posted 09-12-2003 03:21 PM            

Big Bush's Visit Fuels Talk of Big Deals
By Catherine Belton
Staff Writer
http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2003/09/12/002.html

He may be retired from public life but George Bush seems to cause a stir every time he comes to Russia.

You name it and market players were buzzing Thursday about the real reasons behind the former American leader's visit -- an $18 billion play by U.S. oil giant ChevronTexaco for a blocking stake in the new Yukos-Sibneft combo? The launch of a $500 million private tie-up between Alfa Group and Pentagon-connected Carlyle Group? Divvying up the hydrocarbon resources of postwar Iraq?

Late Wednesday, before Bush Sr. had even left, traders in New York had already heard word that he was heading to Russia to help clear the way for the sale of a strategic stake in YukosSibneft to ChevronTexaco, which named one of its tankers after Condoleezza Rice, a former board member who is now his son's national security adviser.

But it didn't stop there. The buzz continued Thursday as news spread that Bush was also here to help finalize the creation of a $500 million private equity fund between Russian oil-to-telecoms giant Alfa and one of his present employers, the Carlyle Group, a defense industry insider that counts former U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and former British Prime Minister John Major among its advisers.

The U.S. Embassy in Moscow would not comment on Bush's visit, saying only that it was "private." What is known, however, is that he will meet with President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on Sunday, when he arrives in Moscow from St. Petersburg. The Kremlin, too, declined to say what was on the agenda.

It is also known that Bush will deliver the keynote speech at a dinner Monday evening for Russian business leaders -- including Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky -- on behalf of Carlyle.

"We use him to speak at conferences and events," said Carlyle's London-based spokeswoman Katherine Elmore-Jones. Jones, however, would not say if a new private equity fund would be officially announced, but did say that the deal, which the Financial Times first reported is in the works, was still being discussed.

But with U.S.-Russia energy ties high on the agenda for both nations and a bilateral summit on the issue scheduled to begin in St. Petersburg in 10 days, all eyes were on Chevron and its possible purchase of a 25 percent plus one share stake in the new YukosSibneft. The Sunday Times last month quoted anonymous sources close to the deal as saying it was near completion.

Yukos shares jumped more than 4 percent on the news in early trading Thursday.

"This rumor is based on Bush's visit. He is probably going to discuss the acquisition of a stake in YukosSibneft by a major U.S. oil company," a prominent investment banker said.

He said the rumor is that Yukos' sale of a strategic stake to Chevron would be announced at the St. Petersburg summit.

But neither Yukos nor ChevronTexaco would comment on what both companies called "market speculation."

However, other investment bankers were very specific, saying the price for the deal had already been agreed -- a staggering $18.6 billion for 25 percent plus one share, half in cash and half in ChevronTexaco stock, which would be a huge premium over the combined market value of the companies.

But with Yukos under fire from the Kremlin for its moves to finance opposition parties amid a massive bout of infighting between clans in the Kremlin itself, analysts said it seemed that most of the buzz was coming from Yukos.

"Yukos is pushing this, given that there is the possibility of a renewed attack against the company during the election campaign," said Christopher Weafer, chief strategist at Alfa Bank. "Yukos is trying to bend a deal to suit its own purposes, for protection.

"The attack on Yukos in July turned out to be hugely popular with the electorate and they fear the Kremlin might launch something again," Weafer said. Core Yukos shareholder Platon Lebedev was arrested that month for allegedly stealing property in a 1994 privatization.

Weafer said Yukos shareholders appeared to be trying to play two U.S. oil majors, Chevron and ExxonMobil, off of each other in a bid to push the deal along.

"There is room for one more deal in the pipeline. Getting a third [sale of a Russian oil company to a foreign company] approved will be much more difficult," he said. Rival global oil giant BP's recent $6.35 billion deal for a 50-50 partnership with Alfa and Access/Renova's Tyumen Oil Co. boosted BP's global ranking and set off a race between other global oil majors to be the next to clinch the next big deal in one of the fastest-growing oil patches in the world.

Executives from both Chevron and Exxon have been in Moscow for months conducting due diligence studies on Yukos and Sibneft. One market insider said "they are only here because the other one is here."

Joseph Stanislaw, the president of the influential Washington-based think tank Cambridge Energy Research Associates, said by telephone that a race certainly seemed to have started for Russia's oil resources, especially because Iraq, which has the world's second-largest reserves, is still in chaos.

"For international oil majors to grow they have to find brand new reserves. The only opportunities are in Russia, Kazakhstan and parts of the Middle East," said Stanislaw, who is also visiting Moscow. "Iraq is a potential opportunity, but nobody is sure when they are going to be able to go in. If you're not the first and second mover in Russia, you could lose an opportunity. In Iraq, there isn't even a queue yet."

But despite the Bush family's well-known ties with the oil industry, some analysts said they doubted he would try and talk up a deal with YukosSibneft.

"He's on a retainer for Carlyle. He's not cheap and he's not silly. He's here to launch a major investment fund," said James Fenkner, head of research at Troika Dialog.

Analysts also questioned whether it would make any sense for a big oil major to risk billions at a time when Russia seems to be moving into a period of increasing political uncertainty.

"Why a buyer would take a minority stake in YukosSibneft before the elections and when the company is under pressure from the Kremlin is beyond me," Fenkner said. "It would be a pretty darn aggressive play."

Other sources with knowledge of Bush's visit, however, said privately that Bush would use the visit precisely to help clarify the uncertainty swirling around Yukos.

Yukos chief Khodorkovsky has become a leading Russian voice in the West in recent years. He was the first Russian oil baron to send crude directly to the United States -- Texas to be exact -- and was key in establishing high-level energy talks between both countries. He has also tied himself to the Rothschilds, one of the West's most influential banking families, and set up a fund -- the Open Russia Foundation -- to promote ties between former Cold War foes. Influential U.S. foreign policy guru Henry Kissinger sits on Open Russia's board, as does Lord Jacob Rothschild.

Kissinger, coincidentally, is also currently in Moscow, and will attend the Carlyle dinner.

posted 09-12-2003 04:27 PM            

http://www.openrussiafoundation.com/about/rothschild.htm

Nathaniel Charles Jacob Rothschild, fourth Baron Rothschild, is head of the English branch of the Rothschild family and chairman of RIT Capital Partners plc.

Lord Rothschild has played a leading role in the Arts and Heritage field, both in Great Britain and abroad. He was chairman of the National Gallery from 1985 to 1991, during a period of construction and restoration. He has just completed six years as chairman of the National Heritage Memorial Fund and has been responsible for the distribution of 1.25 billion pounds sterling of National Lottery proceeds to support the heritage sector in the United Kingdom.

Lord Rothschild serves as chairman of Yad Hanadiv, the Rothschild foundation which built and handed over to the State of Israel the buildings for both the Knesset and the Supreme Court. He is also President of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, an organization dedicated to cooperation in research, analysis and policy planning on issues affecting Jewish life worldwide.

He is the family member responsible for Waddesdon Manor/the National Trust. The Manor was bequeathed to the National Trust by his cousin Mrs. James A. de Rothschild in 1957 and, in 1995, underwent a major refurbishment program. In 1997, the Manor was given both the Museum of the Year award and the National Trust House of the Year award.

He is a founding trustee, with Lord Sainsbury of Preston Candover, of a foundation for the conservation of the archaeological site of Butrint and its hinterland, in Albania.

Lord Rothschild has been honored by the Government of Portugal for his contribution to the country's economic development, by the World Monuments Fund for his leadership with respect to cultural heritage and by the Weizmann Institute of Science on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the State of Israel. He has received many British honors, including the Order of Merit in 2002 and KNIGHT GRAND CROSS OF THE ORDER of the British Empire in 1997 for services to arts and heritage.

posted 09-12-2003 04:29 PM            

Warren Buffet, Schwartzenegger and Rothschild

ROTHSCHILD/CHENEY/SCHWARTZENEGGER CONNECTION

This article appears in the September 5, 2003 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.

Cheney's Energy Pirates
Behind Schwarzenegger Recall Hoax
by Jeffrey Steinberg
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2003/3034cheney_calif.html

The very same Dick Cheney-Enron energy pirates who ripped off the people of California during the 2000-01 so-called energy crisis, are now out to loot the state once again—under the guise of the "recall Davis" referendum, and the candidacy of the man Lyndon LaRouche refers to as the "overpriced geek act," Arnold Schwarzenegger.

While the rationale behind the drive to recall Gov. Gray Davis is that he drove the state into a $38 billion deficit, EIR has systematically exposed (see chronology, below) that California was robbed blind by Enron, Reliant, Williams Energy, and the whole crowd of energy pirates, who criminally conspired and profiteered off energy deregulation, while virtually destroying the U.S. electric power grid.

The same people who brought Californians 1,000% increases in energy prices and resulting massive deficits, corporate bankruptcies, and job losses, were responsible for the Northeast energy blackout in August, which crippled many U.S. and Canadian cities, and left 50 million in the dark.

And now, they want to overturn the 2002 California gubernatorial elections by a GOP-bankrolled recall drive, aimed at installing a Milton Friedman-loving Hollywood geek act whose greatest claim to fame is that he pumped himself with enough steroids, and puffed enough marijuana, to win some bodybuilding contests, and parlayed that into Hollywood hits and a multimillion-dollar portfolio managed by some of Wall Street's most notorious speculators. On his own website, "The Terminator" boasts of his business acumen, which he learned from his "mentors," underground economy-promoter Milton "legalize drugs" Friedman, casino magnate Donald Trump, real estate wheeler-dealer Leslie Wexner, and mega-speculator Warren Buffett.

As LaRouche comments, we already had one bad experience, in Germany, when they installed a right-wing Austrian strongman in power. California does not have to go through that again.
Cheney to California: Go to Hell

The looting of California by the energy pirates, led by Enron, Dynegy, Reliant, and Williams, was already under way when George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were sworn in as President and Vice President in January 2001. But that was nothing, compared to the White House-sanctioned looting once they were in office. In 2000-01, California's annual energy bill went from $7 billion to $28 billion, as a result of deregulation and the unbridled price manipulations brought on by California's passage of energy deregulation in 1996 to take effect in 2000.

In December 2000, Governor Davis held emergency meetings in Washington with President Bill Clinton, Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, and Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, to head off the imminent bankruptcy of California's two major public energy utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) and Southern California Edison—the fruits of year one of dereg. The utilities were caught in a bind, because there were regulatory caps on the rates they could charge customers, but no ceiling on what the private energy suppliers could charge them. By January 2001, the utilities faced $11 billion in unpayable debts.

As soon as Bush-Cheney took office, they delivered a message to Californians: Go to Hell! President Bush announced a one-time-only, two-week extension of Clinton's emergency order forcing power-merchant companies to sell power to the near-bankrupt California utilities.

Vice President Cheney, appointed to head up the Administration's energy task force on day eight of the Bush Presidency, candidly told reporters the emergency order would not be renewed, and the Bush Administration would not lift a finger to help California to counter the energy pirates. "I'm a believer in markets," he babbled. "I think the notion of deregulation is basically sound. What happened in California, it was poorly executed."

Never mind Cheney's own lucrative career as CEO of the energy firm Halliburton; never mind that Enron was the largest corporate contributor to the Bush-Cheney campaign, and the other energy pirates were right behind Enron in bidding for Administration favor.

Shut off from any help from the Federal government, California was compelled, on Jan. 31, 2001 to legislate $10 billion in new state bonds—just to buy electrical power. And it would take a Feb. 21 Federal court order to force Reliant, Williams, AES, and Dynegy to even keep selling to California.

By March 2001, the piracy by the energy companies had reached the point that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), although dominated by dereg backers, had to launch a confidential probe into price manipulations by Williams Energy and Reliant. Eventually both firms would be fined tens of millions of dollars for shutting down California power generators in order to drive up prices. In the Williams case, the shutdowns were carried out in 2000, before Bush-Cheney, during the opening phase of the looting, but were kept secret by FERC until after the Cheney task force report was issued fully embracing deregulation.

The fines were a slap on the wrist, as Williams' profits soared by 172% in the first quarter of 2001, and Reliant's jumped by 104%—largely due to the scalping of California.

All told, from the 2000-01 crisis to the present, California has been robbed of a sum greater than the current $38 billion state deficit!
Dick, Arnie, and Ken Conspire

The Cheney energy task force was a rubber stamp for Enron and the other energy pirates, who virtually wrote the text of the group's report, which was rushed to release on May 16, 2001 (a new General Accounting Office report assails Cheney for keeping the entire effort secret—see accompanying article). While the Cheney report peddled energy cartel looting on the homefront, it also targetted Iraq and other oil-rich countries for imperial conquest and energy grab.

The Cheney report made scant mention of the California crisis. Cheney also spat on California in a PBS "Frontline" interview after the report was unveiled, coldly denying that the energy giants were functioning as a cartel. "The problem you had in California," Cheney lied, "was caused by a combination of things—an unwise regulatory scheme, because they didn't really deregulate. Now they're trapped, from unwise regulatory schemes, plus not having addressed the supply side of the issue. They've obviously created major problems for themselves and bankrupted PG&E in the process."

In April 2001, Cheney had met with Enron's chief executive, Kenneth Lay, a member of the Pioneers group of Bush campaign mega-contributors, who presented the Vice President with a memo laying out eight proposals. Seven of the eight, all promoting radical deregulation, were adopted almost verbatim in the Cheney report. Lay reportedly also pressured Cheney to ensure that his report made little mention of California. Cheney obliged.

Lay was running a simultaneous campaign in California, to focus the blame for the energy crisis on Governor Davis, and to dodge state and Federal prosecutors for Enron's predatory actions. Former Dow Jones California bureau chief Jason Leopold recently revealed that on May 24, 2001—one week after the Cheney report's release—Lay held a secret meeting at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills, to organize a group of GOP bigshots and Hollywood celebs to join his propaganda push against Davis, and peddle Enron's schemes for accelerated looting of the state through even more drastic deregulation.

Among the attendees: former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, infamous Drexel Burnham junk bond felon Michael Milken—and Arnold Schwarzenegger! The attendees were given a proposal titled "Comprehensive Solution for California." One key feature was that all state and Federal probes into Enron's role in the California energy crisis should immediately be shut down.

Lay knew Enron was dying, despite robbing California blind—the firm would file for bankruptcy Dec. 2, 2001—when he made the pitch to end the probes and give Enron one last chance to loot its way out of bankruptcy court.

A Leopold source at the meeting revealed that Schwarzenegger and Riordan had been asked to the session as likely GOP gubernatorial candidates against Davis in 2002.

Just before that meeting, on April 15, 2001, the New York Times reported on a meeting between "Bush political advisors" and the Terminator, to discuss a gubernatorial run. White House chief political advisor Karl Rove was quoted saying that a Schwarzenegger run "would be nice. That would be really, really nice. That would be really, really, really nice." In fact, Arnie had been at the White House, meeting with Rove, on April 12.
Lord Jacob's Dark Age Soiré

While Schwarzenegger declined to run against Davis in 2002, he was being groomed by a much bigger group of financier pirates for some political slot. On Sept. 23, 2002, amid the Washington-London mobilization for war against Iraq, Arnold accompanied speculator Warren Buffett to a gathering at the Waddesdon Manor estate of Lord Jacob Rothschild in Britain. London Times correspondent Anatole Kaletsky, a guest at the European Economic Roundtable conference, co-sponsored by Buffett and Rothschild, wrote about the "dark age" gathering in a column on Sept. 26.

By Kaletsky's account, the meeting aimed at giving the elite financiers a preview of the hell to come, as Cheney and British Prime Minister Tony Blair steered their governments into a string of perpetual wars, starting in the Mideast, but soon to engulf Eurasia. "The apocalyptic tone was set by a hair-raising discussion of the Middle East," Kaletsky wrote. "After hearing presentations from two well-placed Washington officials, it became clear not only that war now was inevitable—and in a matter of weeks, not months. Far more alarming, was that the war would not stop with the removal of President Saddam Hussein, still less with a UN-sponsored campaign to eliminate Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.... After dealing with Iraq, the pressure for 'regime change' would shift to Iran, then Saudi Arabia, Syria and Pakistan... As if an ever-expanding war were not bad enough, the economic outlook presented to the gathered plutocrats was even grimmer, since it was not overlaid with the blustering confidence of the Washington war party.... The economic experts—including James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, Paul Volcker, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, and, of course Buffett himself—all emphasized the impotence of monetary and fiscal policy after the collapse of one of the greatest speculative bubbles of all time. To make matters worse, the assembled company generally agreed that America and Britain would soon be threatened by new bubbles in the property market."

Since the September 2002 session, Lord Jacob Rothschild has emerged as the "white knight" designated to save Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, should President Vladimir Putin move against Khodorkovsky's Yukos oil empire. The same Khodorkovsky was recently a guest of Buffett et al. at the Sun Valley, Idaho ranch of Meyer Lansky's favorite broker, Herbert Allen, Jr., at the annual gathering of telecommunications executives and Wall Street speculators. According to one Russian source, Khodorkovsky capped his U.S. visit with a secret meeting with Vice President Cheney.

In July 2000, a somewhat less elite collection of financiers, technocrats, and politicians than those assembled by Lord Jacob at his British manor, had gathered at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City, to anoint George W. Bush and Al Gore as Wall Street/London-vetted Presidential candidates, because both men would hand financial crisis management to the Federal Reserve and the banks.

According to accounts by Reuters and the Scotsman, the Waddesdon Manor event similarly vetted the Terminator as the man for this season of wars and financial catastrophes.
Enter George Shultz

To make clear that Schwarzenegger is out to rape California in the tradition of Dick Cheney's Enron: On the opening day of his quest for the governor's mansion, Schwarzenegger showed up with his new chief campaign economic advisor, George Shultz, the man who installed Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle as top campaign policy wonks for George W. Bush, and who in 1971 was the official who convinced President Nixon to end the Bretton Woods system, thus triggering more than 30 years of global speculative looting and physical economic breakdown.

posted 09-15-2003 01:59 PM            

Warren Buffet, Schwartzenegger and Lord Rothschild

Is Arnold the running man?

Stephen McGinty

Tough-guy Arnold Schwarzenegger is a man more familiar with the red carpets of a movie premiere than a white collar business seminar, so the sight of the Terminator escorting Warren Buffet, the second-richest man on the planet, to the European Economic Round Table conference on Monday was slightly strange. His pressed business suit, white shirt (attaboy Arnie) and sombre striped tie were a world away from the army fatigues or black leather jacket of his signature roles, triggering speculation that a career change may be just around the corner.

After a string of flops - remember Eraser, End of Days and Collateral Damage? Probably not - the actor needs next year’s Terminator 3 to hit paydirt. Should the film nosedive he plans to move into politics and run for the governorship of California, the platform from which Ronald Reagan propelled himself into the White House. A spokesman for NetJets, the corporate aircraft firm owned by Buffet - which sponsored the seminar - insisted Arnie was an ordinary delegate, as well as a customer, just there to listen. He was not there to talk nor paid to attend.

From the sidelines it seems a slick piece of synergy by the billionaire Buffet: organise a lavish conference at Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire, the ancestral home of the Rothschild banking family, invite the world’s leading businessmen and financiers, and dazzle them with a major Hollywood star. Schwarzenegger, an astute businessman himself with a degree in business and economics from the University of Wisconsin, gains the wisdom and knowledge of guest speakers such as James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, Jorma Ollila, chief executive of Nokia and Roland Berger, a prominent consultant in global strategy. After two days of handshakes and drinks he’ll have boosted his credibility with the men who may one day bankroll his political ambitions. He might well also point out how happy he is with NetJets’ services. The company, whose other clients include Pete Sampras and Martina Hingis, sell an eighth or a 16th of a private jet to customers, entitling them to a certain number of flying hours without the expense of maintaining ground crews and hanger space.

A Republican - though one married to a Kennedy - Schwarzenegger signalled his support for Dubya Bush in his choice of footwear. While his follow guests shuffled around in their handmade Italian shoes, Arnie had the additional swagger bestowed by a pair of black cowboy boots with stainless steel tips.

What appeared to be a promotional stunt may instead be the actor’s next step towards joining the President’s political posse.