How Greece Has Fallen Victim To “Economic Hit Men”
Mr. John Perkins, well-known as the author
of Confessions of an Economic Hitman, talks
about how so-called “U.S.-led global economy” has destroyed the world and many
countries including Greece have fallen victims to it.
Reading this article, you will see that the
Greek people are victims and they do not have to assume responsibility for
debts.
What is important is to refuse payment, put
bankers involved in crime into prion, change over from austerity budget to
former Japanese-style of state-controlled economy and finally nationalize the
central bank.
Although it is theoretically easy to
reactivate the economy it is actually difficult, because it is necessary to
legally remove those with power who hold fast to vested interests. There is
very valuable advice in the article. It says: “these presidents are in very,
very vulnerable positions, and ultimately we the people have to stand up, because
leaders can only do a certain amount.” Democracy cannot exist if you leave it
to other people.
Masatoshi
Takeshita
July
7, 2015
Excerpt from a Japanese article: Trend of Japan, World and Universe: July
4, 2014
How
Greece Has Fallen Victim To “Economic Hit Men”
Source:
John Perkins
is no stranger to making confessions. His well-known book, Confessions of an
Economic Hit Man, revealed how international organizations such as the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, while publicly professing
to “save” suffering countries and economies, instead pull a
bait-and-switch on their governments: …..
That’s where
the “economic hit men” come in: seemingly ordinary men, with
ordinary backgrounds, who travel to these countries and impose the harsh austerity
policies prescribed by the IMF and World Bank as “solutions” to the
economic hardship they are now experiencing. Men like Perkins were
trained to squeeze every last drop of wealth and resources from these
sputtering economies, and continue to do so to this day.
Michael Nevradakis: In your book, you write about how you were, for many
years, a so-called “economic hit man.” Who are these economic hit men, and what do they do?
John Perkins: Essentially, my job was to identify countries that had resources that
our corporations want, and that could be
things like oil – or it could be markets – it could be transportation systems.
There’re so many different things. Once we identified these countries, we arranged huge loans to them, but the money would never
actually go to the countries; instead it would go to our own corporations to
build infrastructure projects in those countries, things like power plants and
highways that benefitted a few wealthy people as well as our own corporations,
but not the majority of people who couldn’t
afford to buy into these things, and yet they were left
holding a huge debt, very much like what
Greece has today, a phenomenal debt.
And once [they were] bound by that debt, we would go back,
usually in the form of the IMF – and in the
case of Greece today, it’s the IMF and the EU [European Union] – and make tremendous demands on the country: increase taxes, cut back on spending, sell public
sector utilities to private companies, things like power companies and water
systems, transportation systems, privatize those, and basically become a slave to us, to the corporations, to the IMF, in your case to
the EU, and basically, organizations like the
World Bank, the IMF, the EU, are tools of the big corporations, what I call the
“corporatocracy.”
….. these
investments were made in things like electric energy systems that the economy
would grow at phenomenally high rates. The fact of the matter is, when you
invest in these big infrastructure projects, you do see economic growth, however,
most of that growth reflects the wealthy getting wealthier and wealthier;…..
By insisting that the
countries adopt policies that will sell their
publicly owned utility companies, water and sewage systems, maybe schools,
transportation systems, even jails, to the big corporations. Privatize, privatize. Allow us to build military bases on their soil. Many things can be done, but basically, they become servants to what I
call the corporatocracy. ….. It’s a
corporate empire, and the big corporations rule. They control the politics of
the United States, and to a large degree they control a great deal of the
policies of countries like China, around the world.
I’ve been
following Greece for a long time. I was on Greek television. A Greek film
company did a documentary called “Apology of an Economic Hit Man,”
and I also spent a lot of time in Iceland and in Ireland. I was invited to
Iceland to help encourage the people there to vote on a referendum not to repay
their debts, and I did that and encouraged them not to, and they did vote no,
and as a result, Iceland is doing quite well now economically compared to the
rest of Europe.
In the case of Greece, my reaction was that “Greece is being hit.” There’s no question about it. Sure, Greece made mistakes, your leaders
made some mistakes, but the people didn’t
really make the mistakes, and now the people are
being asked to pay for the mistakes made by their leaders, often in cahoots with the big banks. So, people make
tremendous amounts of money off of these so-called “mistakes,” and
now, the people who didn’t make the
mistakes are being asked to pay the price. That’s consistent around the world: We’ve seen it in Latin America. We’ve
seen it in Asia. We’ve seen it in so many places around the world.
This leads directly to the next question I had: … there’s this sentiment in
Greece that many people have that the country failed, that the people failed .
. .
Sure, that’s
part of the game: convince people that they’re wrong, that they’re inferior.
The corporatocracy is incredibly good at that, ….. And
in this case, all of this energy has been directed at the Greek people to say
“you’re lazy; you didn’t do the right thing; you didn’t follow the right
policies,” when in actuality, an awful lot of
the blame needs to be laid on the financial community that encouraged Greece to go down this route.
We also have
to understand that, … Globally, the middle class has been in decline. Big business needs to recognize – it hasn’t yet, but it
needs to recognize – that that serves nobody’s long-term interest, that the
middle class is the market. And if the middle
class continues to be in decline, whether it’s
in Greece or the United States or globally, ultimately businesses will pay the price; they won’t have customers. Henry Ford once said: “I want to pay all
my workers enough money so they can go out and buy Ford cars.” That’s a
very good policy. That’s wise. This austerity
program moves in the opposite direction and it’s a foolish policy.
How did the people of Ecuador and other countries that found themselves in
similar situations eventually resist?
Ecuador
elected a pretty remarkable president, Rafael Correa, who has a PhD in
economics from a United States university. He understands the system, and he
understood that Ecuador took on these debts back when I was an economic hit man
and the country was ruled by a military
junta that was under the control of the CIA and the US. That junta took on these huge debts, put Ecuador in deep debt; the people didn’t agree to that. When Rafael Correa was democratically elected, he immediately said, “We’re not
paying these debts; the people did not take
on these debts; maybe the IMF should pay the debts and maybe the junta, which
of course was long gone – moved to Miami or someplace – should pay the debts,
maybe John Perkins and the other economic hit men should pay the debts, but the
people shouldn’t.”
And since then, he’s been renegotiating and bringing the
debts way down and saying, “We might be
willing to pay some of them.” That was a very
smart move; . . . he, like so many presidents,
has to be aware that if you stand up too strongly against
the system, if the economic hit men are not
happy, if they don’t get their way, then the jackals
will come in and assassinate you or overthrow you in a coup.
We have to realize that these presidents are in very,
very vulnerable positions, and ultimately we the people have to stand up, because
leaders can only do a certain amount. Today, in
many places, leaders are not just vulnerable; it doesn’t take a bullet to bring down a leader anymore. A scandal – a sex scandal,
a drug scandal – can bring down a leader. These
leaders are very aware that they are in very vulnerable positions: … They’re
aware of that, and it behooves we the people to really stand up for our own
rights.
You mentioned the recent example of Iceland . . . other than the referendum
that was held, what other measures did the country adopt to get out of this
spiral of austerity and to return to growth and to a much more positive outlook
for the country?
It’s been
investing money in programs that put people back to work and it’s also been
putting on trial some of the bankers that caused the problems, which has been a
big uplift in terms of morale for the people. … So, the important thing for an
economy is to get the employment up and get disposable income back up, so that
people will invest in their country and in goods and services.
In closing, what message would you
like to share with the people of Greece, as they continue to experience and to live through the very harsh results
of the austerity policies that have been implemented in the country for the
past three years?
I want to
draw upon Greece’s history. You’re a proud, strong country, a country of
warriors. The mythology of the warrior to some degree comes out of Greece, and
so does democracy! … I would encourage the people of Greece to stand up: Don’t
pay off those debts; …
And so, I would encourage the Greek people to continue to do this. Don’t
accept this criticism that it’s your fault, you’re to blame, you’ve got to
suffer austerity, austerity, austerity. That
only works for the rich people; it does not
work for the average person or the middle class. Build up that middle class; bring employment back; bring disposable income
back to the average citizen of Greece. Fight for
that; make it happen; stand up for your rights; respect your history as fighters and leaders in democracy, and show the
world!
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