China will re-open the old Silk Road as a new trading route linking Germany, Russia and China

By Peter Koenig

April 08, 2014 "ICH" - Russia has just dropped another bombshell, announcing not only the de-coupling of its trade from the dollar, but also that its hydrocarbon trade will in the future be carried out in rubles and local currencies of its trading partners – no longer in dollars – see Voice of Russia

Russia’s trade in hydrocarbons amounts to about a trillion dollars per year. Other countries, especially the BRICS and BRCIS-associates (BRICSA) may soon follow suit and join forces with Russia, abandoning the ‘petro-dollar’ as trading unit for oil and gas. This could amount to tens of trillions in loss for demand of petro-dollars per year (US GDP about 17 trillion dollars – December 2013) – leaving an important dent in the US economy would be an understatement.

Added to this is the declaration today by Russia’s Press TV – China will re-open the old Silk Road as a new trading route linking Germany, Russia and China, allowing to connect and develop new markets along the road, especially in Central Asia, where this new project will bring economic and political stability, and in Western China provinces,where “New Areas” of development will be created. The first one will be the Lanzhou New Area in China’s Northwestern Gansu Province, one of China’s poorest regions.

“During his visit to Duisburg, Chinese President Xi Jinping made a master stroke of economic diplomacy that runs directly counter to the Washington neo-conservative faction’s effort to bring a new confrontation between NATO and Russia.” (press TV, April 6, 2014)

“Using the role of Duisburg as the world’s largest inland harbor, an historic transportation hub of Europe and of Germany’s Ruhr steel industry center, he proposed that Germany and China cooperate on building a new “economic Silk Road” linking China and Europe. The implications for economic growth across Eurasia are staggering.”

Curiously, western media have so far been oblivious to both events. It seems like a desire to extending the falsehood of our western illusion and arrogance – as long as the silence will bear.

Germany, the economic driver of Europe – the world’s fourth largest economy (US$ 3.6 trillion GDP) – on the western end of the new trading axis, will be like a giant magnet, attracting other European trading partners of Germany’s to the New Silk Road. What looks like a future gain for Russia and China, also bringing about security and stability, would be a lethal loss for Washington.

In addition, the BRICS are preparing to launch a new currency – composed by a basket of their local currencies – to be used for international trading, as well as for a new reserve currency, replacing the rather worthless debt ridden dollar – a welcome feat for the world.

Along with the new BRICS(A) currency will come a new international payment settlement system, replacing the SWIFT and IBAN exchanges, thereby breaking the hegemony of the infamous privately owned currency and gold manipulator, the Bank for International Settlement (BIS) in Basle, Switzerland – also called the central bank of all central banks.

To be sure – the BIS is a privately owned for profit institution, was created in the early 1930’s, in the midst of the big economic melt-down of the 20^th Century. The BIS was formed precisely for that purpose – to control the world’s monetary system, along with the also privately owned FED and the Wall Street Banksters – the epitome of private unregulated ownership.

The BIS is known to hold at least half a dozen secret meetings per year, attended by the world’s elite, deciding the fate of countries and entire populations. Their demise would be another welcome new development.

As the new trading road and monetary system will take hold, other countries and nations, so far in the claws of US dependence, will flock to the ‘new system’, gradually isolating Washington’s military industrial economy (sic) and its NATO killing machine.

This Economic Sea Change may bring the empire to its knees, without spilling a drop of blood. An area of new hope for justice and more equality, a rebirth of sovereign states, may dawn and turn the spiral of darkness into a spiral of light.

Peter Koenig is an economist and former World Bank staff. He worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources.