Biden’s gambit in Afghanistan

The post follows upon the two-part post on the American/NATO pull-out of Afghanistan. The hysteria and negative reporting in the American media has been going on at full throttle, with reports already steering the narrative in the public toward sanctioning the Afghanis and at the very least delaying recognition of any government that is to be formed. The hot war that has now ended is shifting toward a covert and hybrid war, with the effort to keep Afghanistan destabilized already taking shape. This post will be more of a focus on the US, though, along with the astrology of the US and what it will mean for the nation in the immediate years ahead.

In the first post on Afghanistan we looked at the government that has just fallen and the background on the 2001 war and how it evolved over time. In the 2^nd post we had a look at the events and a few possibilities as to what is to emerge with the new government, currently in formation. In this post we have a look at what the basis of every war involves – cui bono? – who has ultimately benefited from the war in Afghanistan and in a wider sense, the ‘War on Terror’.

In the Leo Blue Moon letter we expanded a little on what had taken place in Afghanistan and mention was made of a direction in the US chart that was most prevalent on the ides of August:

“In October of last year I did a post where I was tracking the special relationship. There were solar arc directions of Pluto to the meridian axes of both the US and the UK. For the UK that influence began in January of this year, to be exact in four months. For the United States, that direction was exact – on 15 Aug 2021, the day the Taliban took over in Kabul. The US and the UK have mutual Moon/Saturn contacts in their synastry (relationship chart), so there are old karmic links between the two nations. That is not difficult to see. But Pluto directions to the MC of an individual or nation can point to one of two things – the ultimate attainment of objectives, or ruin through the misuse of power.”

We will take that as a basis. But before we look at the transits and directions to the US, and in answer to the question of cui bono, we have the following from Julian Assange, from 2011, speaking on the war in Afghanistan:

“The goal is to use Afghanistan to wash money out of the tax bases of the US and Europe through Afghanistan and back into the hands of a transnational security elite. The goal is an endless war, not a successful war”

In other words, our tax dollars were being used to fund the ‘fun and games’ of an elite transnational security apparatus, headed by the US and UK, with hangers-on in certain Western European countries. The war made a fortune for what Ray McGovern defines as the MICIMATT (Military-Industrial-Counter-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think Tank) complex. The main beneficiaries have been the Anglo-European ‘defense’ industries and their shareholders, media conglomerates and covert operations, the latter having operated through the heroin rat line run out of the Kabul airport and Bagram air base.

Interesting acronym, the MICIMATT. It sounds like a kids’ club or playground, even a corner convenience store. “I’m goin’ to the Micimatt for beers and chips. The game’s on tonight.” Americans will get it. I have heard many comments, like this one and this one, to the effect that the intelligence/policy level at the MICIMATT is about on par with the comparison, too.

But seriously, to put the matter succinctly, the wars in Afghanistan and in the Middle East/Southwest Asia have been wars for the oligarchs and the very wealthy, all the while draining our purses and exacting chaos and destruction on foreign lands. The war and ensuing occupation have rendered Afghanistan, for instance, the 7^th-poorest nation on Earth, in contrast to what we were told was ‘bringing democracy, freedom and nation-building’ to Afghanistan. We’ll come back to this, because there appear to be some major changes in the works.

Moving on to the astrology of the US on 15 August this year, the chart for the US with transits and directions is below (bigger):

The immediate standout is the combined direction of the natal Pluto/Ascendant semisquare to the natal MC, activated by transiting Uranus, showing the sudden turn in the fates – the plural of fate is emphasized here – of the nation. The combination formed by the direction is MC=Pluto/Asc, which would normally indicate the achievement of objectives and the attainment of power and authority. Indeed, Biden and Blinken both stated the US had achieved all their objectives in Afghanistan, and they had – just not the ones they stated. Instead, the objectives thus attained were for the aforementioned MICIMATT. But then, Uranus has a way of putting a big kink in the plans of mice and men.

The transit of Uranus activating the direction under consideration points to, “A frequent change of environment, the misfortune to live in constant anxiety and restlessness. – Extraordinary incidents and upsets, accidents”. Events in Afghanistan certainly have been extraordinary in recent days, as well as upsetting. But there is more.

The natal US Midheaven itself forms the midpoint MC=Mer/Ura, which is an important aspect of the US and deserves to be read in its entirety:

“A person with the ability to grasp all connective links and relationships correctly and to draw the logical conclusions from such knowledge. – An inventor, a mathematician, a physicist or a cosmobiologist. – The ability to think about a particular matter acutely and keenly and to act swiftly.”

All of those points have been active in the United States in the past, a nation that is well known for its scientists, its tech and its ability to act quickly and decisively. That was particularly evident in WWII, when American threw its entire manufacturing might behind the war effort and mobilized the population toward the war as well. A lot has changed since then. We won’t go into why here except to say the leadership in Washington has lost touch with the evolving world, evident in the chaotic scenes coming from Afghanistan now.

In addition to directions to the natal MC, we see the transit of Pluto opposite the natal Mercury, showing the attempts to spin the situation in Kabul in a better light, as well as to heighten the sense of alarm in the Western public, blaming to the Taliban for the confusion and sporadic violence there. Transiting Pluto also aspected natal Uranus, the ‘revolutionary’ combination. The aspect to Uranus also activates a particular direction, though, also mentioned in the Leo Blue Moon letter, as follows:

“…We all know the nation is divided, with increasing disparities of wealth and influence and with a polarized society. This has happened two times before – once in 1896 and then in the 1930s. On all three occasions – 1896, 1936 and 2020 – there was a configuration of solar arcs involving the following planets: Mercury, Ceres, Jupiter and Uranus. Each of those years was an election year. In each case there was a candidate who was demonized by the press, seen as the devil incarnate by the establishment and these periods have been characterized by extremes of inequality. Each period has been accompanied by national hysteria against the ‘bad guy’ – a ‘bad guy’ who was loved by a sector of the populace, as in the working classes…”

And hated by another. If we look at the rectangle next to directed Jupiter, we see the minutes of separation formed by directed Jupiter, noting the most recent exact direction was to Mercury, about three months ago, followed by Uranus at about 6 months (just after the election, with only 4’ of separation when the Capitol building was stormed) and lastly to Ceres, exact on 6 Nov 2020 – election day.

Many pundits had predicted a surprise Trump win, but with Jupiter directed to Ceres, a turning point was in the works, one that would favour more progressive policies (since Uranus was involved) and which would go against the sitting government, since directed Pluto was on the MC and there had been talk of keeping the office by force, ‘if necessary’. On election day, Pluto was also transiting in aspect to all the points to which Jupiter was directed, thereby activating the directions, and showing a storm was in the works. That storm was to come in Kabul, which has thrown the current US government into disarray. Note, too, by the astrology, there would have been a storm for the government no matter who had been elected.

Lastly, we note the transit of Neptune on ‘Saigon v. 2 day’ was opposite its natal position, square to natal Mars and sesquisquare the natal north node. That period of Neptune transits opposite its own place has only happened once before in US history. One example was in 1858, just before the Civil War. The country was divided then, too, over slavery. It was the year Lincoln had accepted the Republican nomination for US Senate and gave his House Divided speech. Now we have Black Lives Matter and Critical Race Theory. But the transit itself highlights the nation’s ideals. Idealism has always been a keynote of American life, and those are being challenged again in the US. And that brings up a point worth considering.

The US faces no external enemies, despite what we are told. There are two wide oceans that separate the nation from Asia and Europe, a narrow isthmus at Panama to the south, and a friendly nation and the Arctic Ocean to the north. No one is going to attack the US. No one wants to. Instead, Washington tries to project its power and ‘values’ across the world, at great expense to American taxpayers, not to mention the pain and destruction it has brought to other nations. The list is long. But who exactly has benefitted from that adventurism in the past? The fact is, America hardly ever forcefully intervenes in other nations unless the interests of certain vested interests are threatened, and in these days those vested interests are largely along financial lines and control of resources.

Why did we go bomb and destroy Libya, for instance, or Syria, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq and so forth? It was for those very reasons – control of resources, and then to stop any hint of socialism and bucking of the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency. It is why Iran, Russia and China are seen as the prime threats to the US at the moment – because they do not play by our rules-based order – why we still try to destabilize Venezuela and why Cuba is again on the hit list for regime change. Why have we just seen Biden’s gambit, then, and why the vitriol from Trump if his aim (as he painted it) was to get the troops out? Picture this:

“2021 is 1975, America’s oil problems, a real estate bubble, and an economy that’s about broke have returned. Here, let me quote from the aforementioned article on the Vietnam era situation:

“The origins of the Great Inflation were policies that allowed for an excessive growth in the supply of money—Federal Reserve policies.”

Remember, Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society was expensive, as was the Vietnam War, and those moon launches did not come cheap either. Nixon was forced to nix the gold standard, and the dollar became pure paper, or “air” if we tell the whole truth. We’ve no space here to discuss the ramifications of the Great Depression, but the collapse of the Bretton Woods agreement, the establishment of the so-called Phillips curve in pursuit of lower unemployment, and other factors like fiscal imbalances and energy shortages culminated about the time Saigon was evacuated.”

The point being made in the quote is that the US possibly faces energy supply problems now unless it returns to fracking, which has to be heavily subsidized and which poisons the environment. Otherwise supply is left to the vagaries of the international markets in terms of pricing and supply. Iran can shut off the Strait of Hormuz, Washington had to give up on Nordstream II, which would have been an additional source of revenue for American gas, Venezuela is still sovereign, and so forth. Perhaps the point gets a little clearer.

The US Treasury is printing money like nobody’s business, real estate is in another bubble, propped up since the beginning of the pandemic and boosted by bailouts to Wall Street. The national debt-to-GDP ratio is into the 100+ percentile. The latest figure is approaching $30 trillion, with 100 million workers out of work. The pandemic grinds on, with the hospitals in the US loading up again in some areas. Currency and credit derivatives have sextupled in one year alone since last year. American taxpayers cannot continually foot the bill for everything, while corporations and oligarchs pay little if any tax and demand that taxes (on them) be kept very low. Something had to give.

Biden has made two telling statements in the past months:

• American troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war in the place of anyone else. (Paraphrased from his speech. Allies should take careful note, and probably are.)
• “Capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism; it’s exploitation.” (His statement about his new antitrust executive order.)

The American/NATO pull-out from Afghanistan is a reflection of his statements. One cannot rebuild an economy with major conflicts going on, and Afghanistan had drained the American taxpayer’s purse by $100 billion/year on average. And in this we come to the clincher for Biden.

There are some very unhappy people across the West and in Washington especially because American and NATO troops have had to leave so abruptly, left without a foothold in the region and with the heroin ratline about to shut down. The Taliban have promised the regional powers opium production in Afghanistan will cease as soon as government is formed. Here is what is evolving:

• Having lost the foothold in Central Asia to the regional powers – China, Russia, Iran, Pakistan and India – the West has no base from which to challenge those powers militarily, or from which to launch covert ops within those regional centers. There was a recent covert visit by the CIA director to assess possibilities and the situation in general, the cover story being to speak about the crisis at the Kabul airport.
• The American economy shows rumblings of ending the neoliberal project, which also means the globalist project. This is evident in Biden’s anti-trust executive order. As to how far it will go remains to be seen, as it will be heavily challenged by vested interests. In the tech sphere especially, that will be very interesting to watch. New tech platforms will be emerging, as well across many industries. The effect on media, too, will be pronounced.
• Because the Western elites in the US, UK and Germany especially have lost their main staging area in Afghanistan, and because Iran is about to be made a full member of the SCO, it is very likely nations in Southwest Asia will soon be following the lead of Afghanistan, as in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. This will take time to materialize, but over the next couple of years, all going well for Asian nations, it will be fact.
• The hysteria we are hearing out of the establishments in the three aforementioned Western powers points to the loss they are suddenly realizing. Illusions are dying quickly in the West – of special relationships, of supposed alliances and of their sense of power and influence. As is the case with people like Tony Blair, the guilty dogs are barking the loudest. And the British media was as guilty as Blair in pushing for the war to start with. Now they broadcast his imbecilic tirade. We are seeing the three first stages of grief over that loss – denial, anger and bargaining. We have yet to see depression and acceptance, especially from the US and UK.
• One of the most profitable revenue streams for the MICIMATT has now abruptly stopped. And there are no more good endless wars on the horizon. Invade or bomb Russia, China or Iran? – suicide. Too quick, bad for public image and too many dead Americans. The Rand corporation and military have already done all the war gaming. How about invading Syria and finishing the job of ousting Assad? Oops, Russians again. Venezuela? – long guerrilla war, scads of refugees fleeing to you-know-where, probably Russians and Chinese arming the Venezuelans, motivated populace, and very unpopular in you-know-where – except maybe in southern Florida. Same with Cuba. Ukraine or Belarus? Damn Russians again.

So, the military-industrial people along with their obedient media will soon be looking for another war to prosecute somewhere. Or perhaps they can coax/coerce some other regional power to start a war with one of their neighbors and supply them (doesn’t matter which side, or perhaps both) with expensive American weaponry. We can’t start laying off American workers for lack of a good war, can we? Well…can we?!? But Biden seems intent on doing so. So, blame Biden for everything. All this might sound very cynical, but the truth is, that is the way of things in Washington.

Really, if you want to know where the blame lies for the US/NATO Saigon moment, have a read of this for a wider perspective. And then, read this. We won’t go over it here. The two posts reveal quite a lot about what went on there. But someone has to be blamed, someone has to take the fall for the loss of Afghanistan. And the Western elites seem intent on laying the blame at Biden’s feet. Of course, Biden has not handled the PR very well, but at least we are out of Afghanistan, almost.

The ‘Kabul debacle’ is showing the clear fractures within the main NATO partners, with recent grandstanding by the British and French at the G7 meeting, largely for domestic consumption. This has been a particularly painful episode for the British – for their neocon cohorts in the Conservative Party, notably – and Biden has now poured salt in the wounds there by stating the August 31^st deadline to get the troops out stands. The other G7 partners were pushing for an extension.

There is much more to add, but we will leave it for later. To summarize, though, big changes are afoot for the US, and for the UK, too. If (we should say when) the neoliberal project finally dies its last gasp in the US, it will quickly follow in the UK. The pandemic has highlighted all the weaknesses and selfishness inherent in that system. The rout in Afghanistan has put the seal on the more militaristic end of it, as in ending it. Some commenters are still in denial, saying we can somehow salvage what is left of our influence in Afghanistan. It is pure fantasy.

Afghanistan was a neoliberal, neo-colonial project. It will now become a semi-socialist economy at least, probably much along the same lines as Iran. There is already talk across media of sanctioning Afghanistan. Boris Johnson says the West has ‘large leverage’ over the Taliban via the frozen $7 billion in funds. To the Chinese, that is a drop in the bucket. Besides, it is the Taliban who holds the cards in Kabul. The new government there will have to approach all of that very carefully and slowly.

In the US, the general public is unaware of what is at stake for the US. Afghanistan is a distraction, and the public is kept in the dark, for the very reasons the vested interests are going after Biden. From a previous link:

“Now, on to how Biden has to bail out of Kabul, and fast. The system is busted. The huge deficits cranked out by the treasuries of the world are, of course, being paid for by the 99%. But the money machine is too big, too fragile now, and looming catastrophes like climate change have these elites a bit more worried than usual. There’s something huge on the horizon, and I think the last thing the American president needs are loose ends in the mountains of Afghanistan.

The United States has used up most of her strategic oil reserves [by] making SUV drivers from Philly happy. Pressuring Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and other gas and oil producing nations has not worked to generate more supply. The Saudis are all but done producing anything that will pump through a pipeline without mixing it with seawater. And America’s reputation is the least of Joe Biden’s worries. In fact, it’s not the biggest worry for any of us. The other foot falling, is.”

As in climate. But it is more than that. That ‘other foot’, as the author calls it, also has weight added to it by the estimated quadrillions (that’s right) of dollars in derivatives being used as ‘air currency’ (as in close to worthless) around the world. Russia has completely de-dollarized if need be. China has just introduced its digital yuan. Iran is using barter to trade its oil and is starting to use other currencies in payments. To the Eastern nations, the writing is on the wall. And all the while the American reputation is declining year by year. And bubbles are about to start bursting in the United States. Europe has its own problems. And in the East? Well, they can get along quite well without us.

To end on an astrological note, the first of the Pluto return exact conjunctions starts next year, in the first of the year, continuing until October of 2023. The last conjunction is the direct station of Pluto on the natal Pluto, not exact but within orb.

Currently, transiting Pluto is across from the US Mercury, giving us all the hysteria, hyperbole, the knives out for Biden (a.k.a. culpable people or those about to lose their income streams trying to cover their backsides) via the media (Mercury) and the open fearmongering, as in warnings of a Daesh attack on the mobs at the airport.

There have just been a few bombings there, with Americans killed, apparently an effort to disrupt the evacuation plans, among other things. Two days before, the head of the CIA was there. The US and UK had warned hours before of just such an attack. You can draw your own conclusions. We can expect ongoing efforts to keep Afghanistan destabilized. And now a Republican congressman is calling for arming a viable resistance faction, shades of Charlie Wilson’s War. This will not help Afghanistan. It is to keep a toehold in the country. There is more to this story, but we will have to leave it for now. There is covert Western activity afoot, from informed sources. There will be another post on that aspect to come.

Staying with the US for the remainder of this post, there have been several most significant events in the saga of declining empire and hegemony in the past few years. The first was the almost-shootout at the OK Corral moment in Syria in 2013, described in the Leo Blue Moon letter. Obama blinked. The second was the Russian intervention in Syria in 2015. The West could do nothing to stop it. The third was the Iranian missile attack on two American bases in Iraq on Jan 8 2020. Trump blinked. That was also two days before the 10 Jan lunar eclipse, with Saturn and Pluto conjunct in Capricorn, signalling also the coming pandemic, signalling the end of the Western era of dominance in world affairs. And now we have the present events in Afghanistan.

Above all, though, for the United States the Pluto return takes place in the 2^nd house – national finances, national currency, national self-esteem – and will be accompanied in that house by transiting Saturn for the entire period of the Pluto return, along with a transit over the US Moon (one of the main glamour-busting transits). Then, there is the ongoing transit of Uranus through Taurus, in the US 5^th house (stock market, speculators, and national happiness). On the world scale, the international monetary and financial system in undergoing a fundamental overhaul and Uranus is only half-way through its transit of that sign.

Very great and enduring changes are in store for the United States in the immediate future – financial, social, economic, security and for the national perception of itself. Old beliefs and myths often die a hard death. Much of the changes that will take place will occur in Foggy Bottom, the Beltway, New York and Silicon Valley. The battles to come will be hard-fought, and all internal. The American public will be the key to success or failure of progressive and humanitarian change.

Afghanistan is both a symptom and a symbol for the changes to come. It is time to bring Americans home, both physically and in ideals. Our challenges need our full attention at home. The rest of the world can and will handle their own. To call this episode ‘Biden’s fiasco’ is a false narrative. American foreign militarism and policy has been a fiasco for decades. It is time we started to see it for what it is.

Featured pic from Axios