At long last the world’s respected mainline media and opinion makers are beginning to acknowledge in muted tone the shadow of conspiracy behind the 9/11 terror. There is as yet only a hint, not any blunt assertion. In a recent article published in a national daily the highly respected former senior associate of the Carnegie Endowment and leading authority on US-China relations, Mr. Minxin Pei, made the following points.

Mr. Pei pointed out:

• that China had just completed a golden decade of progress after 9/11.
• He attributed this partly to the fact that China was the main beneficiary in the aftermath of 9/11.
• He described how China gained hugely from the US attack against Iraq and the decade long war in Afghanistan.
• This decade saw China emerge as America’s biggest creditor while the US got trapped in a sinking economy.
• Prior to 9/11 American leaders perceived China as the biggest security threat.
• But 9/11 diverted America’s attention to fighting terror.

Mr. Pei wrote:

“Washington’s war on terror, however, would have had a limited and perhaps short-lived impact on changing China’s strategic environment. In retrospect, it was the ill-fated invasion of Iraq, which completely consumed America’s energy and preoccupied its military (not to mention the $1 trillion in war-related spending), that provided China the benign security environment it needed to focus on economic development.”

Mr. Pei of course sees no conspiracy. He draws attention to bald facts. But readers would recall that for the past seven years I have been persistently alleging a conspiracy hatched between sections of America’s big business and China’s army. I termed this nexus as the world’s real axis of evil. I alleged that this nexus had deliberately subverted America to pose the biggest threat to world peace. My assessment was based upon the following facts that suggested collusion between this US lobby and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

Respected mainline media in America has acknowledged that US intelligence was aware of the 9/11 plotters operating in America but failed to act in time.

Was this negligence or sabotage?

After 9/11 the findings of the US Counter-Terrorism Chief Richard Clark were ignored. For years Clark had been warning the administration about the growing threat of Al Qaeda. He was ignored. After 9/11 he correctly pinpointed Al Qaeda as the attacker. But before and after 9/11 a clutch of officials surrounding President Bush blocked him from briefing the President. The last straw was when against his findings these officials succeeded in persuading the President that President Saddam of Iraq was the mastermind behind 9/11. That helped divert the US military from finishing off Al Qaeda to start a war in Iraq. Subsequently it was proved that neither did Saddam have anything to do with 9/11, nor had he weapons of mass destruction as falsely alleged by the US. In disgust Clark resigned in March 2003 and gave his version in a book.

Before 9/11 the US was helping the Taliban and even offering aid. But on 9/11 itself the Chinese government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Taliban in the presence of Osama bin Laden to help build the telecom sector in Afghanistan. After 9/11 the US became the enemy while China the best ally of Taliban with a firm footing in Afghanistan that continues till this day. While the US bleeds economically fighting insurgency in Afghanistan, China is busy profiting from the mining rights it obtained from Kabul. It might even be said that US troops are safeguarding Chinese mining operations in Afghanistan!

Before China entered the World Trade Organization (WTO) it was not under the scanner of the World Bank or committed to trading norms. On September 17, 2001 Beijing was to sign the agreement for becoming a member of WTO. That did not suit either the PLA, the main Chinese exporter to the US, or even sections of the US corporate lobby that had unfettered scope to profit from child labour, grossly underpaid bonded labour, and other advantages that violated WTO norms. Just six days before the China-WTO treaty was to be signed, 9/11 was perpetrated. Was the destruction of the WTO towers an attempt to forestall the signing of the treaty that would have benefited the PLA and sections of corporate America? If so, the plot did not work. The treaty was signed.

Now consider the factors that emerged from the actions of Washington and Beijing. On 9/11 the terror attack was launched. On 9/11 China moved centre stage in Afghanistan through the MOU it signed. The US attacked the previously friendly Taliban government but instead of eliminating it, as it could, it launched the war against Iraq on the basis of false allegations. As China consolidated its relations with the Afghanistan government without any visible alienation from the Taliban, America got embroiled in two financially crippling unwinnable wars. This resulted in a crippled America and blooming China.

The question is: Was this or was this not the result of collusion between powerful sections in America and China?

Mr. Pei concludes his article with the observation that American attitudes to China will continue to harden until the strategic advantages acquired by Beijing after 9/11 are neutralized. He does not envisage any immediate collision between the US and China. But he does see a new American resolve. I have often pointed out how US Presidents in their first terms are like putty in the hands of the powerful US corporate lobby. But in their second terms, with nothing to fear in future elections, they come into their own and follow independent agendas.

That is what President Bush attempted in his second term. He signed the Nuclear Deal with India not for energy requirements but for a strategic alliance. Unfortunately India let him down by refusing to exploit strategic possibilities.

It is welcome that now mainline media is beginning to recognize the contours of the world’s evil axis though it is too polite to call a spade a spade. But exposure of this axis is necessary not for launching witch hunts. If there are bad guys in Washington colluding with bad guys in Beijing to subvert the world, there are also good guys in Washington with access to the good guys in Beijing seeking peace and stability. Exposure will strengthen the hands of the good guys to defeat the bad guys.
 
Unfortunately among Indian leaders there are neither good guys nor bad guys. There are only dumb guys dancing to the tune of the evil axis which continues to dominate political thinking in this country.