The Canadian government under Justin Trudeau is undermining not just Canada’s (ok, undeserved) reputation as an honest, fair mediator, but he has chosen 2019 to make Canada the enabler of the worst of US imperial policies.



Yes, the Huawei debacle is an embarrassment that will be remembered more as a joke, though possibly as the Suez Crisis of the US empire.* Whatever. Canada to the rescue! And of course, Canada reviles Islamic Iran, while shedding crocodile tears for the 50 Muslims murdered last week in New Zealand.


But far more despicable, downright ‘war-crime’ territory is Canada’s role in undermining the Venezuelan socialist government. The US war on Venezuela has been ongoing ever since Hugo Chavez miraculously survived a US-backed coup in 2002. Canada has been a minor irritant to the socialists, but not the villain. Until now.



The scenario is a variation on Eisenhower in Iran 1953 and from Reagan on, JFK in Cuba 1961, Nixon in Chile 1973 ... Same use of an angry old elite furious that the common people were finally getting some justice. The current attempt at overthrowing the socialists is in full swing: total boycott, a lying media shrilly howling for President Maduro’s resignation, sabotage.


Canadian computer villains


Cyber warfare is use of computers, which can be hacked and infected with viruses. US-Israel developed the Stuxnet virus as a cyber weapon to sabotage Iran’s nuclear power program in 2010. Iran miraculously survived this -- and 40 years of nonstop subversion, but it is exhausting. Iran is no longer so vulnerable, alhamdulillah.


What was meant to be the crowning achievement of imperial subterfuge in Venezuela was to use a similar computer breakdown of the electrical system of virtually the entire country. (Bad move to put all your electricity in one basket.)


In a Telesur interview (sorry, it’s banned under Canadian democracy), Professor Adriansa dealt with possible causes of the blackout at the Guri Dam Hydroelectric Project, which provides 70% of Venezuela's electricity.


The dam was built in 1963 and expanded in 1976. Since 2000, there is an ongoing refurbishment project to extend the operation of Guri Power Plant by 30 years.


The Guri computer system which broke down was bought from ABB Canada, a subsidiary of ABB Switzerland and Sweden, in 2005, to interface with an existing centralized control system that was installed by SNC Lavalin. (yes, the SNC Lavalin)


Adriansa concluded the Guri computer system may already have had a backdoor built into it that would allow it to be hacked. Software or viruses could have been added gradually over a period of months. This would have required internal or ABB Canada complicity. As with the Stuxnet virus, software can be designed so that something would happen on a particular date.


The purpose -- to paralyze Venezuela at the perfect moment, to create the psychological conditions the US has been seeking, where they wouldn't have to bomb Venezuela. The Venezuelan people would give up their socialist project, the scenario goes, President Maduro would be driven from power, and the Venezuelan constitution would be repealed. Happy (imperial) ending.


Right on cue, as the hysterical demonstrations and containers of toothpaste and pasta were being burned on the Colombian border, with US troops on alert nearby, egged on by Quisling Guaido, the entire electrical network of Venezuela was destroyed. For 12 days now, Venezuelans have been living on life support. So far, the people are not buying into the US plan to overthrow Maduro.


Can the Venezuelans hold firm through this latest colour revolution? Will they surrender to US diktat? I know if I were there, I would only be more committed to defeat the gringos and their lackeys.


CIA gift to Siberia


This cyber warfare really is old hat. It began as soon as computers became integral to industry back in the 1980s. The most spectacular example of this was the CIA plan to sabotage the economy of the Soviet Union, which resulted in “the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space”.


The CIA covertly transferred computer technology -- again via a Canadian company -- containing malfunctions, including software, that later triggered a huge explosion in a Siberian natural gas pipeline in mid-1982, former air force secretary Thomas Reed revealed in his memoirs At the Abyss: An Insider's History of the Cold War (2004).


The US was trying to stop western Europe from importing Soviet natural gas. (Hey, isn’t that what the US is still trying to do, even after it destroyed the Soviet Union?) A KGB insider gained access to Russian purchase orders and the CIA slipped in the flawed software.


I hope the Bolivarians have backbone. They have to crack down on the traitors. It’s Cuba post-Bay-of-Pigs time. The white elite vs the brown socialists. Fighting the empire is not for the weak at heart. What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger.


xxx
*The decline of the British empire reached its end in the 1950s with the Suez crisis, Eisenhower stopped cold a UK-led invasion of Egypt by threatening to dump Washington’s huge holdings of pound-sterling bonds and cripple the British financial system. At the same time, Britain’s remaining colonies were achieving independence. The attempt by the U.S. to undo China’s Huawei communications giant in 2018 has been compared to this period in British decline. China could sell its hoard of US Treasurys, creating a dollar crisis.

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Canadian Eric Walberg is known worldwide as a journalist specializing in the Middle East, Central Asia and Russia. A graduate of University of Toronto and Cambridge in economics, he has been writing on East-West relations since the 1980s.

He has lived in both the Soviet Union and Russia, and then Uzbekistan, as a UN adviser, writer, translator and lecturer. Presently a writer for the foremost Cairo newspaper, Al Ahram, he is also a regular contributor to Counterpunch, Dissident Voice, Global Research, Al-Jazeerah and Turkish Weekly, and is a commentator on Voice of the Cape radio.

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Eric's latest book The Canada Israel Nexus is available here http://www.claritypress.com/WalbergIV.html