. With the war now favouring the freedom fighters of Afghanistan, economic stagnation in the USSR turned into economic decay due to the tremendous cost of financing the war and the health of Soviet war veterans who served in Afghanistan. Meanwhile the theocratic Iran which shared a border with Soviet Azerbaijan enabled the spread of Islamic fundamentalism into the Central Asian republics of the USSR. This, in a way helped the people of Central Asia who were ethnically divided to finally unite under a common cause, which was Islam and led them to reject Soviet domination of their lands. As a result the simultaneous processes of the Soviets being unable to project power into the heartlands of US influence which is Arabia, the Soviet forces being bogged down in Afghanistan which paved the path for Soviet economic decay, and the massive decline in Soviet control of Central Asia all led to the demise of the USSR and the birth of the world's first truly global power,which is the US.

The Dark Side Of The US India Nuclear Deal

While the US India nuclear deal has been greeted with smiles from President Bush and hailed by the Prime Minister of India Dr Manmohan Singh as "liberating India from the constraints of technology denial", the deal still has it's side effects.

First of all, the nuclear deal is a foreign policy victory on one side and a disaster on the other side. The good side is that the US would be able to improve relations with India but on the other hand, agitate and complicate the diplomatic efforts by the six world powers to halt the nuclear programmes of Iran and North Korea. These nations might argue that the US is indirectly admitting India as a de facto nuclear weapons state through the sale of civilian nuclear goods to India even though India is increasing the size of it's nuclear arsenal and not being a signatory of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty. Especially to Iran US action might be seen as bias as the US is openly pushing for nuclear trade with nuclear armed India while blasting Iran for it's civilian nuclear programme which Iran is legally entitled to do under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty which Iran is a signatory.

Another possible problem due to the fallout of the nuclear deal with the US is the possibility of the birth of a triangular arms race involving China, Pakistan and India. Just recently China and Pakistan have both somewhat opposed the deal. This is because they fear the deal would lead to a more sophisticated Indian nuclear arsenal as India could import it's nuclear fuel supplies leaving a much larger fraction of it's uranium reserves for military purposes.As a consequence to keep up with the "threat" of India ,Pakistan and China could use this situation as a pretext for increasing the size and sophistication of their nuclear arsenals, therefore dramatically risking the possibility of an open ended nuclear arms race and a lot less peaceful Asia.

A Historic Strategic Agreement: The US India Nuclear Deal

The US India nuclear deal signed on the 10th of October 2008 has been characterised as one the few foreign policy victories for the infamous Bush administration and a historic victory for India and her prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh in which the deal nearly cost him his job in a failed no confidence vote.

Despite all the opposition to the deal in India, Dr Singh has really made a strategic revolutionary move. He and his supporters have made it clear that this deal would be used to meet the energy requirements of India in a cleaner way as India is set to be the fastest growing electricity consumer by 2015.By building more nuclear power plants India would be able to reduce its dependence on coal which is India's main power plant fuel and as a consequence reduce its imports of coal drastically which would help India to lower her trade deficit.With the deal signed India would also have the necessary resources to play an active role to combat climate change as well as making Indian cities less polluted due to lower reliance on fossil fuels.

On the other hand the nuclear deal would be a strategic move for Indian military.India would be able to greatly increase it's nuclear arsenal.India currently has 78000 tonnes of uranium, the main component in the production of civilian nuclear fuel and nuclear weapons.The rising number of nuclear power plants in India without the deal would mean that India would be forced to use a bigger fraction of it's uranium reserves for fuel production, instead of nuclear weapons.Using the nuclear deal which does not require India's military nuclear sites to be inspected by the the IAEA, India's military strategists could fulfill their dreams of having the greatest nuclear arsenal India could possibly have.Meanwhile a significant portion of uranium for power plants can be imported leaving the balance of uranium reserves for military purposes.

Now on to the global geopolitical perspective of the deal, India is still a clear winner.This is because India is currently too dependent on Russia for nuclear power plant fuel and reactors.As a result this could lead to the rise of misplaced Russian power over India which could threaten her sovereignty.Therefore the US India nuclear deal is a clear counter move to this possible obstacle in the future.This is because India would be able limit it's nuclear trade with Russia and one must also take note that the US India nuclear deal for India is actually an Indo Global nuclear deal because in the process of the US India nuclear deal the embargo on nuclear trade with India by the 45 member Nuclear Supplies Group has been lifted.

This permits India to trade nuclear materials not only with America but with any other nation in the world.That's why India and France just signed a nuclear deal in October 2008.This deal also prevents India from losing control of it's foreign policy as what many Indian critics of the deal believed because now India can trade nuclear goods with any of these nations on the Nuclear Supplies Group any form of American action to end the deal or to relaunch the boycott on India would leave America more isolated as companies worldwide stand to make U$150 billion dollars in contracts for the development of India's nuclear industry.Besides that, the US India nuclear deal would drastically improve ties between the US and India, and as a result stronger military and economic ties could follow on suit.Increasing trade due to warmer relations between India and the US could create a great deal of jobs in the US which soften the blow of the coming recession and lift more people as well as speed up India's approach to free market economics.The US India nuclear deal could also be a great tool for Indian and American strategists to contain China's surging power. As the US India nuclear deal is destined to feed energy hungry India in the long run India's economy would stand to be much more competitive. 

As a consequence India would be more well armed economically to rival and limit China's soft power projection into Asia.Politically a stronger and wealthier India strongly allied with the US stands to exert a great deal of soft power and influence deep into Eurasia therefore helping the free world to contain the totalitarian Chinese regime.Finally the US India nuclear deal which would help construct a more powerful Indian military than it is now would act as the ultimate geostrategic weapon in the long term US project of encircling China and therefore limiting its ability to project its hard power.