Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor

On Sunday, seven Dec 1941, at 7:55 A.M. the Japanese Imperial Navy launched a surprise assault on the U.S. of A. of America Pacific Fleet located inwards Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The theories as well as explanations of the events surrounding the Japanese assault on U.S. forces have got larn a cottage manufacture for historians of World War II.

Questions most U.S. military machine involvement, as well as theories of how it happened as well as who knew what as well as when, reappear alongside each 10th anniversary. As early on every bit 1942 opponents of President Roosevelt defendant him of working to convey the U.S. of A. of America into World War II as well as using the Japanese assault on the U.S. of A. of America every bit an excuse to practise only that.

The events surrounding the assault have got been discipline to multiple interpretations. John Toland, Robert B. Stinnett, James Rusbridger, as well as Eric Nave have got been amid those who argued that a conspiracy existed to occupation an assault on Pearl Harbor to convey the U.S. of A. of America into the state of war as well as was the existent ground for the Japanese success.


Others led yesteryear Gordon Prange, Roberta Wohlstetter, as well as Henry Clausen have got argued that it was a serial of errors on the constituent of the U.S. of A. of America that gave Nippon its opportunity. Since the halt of the war, large amounts of information most who knew what have got emerged, oft providing to a greater extent than smoke than light.

The assault caught a large release of U.S. warships inwards the harbor. The Japanese sank or damaged viii battleships, 2 beyond repair. They also damaged iii lite cruisers, iii destroyers, as well as iv other ships beyond repair.

In the U.S. Navy as well as Marines, 2,086 were killed as well as 749 wounded, as well as inwards the regular army 194 were killed as well as 360 wounded. In addition, the U.S. of A. of America lost 188 aircraft. Japanese losses were fewer than 100 personnel as well as 29 aircraft. The lawsuit shocked the United States, which had been used to the thought of safety inside the territories.

The U.S. of A. of America as well as Nippon had larn important competitors inwards Asia prior to the war. U.S. policy inwards the Pacific during the 1930s as well as early on 1940s was perceived yesteryear the Japanese every bit hostile to their interests inwards the region. At the same time, Japanese expansion inwards the portion was seen inwards Washington every bit hostile to U.S. interests inwards Asia.

U.S.–Japanese relations were deteriorating throughout 1940–1941 as well as every bit the province of affairs became to a greater extent than probable to displace to a military machine solution, U.S. planners foresaw a potential Japanese assault on U.S. interests inwards the Pacific, peculiarly inwards the Philippines where the U.S. of A. of America had a important military machine presence, led yesteryear General Douglas MacArthur. The displace of the U.S. Pacific Fleet from San Diego to Hawaii inwards 1940 was done alongside a role every bit well. Its placement at that spot was a tilt of U.S. involvement as well as intent inwards the region.

Hawaii was a less secure location than California. There had already been a release of studies showing the possibility of an air assault against Pearl Harbor. The possibility was considered important plenty that on seven Feb 1941, General George Marshall (U.S. Army original of staff) sent Lieutenant General Walter Short (commanding full general of the Hawaiian Department) a message informing him that “the gamble of sabotage as well as the gamble involved inwards a surprise raid yesteryear air as well as yesteryear submarine constitute the existent perils of the situation”.

Then on five March 1941 some other message from Marshall informed General Short: “I would appreciate your early on review of the province of affairs inwards Hawaiian Department alongside regard to defense forcefulness from air attack. The institution of a satisfactory organisation of coordinating all way available to this is a affair of inaugural of all priority”. On 27 Nov 1941 the commanders inwards the Pacific were sent what has larn known every bit the “war warning” message.

Marshall’s message cautioned of potential Japanese activity “at whatever moment” as well as also informed General Short, “Prior to hostile Japanese action, yous are directed to undertake such reconnaissance as well as other measures every bit yous deem necessary”. In the navy message it noted the displace of an “amphibious expedition against either the Philippines, or the Kra Peninsula or mayhap Borneo”.

The occupation of tidings has been a important job inwards clearing upwards the questions only about the attack. The U.S. of A. of America had broken a release of Japanese codes including the “Purple Code” (the highest Japanese diplomatic code) as well as realized that relations alongside Japan were deteriorating toward war.

The most famous message intercepted inwards the concluding twenty-four hours earlier the assault was the “Fourteen Part Message,” which was itself of niggling tidings value except that it showed the dry ground of U.S.–Japanese relations.

More of import was the guild setting the fourth dimension of delivery of the Fourteen Part Message every bit 1 P.M. inwards Washington, 7:30 A.M. inwards Hawaii. General Marshall ordered that the information hold upwards communicated to the Pacific commanders yesteryear the fastest possible method.

There is a discrepancy inwards the release of times Marshall was alleged to have got sent officers to banking enterprise tally on the delivery time, but he is known to have got done as well as then at to the lowest degree once. Due to atmospheric conditions the message was sent to Pearl Harbor yesteryear telegraph as well as did non brand it until later on the assault on the base.

There were other important messages, including 1 from Hawaii to Nippon laying out the positions of U.S. ships inwards the harbor. In Dec earlier the attack, the U.S. of A. of America had access to information that the Japanese diplomats had been ordered to fix to destroy their codes.

On vi Dec 1941 Colonel Bicknell, the assistant original of staff, announced to General Short’s staff that “he had received information to the resultant that the Japanese counsels were burning their papers .... It would at to the lowest degree demonstrate that something was most to happen, somewhere”.

In spite of these successes, it needs to hold upwards remembered that the release of codes broken yesteryear the U.S. of A. of America was limited, every bit was the completeness of the information most Japanese intentions. Thus, preparations for state of war were conducted alongside solely partial knowledge.

Another source of concern is the location of aircraft carriers. The U.S. Navy’s Pacific aircraft carriers were non acquaint on the 24-hour interval of the attack. The Saratoga was inwards San Diego, spell the other 2 U.S. carriers were off to reenforce frontwards bases alongside aircraft.

The USS Enterprise had gone to Wake Island as well as was scheduled dorsum to Pearl Harbor only about seven A.M. on seven December, but was held upwards yesteryear bad weather, as well as the USS Lexington was on its way to Midway Island.

The Enterprise was unopen plenty at the fourth dimension of the assault that its aircraft were able to brand contact alongside Japanese aircraft. Their missions saved them for occupation inwards the of import body of body of water battles to come, Coral Sea as well as Midway.

The Theories

One theory argues that President Roosevelt knew most the coming attack, but was willing to sacrifice the aging battleships inwards guild to make crusade to the American people to care the war. In guild to practise this, Roosevelt as well as the military machine ascendence construction inwards Washington non solely placed the U.S. battleships inwards harm’s way, they also sent U.S. aircraft carriers away from the site of the assault to protect them.

Then Washington conspired to deny U.S. commanders inwards the Pacific of import tidings information that would have got led them to assign a higher dry ground of warning on seven December. There is important circumstantial testify for this theory, based on the thought that Roosevelt needed a military machine disaster to travel inwards the war. This theory does non draw concern human relationship for the possible touching on of an assault on other U.S. forces, or a successful defense forcefulness against a strong assault on Pearl Harbor.

It also does non draw concern human relationship for Roosevelt’s honey of the navy, which makes his willingness to sink ships less likely. This theory assumes that Roosevelt as well as the naval leadership understood that aircraft carriers would dominate the adjacent naval war; the testify for this thought is limited.

It also assumes that the tidings clearly pointed to an assault on Pearl Harbor. The challenge when investigating the discipline is inwards separating the information that is meaningful as well as of import from a alluvion of extraneous information.

As 1 historian notes: “we failed to anticipate Pearl Harbor non for a desire of relevant material, but because of a plethora of irrelevant one”. Without a message specifically stating an assault on a site, an analyst must translate the message as well as weigh its value based on what they know most an adversary’s potential as well as preferences.

It is oft easier to encounter a clear pregnant inwards a message alongside hindsight. Another variant of this conspiracy argues that the British authorities knew most the attacks as well as did non inform the U.S. of A. of America inwards guild to forcefulness it into the war.

It is based on the beingness of both British intercept operations, based on U.S. efforts, as well as British agents inwards the regions. The strength of this theory is that the British did have got the technology to interruption the “Purple Code,” which they gained from the U.S. of A. of America as well as from the timely sale of British interests inwards Asia.

This theory assumes superior British noesis of Japanese intentions, for which the testify is weak. And similar Roosevelt, Churchill loved the navy. It was unlikely he would gamble lives, or potentially the war, yesteryear allowing the U.S. Pacific Fleet to hold upwards destroyed.

The Conspiracy’s Place inwards History

There were numerous official investigations of the events only about Pearl Harbor from the rattling beginning. The regular army as well as navy each conducted board as well as private inquiries, such every bit the Roberts Commission, the Hart Inquiry, the Army Pearl Harbor Board, the Navy Court of Inquiry, the Clarke Inquiry, the Clausen Investigation, as well as the Hewitt Inquiry.

In 1946 Congress conducted its ain investigation as well as pulled together all of the previous efforts. There has been renewed involvement inwards events only about Pearl Harbor since its fiftieth anniversary inwards 1991. This has spawned a renewal inwards many conspiracy theories, but also created a growing involvement inwards agreement the actual events as well as causes of the events of seven Dec 1941.

Pan Am 103

Pan Am 103

On 21 Dec 1988, Pan Am Flight 103, en road from London to New York, exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland only one-half an sixty minutes after departure, killing 259 passengers too crew too nine people on the ground. Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 bomb was suspected, too authorities recovered the “black box” (the flying phonation recorder too information recorder) too examined radar evidence.

Britain’s Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) too Scottish detectives collected 35,000 photographs too interviewed 15,000 people, but it was the regain of an electronic timer circuit board, which had been placed inwards a Toshiba cassette actor too and then loaded into a slice of Samsonite luggage, that provided the necessary clues every bit to the source of the plane’s destruction.

The subsequent investigation, every bit with the after crash of TWA Flight 800, produced endless analysis, suspicion, claims, too counterclaims. Victims’ families wanted someone to blame; politicians wanted to flora whether the lawsuit was an attack; too conspiracy theorists tried to insert the lawsuit into existing theories of global politics.


Although the explosion occurred patch George Bush was president, links were speedily made to President Ronald Reagan, too then, during the investigation too trial, to President Bill Clinton. Ultimately, a vast array of individuals too organizations were implicated inwards about means or about other to the explosion.

The AAIB, led yesteryear forensic proficient James Thomas Thurman, found the small-scale circuit board inwards the debris, too could line the bit of the circuit board to a Swiss manufacturer. This, inwards association with specimens from ii types of chemicals used to industry Semtex, a plastic explosive, convinced authorities at that spot was a bomb aboard the plane that was triggered yesteryear a timing device.

In 1989, the 350 tons of debris was reassembled at an regular army base of operations close Carlisle. Investigators too then examined the evidence too concluded that it was a bomb, or, inwards their words, an “intentional explosive device.” The cockpit phonation recorder verified a tremendous audio only prior to the aircraft going down, too strength out marks on luggage indicated that something exploded inwards the luggage compartment.

Although at commencement Islamic Republic of Iran was suspected of what the authorities viewed every bit a bombing—although the give-and-take “bomb” did non look inwards the actual report, but rather “improvised explosive device”—the timer shifted the investigation to ii Libyan tidings agents, Abdel Basset al-Megrahi too Lameen “The Egg” Fhima, who were indicted inwards 1991 too named yesteryear both British too U.S. governments every bit the culprits.

There were, however, numerous other theories too suspects:

• Ahmed Jibril, caput of the General Command of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP-GC). Supported yesteryear Syria, the PFLP hated State of Israel too wanted to punish the US for its back upwardly of the Jewish State. Conspiracy theorists claim that Jibril, however, could non live brought to judge because Palestine is non a sovereign state or a fellow member of the United Nations. This conspiracy theory is also tied to Iran, which supposedly bankrolled the operation, but Syrian Arab Republic could non live implicated because, yesteryear the fourth dimension the US learned all the details, it was involved inwards the Gulf War too President George Bush needed Syrian Arab Republic every bit piece of employment of the coalition to defeat Saddam Hussein.
• Iran. One of the around widely held conspiracy theories is that Iranian agents blew Pan Am 103 out of the skies inwards retaliation for an incident that occurred inwards July 1988 when the USS Vincennes, mistaking an Iranian rider aircraft for a hostile plane over the Straits of Hormuz, shot downward the Iranian plane filled with civilians, killing 290. Iranian leaders vowed to “avenge the blood of our martyrs.”
• Drug runners and/or the CIA. In this version of events, “rogue” CIA agents inwards the Reagan administration, working through Oliver North, were attempting to complimentary U.S. hostages inwards the Middle East. The middlemen inwards the performance were heroin runners from Syrian Arab Republic who transported drugs to the US through Frankfurt, Germany. According to 1 “informant,” a smuggler (with the CIA’s knowledge) would depository fiscal establishment agree luggage onto a plane too an accomplice inwards the baggage subdivision would substitute an identical purse containing narcotics. (There is no explanation for the demand for ii people here, or why anyone with access to the baggage subdivision would non live able to only flora the bogus purse himself.) At whatsoever rate, Monzer al-Kassar, a Syrian drug smuggler, who was behind the operation, learned that a hostage rescue squad had discovered the smuggling operation, too that the squad was aboard Pan Am 103. PBS’s television set programme Frontline claimed inwards Jan 1990 that these “intelligence officials” were a “strong secondary target.” At that point, the diverse theories accomplish a confluence of sorts, with Jibril treatment the actual details of the bombing, switching a suitcase bomb for the drug luggage.
• Yet about other version involved Oliver North too the CIA, peculiarly every bit it related to about other aircraft explosion, over Gander, Newfoundland, inwards Dec 1985. In this iteration, a grouping of special operations forces smuggled a small-scale nuclear “backpack” bomb aboard the aircraft inwards Cairo, which they originally were to convey transported to Republic of Iraq to blow upwardly the Iraqi nuclear weapons evolution facility nether the guise of a nuclear accident. Supposedly, when these soldiers understood that their mission was a suicide mission, they backed out, but to maintain them quiet, the authorities ordered their Arrow Air DC-8 destroyed yesteryear a bomb, which caused the aircraft to crash at Gander, killing 248. The connectedness to Pan Am 103 is that supposedly the same timing device was found at each site, too inwards a missive of the alphabet to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee inwards 1998, the president of the line solid that made the timers claimed that the circuit board inwards both explosions was made for the CIA.
• There was no bomb at all. As inwards the example of TWA 800, which exploded inwards 1996, 1 theory maintains that at that spot was no bomb at all. This theory suggests that at that spot was an explosion, which has been attributed to, with other things, a shotgun or a flare gun going off, a structural defect inwards the bird causing the cabin door to rip free, or an electrical fault. Like other theories, this theory hinges on the absence of bomb fragments at the crash site, and, every bit with TWA 800, this version to a greater extent than oft than non arose from passengers inwards litigation who wanted to testify negligence yesteryear the aircraft manufacturers. In particular, rapid decom- pression theories emphasized the location inwards both Pan Am 103 too TWA 800 of the olfactory organ subdivision every bit having fallen off earlier the aircraft finally crashed, indicating an explosion separated the front end subdivision of the aircraft from the aft. Carl A. Davies, writer of Plane Truth, too John Berry Smith, a British investigator, comparison tests of Pan Am 103, TWA 800, too Air Bharat 182, found no evidence of bombtype explosions that totally demolished the subdivision inwards which a bomb was located inwards controlled bomb tests. Other “explanations” convey included an “electromagnetic high-energy slug” either deliberately or accidentally fired from Alaska.
• The Mossad. Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 sentiment pop with antisemites, this version maintains that the Mossad planted a bomb to kill Americans hence every bit to “discredit” Palestinian Liberation Organization chairman Yassir Arafat’s “peace initiative.” This version lacks the details of around of the other explanations, but soundless manages to house blame on President George Bush.
• The Palestinians. National Public Radio’s All Things Considered programme produced a “confession” inwards 1994 yesteryear Youssef Shaaban, a Palestinian who was standing trial for the killing of a Jordanian diplomat. Many observers, however, considered his confession a desperate elbow grease to make a rest on a certain expiry sentence.
• In add-on to possible guilty individuals or groups, charges were also leveled at Pan Am and/or aerodrome safety for weak safety measures inwards England.

Due to the fact that the incident occurred over Scottish airspace, the trial took house nether Scottish law, but because of the international nature of the bombing, with multiple possible locations too passengers of all nationalities, the trial was held at Camp Zeist inwards the Netherlands yesteryear means of treaty understanding betwixt Libya, the United Kingdom, too the United States.

In May 2000, the courtroom nether Scottish High Court approximate Lord Ranald Sutherland convened. The next January, the courtroom delivered a mixed verdict of guilty for Abdel Basset al-Megrahi too an acquittal for Lameen Fhima. Al-Megrahi instantly appealed. Meanwhile, the families of the Pan Am 103 flying had begun a long bespeak to sue Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for damages, overturning a traditional regulation of international law.

Allan Gerson, a old diplomat, took the example for the families and, partly every bit a number of changes inwards antiterrorism legislation next the Oklahoma City bombing, inwards 1996 the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act was amended to permit lawsuits similar Gerson’s to proceed. In 1998, a federal appeals courtroom ruled that lawsuits against Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya could proceed.

Among the victims was twenty-year-old Theodora Cohen, whose parents waged a induce to sue Libya, calling the gear upwardly on a “ghastly human activeness of war.” Susan too Daniel Cohen, Theodora’s parents, who wrote Pan Am 103, claimed that Clinton direction efforts at “normalizing” relations with Khaddafi’s Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya had interfered with prosecution of the example against the terrorist state.

Paranoia

Paranoia

The psychiatric concept of paranoia is unremarkably traced to ancient Greece, where Hippocrates inaugurated it alongside several other mental maladies, coining the term from the Greek para (meaning “beside,” or “changed”) too nous (signifying “mind,” or “reason”).

Its etymology tin flame also last traced dorsum to Plato’s too Aretaeus’s identifications of “religious madness” too “divine mania,” or citations inward the piece of work of Francois Boissier de Sauvages (Pathologie Methodica, 1759) to transformative delusions inward which patients believed they were beingness transformed into either animals or the reverse sex.

It was non until Etienne Esquirol’s Mental Maladies: Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 Treatise on Insanity (1845) and, later, Emil Kraepelin’s Textbook of Psychiatry (1883–1915) that the concept of paranoia, every bit it is understood today, began to direct keep shape.


Esquirol’s descriptivist business concern human relationship catalogued, alongside others, erotic, reasoning, theomaniacal, incendiary, too homicidal monomanias. Paranoia was identified every bit a délire partiel (monomania), a folie raisonante (a reasoning madness).

Kraepelin’s influential Definition of dementia praecox (early-onset dementia, straight off classed nether the broad category of schizophrenia) most deeply informs the contemporary agreement of the concept every bit a delusional disorder that builds a highly organized, grandiose organization that is held with swell conviction.

From this tradition too that which followed, paranoia has come upwardly to last characterized past times symptoms such every bit projective thinking, hostility, suspicion, centrality, delusions, fright of the loss of autonomy, too grandiosity. Even though paranoids are oftentimes able to make a high grade of occupational functioning, different other psychoses, at that spot is no pharmaceutical or therapeutic “cure” for paranoia.

The most famous instance of paranoia, which has served every bit the footing for most of the major contributions on the report of the plain of report every bit good every bit beingness a remarkable autobiography of paranoia, is Daniel Paul Schreber’s Memoirs of My Nervous Illness (Denkwürdigkeiten eines Nervenkranken [1903]).

Schreber, a high-ranking High German judge, describes the tedious too torturous procedure of beingness transformed into a adult woman past times God inward fellowship to select forth a novel race of men; beingness made into God’s sexual slave; too beingness the victim of a “soul murder” at the hands of physician Paul Emil Flechsig, the managing director of the psychiatric infirmary inward which he offset stayed.

Sigmund Freud’s influential report of the instance read paranoia every bit a defence against (unconscious) homosexuality, or homosexual attack. Although this theory has largely been cast aside, it is notable for Freud’s offset theorization of projection.

Freud also argued that paranoia is a recuperative process, i inward which the paranoid attempts to rebuild his or her the world after a psychotic interruption through delusion. Interestingly, “paranoia” every bit a discrete medicalpsychiatric Definition no longer exists. The electrical flow Diagnostic too Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) instead classifies it every bit an appear of other psychoses, such every bit schizophrenia.

The category of paranoia gradually moved beyond the psychiatric domain too began to last used past times philosophers too social theorists to explicate literary texts, social formations, too historical epochs.

The discourse of heroic “enlightenment”—which seeks to uncover, reveal, too discover knowledges that are otherwise concealed, shrouded, too hidden—is firmly entrenched inward Western philosophical traditions. The notion of “suspicion” every bit an interpretive strategy tin flame last traced from academic too Pyrrhonian skepticism through to the piece of work of Machiavelli, Rousseau, too Hobbes.

Paul Ricouer identifies Nietzsche, Marx, too Freud every bit the key proponents of a tradition that sought to redirect its Cartesian uncertainty from a regard of things, to uncertainty consciousness itself. In Crowds too Power (1962), Elias Canetti describes paranoia every bit an “illness of power” that tin flame assistance to explicate the nature of political ability inward general.

Canetti establishes an equivalence betwixt paranoids similar Schreber too despots too rulers such every bit Adolph Hitler too Genghis Khan. Richard Hofstadter’s famous 1964 essay, “The Paranoid Style inward American Politics,” continues this genealogy past times theorizing paranoia every bit a political style, rather than a pathological category.

Conducted nether the banner of “Studies on the American Right,” it charted the paranoid agency inward U.S. political life since independence, through the key feature of persecution too its systematization inward conspiracy theory.

Hofstadter sought to pull a by too large right-wing agency of mind, too chose to refer to it every bit “paranoid” because “no other give-and-take evokes the qualities of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, too conspiratorial fantasy” that characterizes this mindset.

The concept of paranoia has dispersed into pop civilization inward a vast array of forms including films such every bit JFK (dir. Oliver Stone 1991) too Conspiracy Theory (dir. Richard Donner 1997), television set programs such every bit The X-Files too Nowhere Man, pamphlets, rants, too tracts of every political color, magazines such every bit Paranoia, too books such every bit Jim Keith’s Secret too Suppressed: Banned Ideas too Hidden History (1993).

Rhetorics of paranoia tin flame last identified inward pop music, from Black Sabbath’s classic anthem “Paranoid” to Radiohead’s Paranoid Android, too Garbage’s “I Think I’m Paranoid.” The paranoid ethic of hypervigilance fifty-fifty extends to managerial advice books such every bit Andrew S. Grove’s Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit Crisis Points that Challenge Every Company too Career (1999).

The cultural sensibility expressed inward these works, i that has wholly digested Delmore Schwartz’s adage that “even paranoids direct keep existent enemies,” suggests that at that spot is less danger inward beingness paranoid than inward non beingness paranoid enough.

Like the term “conspiracy theorist,” “paranoid” represents a heavily loaded political too epistemological description, i that is used at for sure times every bit an ironic cast of self-identification, too at others, every bit a condemnatory indictment.

In a fashion similar to the agency “conspiracy theory” is used every bit a description of simulated history, the accusation of paranoia has travel a powerful tactic inward the marginalization of one’s ideological opponents.

Cultural critics too pop psychologists direct keep inward recent years taken upwardly the psychiatric history of paranoia, too (consciously or not) Freud’s contribution to it, inward their attempts to delegitimize those they consider conspiracy theorists.

The conspiracy theorist (or paranoid), it is argued, takes an object or figure that was i time revered too transforms it into the focus of persecutory anxiety, too thence that their conspiracy theories tell us to a greater extent than nigh the subject’s ain wish too fright than they produce nigh anything inward the world.

Paranoia, too thence the floor goes, is a affliction of disaffection: the WASP patriot, the militant feminist, too the Islamic fundamentalist are united past times their marginality, i which organizes their thinking inward a paranoid or conspiratorial fashion.

Other critics direct keep argued that such theories cast appropriate responses to actual circumstances: for example, the widespread belief inward the African American community of the early on 1990s that the authorities was spreading drugs such every bit cleft cocaine inward wretched dark communities should non last read merely every bit “paranoid,” but every bit a dramatization of really existent fears of an institutionally sponsored programme of genocidal neglect, i that is based on the historical revelation of actual conspiracies such every bit COINTELPRO too the Tuskegee syphilis experiments.

William 50 Pierce

William L Pierce

An arch racial conspiracy theorist every bit good every bit a white supremacist leader as well as publisher, William Pierce is most widely known for his novel The Turner Diaries. The novel, similar most of Pierce’s writings, depicts a racial revolution to overcome a national, multicultural conspiracy against Anglo-Saxon Americans inwards the like shooting fish in a barrel twentieth century.

The Turner Diaries by as well as large had an cloak-and-dagger existence every bit a mag series amid many white supremacist movements until its publication every bit a mass inwards 1978, when the Federal Bureau of Investigation denounced it every bit the most unsafe mass inwards the United States.

Pierce’s pseudonymous novel became notorious, however, when Timothy McVeigh bombed the Oklahoma City Murrah Federal Building inwards Apr 1995, killing 168 people inwards an enactment of ane of the novel’s key scenes. An excerpt from The Turner Diaries was found amongst McVeigh at the fourth dimension of his arrest as well as has since propelled Pierce’s advert every bit good every bit his organization, National Alliance, into the mainstream media.


Pierce justifies his extremist writings amongst a conspiracy theorist’s fearfulness of ethnic diversity; inwards his writing, the liberal conspiracy to pollute the US amongst multiculturalism represents the destination of the white race. Ironically, Pierce’s run depicts as well as fifty-fifty exhorts a conspiracy of its own: the targeting as well as killing of those who stand upwards for or back upwards racial multifariousness inwards the United States.

While his fiction depicts the political strife of state of war inwards an imagined social transition from a multicultural to a white United States, Pierce too expresses his extremist politics through other political modes such every bit Libertarian as well as militia ideologies.

Pierce’s incendiary rhetoric has been effective amongst about of his readers; The Turner Diaries is known to postulate hold inspired other crimes. In the early on 1980s, a grouping named for The Turner Diaries’ highest echelon of resistance fighters (the Order) committed murder, robbery, as well as counterfeiting, as well as bombed a synagogue inwards Colorado.

In the early on 1990s, a grouping calling itself the Aryan Republican Army committed banking concern robberies as well as bombings across the Midwest. Later inwards the 1990s, members of the New Order inwards St. Louis were arrested for plotting to bomb the Anti-Defamation League’s New York headquarters, the Southern Poverty Law Center inwards Alabama, as well as the Simon Wiesenthal Center inwards Los Angeles.

Although Pierce denies the influence of The Turner Diaries or whatever other of his many publications as well as broadcasts inwards inspiring vehement acts, he has a history of generating conspiracy rhetoric that exhorts those who would seek a white US to postulate hold action.

Pierce has been active inwards right-wing extremist movements since the 1960s. Born inwards Atlanta, Georgia, xi September 1933, he holds a B.Sc. from Rice University (1955), as well as an M.A. (1958) as well as a Ph.D. (1962) inwards physics from the University of Colorado. Pierce was an assistant professor of physics at Oregon State University from 1962 to 1965.

He as well as thus became a senior question scientist at the Advanced Materials Research Development Laboratory of United Aircraft’s Pratt as well as Whitney Division inwards 1965–1966. During this fourth dimension he was involved amongst the John Birch Society. By 1966, Pierce left his work as well as the John Birch Society for full-time neo-Nazi activism amongst the American Nazi Party, run yesteryear George Lincoln Rockwell.

There, he edited the National Socialist World, a quarterly magazine for academics as well as intellectuals. When Rockwell was assassinated inwards 1967, Pierce became ane of the leaders of the National Socialist White People’s Party, which succeeded the American Nazi Party.

By 1970, Pierce left the National Socialist White People’s Party to bring together the National Youth Alliance, a far-right political grouping whose aim was to disrupt liberal causes on college campuses. Infighting betwixt Pierce as well as the Nazi Youth Party’s founder, Willis Carto, split upwards the grouping into factions. Pierce’s fly came to last known every bit the National Alliance, a grouping he has run since 1974.

Pierce relocated the National Alliance from Arlington, Virginia, to a 346-acre farm inwards Mill Point, West Virginia. In many ways, Pierce is the National Alliance; he runs all aspects of the arrangement as well as writes most of as well as alone oversees all its media. Pierce edits as well as writes for its magazine, National Vanguard (originally Attack!), as well as an internal newsletter, National Alliance Bulletin (formerly titled Action), every bit good every bit Resistancemagazine.

He too oversees several businesses every bit purpose of the National Alliance: National Vanguard Books, Resistance Records, as well as Cymaphane Records. Additionally, Pierce broadcasts a weekly radio program, American Dissident Voices on AM/FM as well as shortwave radio as well as writes articles for Free Speech, the program’s newsletter.

The National Alliance aims to locomote the world’s largest umbrella arrangement for white supremacy as well as is good on its way to coming together that goal. Domestically, Pierce created affiliations amongst the antigovernment Patriot motion during its ascension inwards the 1990s.

Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 decade later, he reached out to neo-Nazi youth groups, in ane trial again, through his tape labels. With chapters inwards twenty-three states as well as a spider web page that is translatable into 8 languages, the National Alliance has locomote good established.

The utilization of technology scientific discipline has driven Pierce’s outreach efforts as well as allows for unique associations: inwards 2002, a large excerpt from ane of his radio speeches, downloaded to a National Alliance listserv, ended upwards on a Hezbollah website ii weeks later. The National Alliance provides a arrive at of literature, radio, as well as music targeting both full general as well as specific audiences that disseminate white supremacist conspiracy theories.

Specifically, Pierce’s run describes a national crisis for white racial purism—a conspiracy of multiculturalism—and urges political activism as well as the recruitment of novel members to ready a political movement.

However, National Alliance’s ideology oftentimes describes strength every bit the agency to this reclamation of a white ancestry as well as a commitment to edifice a white nation. Pierce’s fiction, written nether the advert Andrew Macdonald, depicts con- spiracy theorists reacting to a perceived conspiracy of racial treason.

Largely critical of Jewish media as well as trouble organisation inwards the United States, these novels too focus on miscegenation as well as other racial “pollution” of the Anglo-Saxon bloodline. In these imagined scenarios, race patriots intend to provoke a racial state of war that volition allow for armed rebellion as well as the creation of a white nation.

In The Turner Diaries, the US is represented every bit severely intolerant of a specific “racism”—defined every bit acts perpetrated yesteryear whites against people of color—and has created a climate inwards which white people are nether scrutiny for racist transgressions patch people of color exploit the situation. The seemingly liberal regime extends its oppressive influence amongst a police that repeals the Second Amendment correct to ain firearms.

The consequent insurrection—which eventually becomes a global race war—is chronicled yesteryear ane of its unassuming heroes, Earl Turner, whose beau patriotic, militant white supremacists postulate hold prepared to handle “the System’s” despotism. Turner’s diary describes his experiences every bit he organizes minor resistance cells as well as goes virtually the daily undertaking of domestic terrorism inwards the conspiracy to overthrow the government.

Some of the novel’s major scenes include a mortar assail on Washington, D.C., as well as a truck bombing of FBI headquarters (which McVeigh borrowed for his terrorism inwards Oklahoma City). One of the most graphic scenes is “the Day of the Rope,” inwards which the grouping publicly hangs tens of thousands of race traitors amongst placards describing their treason.

Turner’s heroic acts Pb to his induction into the group’s inner circle (the Order)—a transcendence that concludes amongst Turner’s suicide mission as well as subsequent martyrdom every bit the group’s savior. By the novel’s end, the New Era of white authorisation has overcome the racial conspiracy.

Pierce’s minute novel, Hunter, published inwards 1989, reaches out to a unlike readership, moving away from the working-class emphasis of The Turner Diaries as well as focusing on a highly educated audience. The conspiracy of multiculturalism is the same, but the focus is the Jewish-owned media’s social role.

Protagonist Oscar Yeager is a talented engineer who, although highly educated as well as extremely rational, is beingness uncharacteristically reactionary—literally hunting dark as well as white “miscegenating” couples inwards his disgust virtually the reject of the race.

Unlike Turner, however, Yeager seeks a deeper, intellectual contextualization of his white supremacism every bit good every bit a solution that speaks to the social ambiguities he perceives. Hunter chronicles Yeager’s hunt for a philosophy, his subsequent didactics virtually the Jewish media conspiracy, as well as his ain response to the racial conspiracy of a multicultural United States.

In the novel’s solution, Yeager becomes a media mogul who educates the U.S. world virtually white supremacism amongst a fundamentalist idiot box preacher as well as deposes the Jewish media monopoly yesteryear gaining the largest marketplace position percentage of the viewing audience.

The novel depicts Yeager’s media counterconspiracy every bit a success both inwards reaching white America as well as starting fourth dimension the transition to a racially pure land amongst less large-scale bloodshed but, rather, key behind-the-scene assassinations at high levels.

In add-on to his ii novels, Pierce published Serpent’s Walk, about other racial conspiracy text, inwards 1991, nether the advert Randolph D. Calverhall, as well as has ii other books published amongst National Vanguard Books: The Best of Attack! as well as National Vanguard Tabloid (1984) as well as Gun Control inwards Germany, 1928–1945 (1994).

Pierce’s arrangement has reached out to other spheres of influence: from the buy of AT&T stock inwards lodge to utilization the share-holder meetings every bit a platform for antisemitic speech, to the targeting of youth markets inwards his newest ventures.

The most various products inwards his catalog include the 1993 comic title, New World Order Comix #1, The Saga of ... White Will! as well as a calculator game depicting a virtual race war: “Ethnic Cleansing: The Game!” In 1999, Pierce became involved inwards the music manufacture through white ability music labels Resistance as well as Cymophane Records.

Pierce finds conspiracy everywhere he looks: organizations working against hate-speech postulate hold targeted Pierce’s various businesses as well as postulate hold worked to discredit his tax-exempt condition (through his Church of the Creator organization) every bit good every bit to straight attending toward his enterprise.

In 1996, the Southern Poverty Law Center won an $85,000 judgment against Pierce for his purpose inwards an endeavour to maintain Church of the Creator assets from the household unit of measurement of a murdered member, Harold Mansfield. Pierce continues to refer to these groups every bit purpose of the conspiracy against white values as well as white supremacism, merely every bit he continues to abide by ways to convey his extremist politics to mainstream media.

Chief Pontiac

Chief Pontiac

Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 state of war leader of the Odawa tribe, Pontiac (often called Chief Pontiac) was identified past times many contemporary British colonial officials equally the primary instigator of a devastating succession of military machine attacks against Anglo-American forts in addition to settlements throughout the Great Lakes portion during the summertime of 1763. As rumor in addition to speculation grew, the British feared that his actions were component subdivision of a wider French conspiracy, merely it is to a greater extent than probable that Pontiac was pursuing his ain plot.

His reputation equally the architect of i of the most substantial Native American military machine actions inwards North American history was cemented past times the prolific U.S. historian Francis Parkman.

In his History of the Conspiracy of Pontiac (1851), Parkman credited Pontiac’s intellect in addition to bravery inwards executing the plot, merely characterized his actions equally a doomed effort on the component subdivision of “savages” to stave off the inevitable advance of Anglo-Saxon culture across the continent.


While subsequent historians demand hold disputed the extent of Pontiac’s political influence in addition to military machine organizing beyond his domicile settlement nigh Detroit, he was undoubtedly the principal catalyst for a Native American resistance crusade unprecedented inwards both its geographic orbit in addition to its ultimate diplomatic success.

An active partisan on behalf of the French during the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), Pontiac remained loyal to his allies later on the conquest of Canada past times Great United Kingdom of Great Britain in addition to Northern Ireland on 8 September 1760. Many of his subsequent activities were devoted to trying to convey almost a provide to the human relationship his people experienced amongst the French civil in addition to military machine officials.

Following the takeover of sometime French forts inwards the Great Lakes in addition to Ohio Valley past times British Army troops (1760–1761), many of the local Native American nations grew aggrieved past times the parsimony of British officials inwards diplomatic negotiations, equally good equally past times the failure of the British to fulfill an before hope to ban settlement due west of the Appalachian mountains.

Pontiac worked to meld this growing anti-English take in amidst the region’s native peoples amongst nativist messages of spiritual revival emanating from Delaware villages inwards the Ohio country. Pontiac also collaborated amongst the local French population at Detroit, roughly of whom promoted the notion of the defeated French virile somebody monarch sending an regular army upwards the Mississippi River to bring together amongst the natives against the British.

Jittery British traders in addition to officers, upon hearing this news, proved all equally good gain to believe that the ensuing state of war was the production of a French conspiracy, merely inwards fact Pontiac in addition to his followers fought for their ain ends.

Pontiac commenced his siege of the cardinal British fort at Detroit on nine May 1763. Within a month, he had nearly 1,000 Odawa, Ojibwa, Potawatomi, in addition to Huron warriors fighting amongst him. Pontiac followed upwards his initial gear upwards on past times sending wampum belts amongst encoded messages encouraging similar attacks against other British posts.

For this reason, he has been characterized equally the orchestrator of the entire conflict. Yet patch other native nations followed Pontiac’s lead, a lack of unity inwards timing in addition to an emphasis on local tribal objectives proved the dominion for the duration of the war.


This did not, however, compromise the overall touching on of Native American military machine actions. Their well-conceived ruses, gunfire from entrenched positions, in addition to flaming arrows had, past times the goal of June 1763, destroyed or forced the abandonment of nine British-occupied forts betwixt western Pennsylvania in addition to Wisconsin.

The troops at Detroit held out until reinforcements arrived on three Oct 1763. On xxx Oct 1763 Pontiac learned that his appeals for assistance from French troops soundless posted inwards Illinois had been categorically rejected, in addition to he raised his siege.

Hostilities inwards Pontiac’s War continued intermittently for the side past times side 2 years, in addition to during that fourth dimension Pontiac visited Native American communities throughout modern Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, in addition to Illinois, urging continued resistance to the British regime.

With most of the interior forts razed, Native American warriors turned their attending to frontier settlements. Ultimately, historians demand hold estimated that native attacks inwards Pontiac’s War accounted for the deaths of 2,000 Anglo-American settlers in addition to 400 British soldiers.

As Pontiac’s notoriety grew, he came to live on seen past times the British regime equally crucial to prospects for ending the conflict. Despite the success of 2 military machine expeditions sent to the Great Lakes portion over the summertime of 1764 inwards securing the submission of many of the principal combatants, Pontiac remained elusive.

Fearing that the state of war would hold unless he was dead or conciliated, the British pursued him relentlessly. In talks amongst British negotiators at Fort Ouiatanon (near modern Lafayette, Indiana) inwards July 1765, Pontiac agreed to preliminary price of peace.

Pontiac’s principal demand that the British brand clear purchases of set down inwards the Great Lakes portion inwards advance of whatever settlement was endorsed inwards the July 1766 Treaty of Oswego, which ended Pontiac’s War.

After fighting the British to a military machine stalemate in addition to securing a cardinal diplomatic victory for his native allies, Pontiac attempted to alive a peaceful life of hunting. Yet his reputation attracted attending in addition to fear, in addition to he was murdered nether suspicious circumstances past times a Peoria Indian inwards the Illinois hamlet of Cahokia on xx Apr 1769.

Populism

Populism

The agrarian displace inwards the West, South, too mount regions of the U.S. inwards the piece of cake nineteenth century, known every bit Populism, contained several elements of conspiracy thinking directed at New York City, politicians, too the railroads.

Although mainstream Populists did non to a greater extent than ofttimes than non encompass the notion of a “New York money power,” many nevertheless were convinced that powerful forces had united to oppress farmers, miners, too industrial workers.

This thought was epitomized inwards the 1896 oral communication at the Democratic convention inwards which William Jennings Bryan, the party’s nominee for president, warned that these forces “will non crucify mankind on a cross of gold.”


Following the Civil War, a full general cost deflation laid inwards that especially wound farmers who had long-term (five- to fifteen-year) mortgages past times making the dollars they repaid much to a greater extent than valuable than the dollars they borrowed. At the same time, novel silvery discoveries inwards the West unleashed a torrent of silvery onto the market.

Advocates for farmers too debtors saw a agency to combine the blessings of silvery too the plight of the farmers past times monetizing silvery at a fixed charge per unit of measurement of 16:1 (or 16 silvery ounces for 1 ounce of gold). In fact, the marketplace charge per unit of measurement was closer to 17:1, only the “silverites” hoped to forcefulness the authorities to buy the silvery at inflated prices, thus putting to a greater extent than money into the economy, especially inwards the West.

At the same time, agrarians became concerned virtually the grade of prosperity inwards railroads too banking field agriculture—the backbone of the Republic since Jefferson’s time—languished. As the historian of the Populist movement, John D. Hicks, noted, the farmer believed that he “worked longer hours, nether to a greater extent than adverse conditions, too alongside smaller compensation for his project than whatever other human being on earth.”

Farmers also felt exploited past times the railroads too grain elevators, which they deemed to take away maintain a “monopoly” over local transportation too storage. In truth, few rural areas inwards states such every bit Kansas lacked access to at to the lowest degree 2 railroads, only the inconvenience of hauling grain to sites further away was deemed unprofitable past times many farmers.

Complaints virtually the railroads were preeminent inside the immature Populist Party. The political party originated alongside diverse farmers’ organizations, such every bit the National Farmers’ Alliance too the National Farmers’ Alliance too Industrial Union, every bit good every bit local antimonopoly parties, such every bit the People’s Anti-monopoly Party inwards Minnesota, the National Greenback Party, too the local Grange organizations.

Various groups met inwards 1889, too the national convention of the “People’s Party of the U.S.A.,” known every bit the “Populists,” met inwards May 1891 to trace upwards a platform too nominate a candidate.

Key leaders of the agrarian displace were present, including Ignatius Donnelly of Minnesota, “Sockless Jerry” Simpson of Kansas, Tom Watson of Georgia, too James Weaver of Iowa. The convention nominated Weaver to run on a platform that demanded “free too unlimited coinage of silvery at 16:1,” an income tax, too restrictions on immigrants.

Although the platform did non specify authorities ownership of the railroads, mainstream Populists all agreed on that mensurate every bit well, only most agreed it was non probable inwards the nigh future, too they thus settled for authorities rule of the railroads.

Weaver, of course, had no acquit upon on the 1892 election. Congress had already passed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which was a half-measure inwards which the authorities planned to buy large amounts of silver—not at 16:1, only at 16¹/₂:1.

This created a window for arbitrage amid speculators, resulting inwards a massive natural springtime of golden from the U.S. Treasury too major banks too triggering the panic of 1893. Although Congress repealed the human activeness that year, the harm had been done too the erosion of the golden reserve undermined the nation’s banking system.

The panic gave the Republicans a crusade issue—the golden standard—and the Democrats took the bait past times nominating William Jennings Bryan, a Democrat alongside rigid populist leanings, every bit their presidential measure bearer. Bryan’s positions too so closely paralleled those of the Populist Party that it did non nominate its ain candidate, only supported Bryan.

At the convention, Bryan delivered his famous oral communication inwards which he railed at those who would impose the golden measure too “crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.” The Populists did reach command of to a greater extent than or less legislatures too judgeships, passing a constabulary inwards Nebraska that imposed a cutting inwards railroad freight rates.

But railroad too elevate freight rates had taken a backseat to the silvery issue. Moreover, every bit reform elements inside the Republican Party gained momentum, the Populists lost ground.

Unable to win at the ballot box alongside whatever regularity, they faced either fusion into the Democratic Party or allying themselves alongside the hated Republicans, who were genuinely enacting reforms. And despite the master lofty goals of a political party that had no discrimination betwixt races, the southern Populists had much unlike attitudes than those inwards the Midwest.

The Populists embodied the late-nineteenth-century agrarian anxiety virtually the declining status of the farmer inwards U.S. society. Farmers had gone into the Civil War era every bit a majority, too had controlled the electoral college through the votes of the South, West, too Midwest—all essentially hinging on the ability of the farm bloc.

But later on the Civil War, the U.S. shifted to a manufacturing society, too farm states lost their electoral clout. While literature too civilization soundless held the farmer inwards high esteem, neither his income nor his political ability seemed to confirm that status.

This produced an anxiety noted past times Richard Hofstadter inwards his Age of Reform (1955), where, despite the fact that falling prices across the board genuinely made most farmers meliorate off, they inwards full general perceived they were losing footing inwards the economy.

Along alongside railroads, banks increasingly became targets for agrarian attacks. The unwillingness to allow branch banking ensured that inwards the Midwest especially, pocket-size province banks relied always to a greater extent than heavily on big-city banks, peculiarly those inwards New York City. This, inwards turn, magnified conspiracy theories involving a “money trust” or “Jewish bankers” who controlled the nation’s finances.

Publications such every bit William “Coin” Harvey’s Coin’s Financial School (1894) contributed to such views. Like other 3rd parties inwards U.S. history, however, the Populists melted into 1 or the other of the 2 established parties, too had largely disappeared past times 1900... except inwards the fictional concern human relationship of Frank Baum.

Third World/Global South

The term Third World applies to those nations in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and the Western Hemisphere that mostly secured independence from the imperial powers after World War II. In the cold war construct the First World, dominated by the United States, also included Western Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan.

These nations were wealthy, highly industrialized, urban, largely secular, democratic, and had capitalist economies. The Second World consisted of the Soviet bloc, dominated by the Soviet Union.

These nations were industrialized but not as wealthy as the First World; they were secular, authoritarian, and had socialist economics. The Third World nations, consisting of two-thirds of the world’s population, were poor, rural, and agrarian, with traditional societies.

After the breakup of the Soviet bloc and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the terms no longer applied and because most of the nations of the Third World were south of the equator the term Global South came to be used as a collective label for these nations.

The gap between rich and poor nations grew in the 20th century. As the Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru commented, "The poor have to run fast just to keep up". Third World countries were caught in a cycle of poverty, with low incomes and low production. After independence many became dictatorships and attempted to improve their economies, usually unsuccessfully, by adopting socialist systems on the Soviet state capitalist model.

Economists often referred to the poor developing nations as low-GDP (low Gross Domestic Product) countries, meaning they produced little in the way of goods and services. Countries in the Global South adopted a wide variety of methods to break out of the cycle of poverty.

In China Mao Zedong led a socialist revolution and mobilized the masses, but only with privatization after his death did the Chinese economy begin to take off. India, the world’s most populous democracy, adopted a capitalist approach; India also successfully applied the technology of the Green Revolution, the use of hybrid seeds to increase agricultural productivity.

At the beginning of the 20th century, India suffered major famines but by the end of the century it was exporting foodstuffs. India and many other poor nations also invested heavily in education. In Southeast Asia educated workers became the backbone of industrialization and the development of high-tech firms.

Other nations built huge development projects, such as the Aswan Dam in Egypt and the Three Gorges Dam in China. Following Western advice in the 1950s and 1960s, many Third World nations concentrated on industrialization, to the detriment of the agricultural sector. That, along with ecological changes, droughts along wide bands of Africa, civil wars, political corruption, and instability, contributed to large famines and mass starvation in many African nations.

In the Middle East oil-producing nations joined a cartel, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), to gain increased revenues from their major resource. They then used the new revenues to build modern infrastructures. Kuwait was able to provide a complete welfare system from cradle to grave for its small population.

Other countries, such as the "little dragons" in Southeast Asia (Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore), attracted foreign businesses and industries. Many nations in South America and Africa also borrowed vast amounts of money from private and public Western banks, such as the World Bank, to bring much-needed capital into their countries.

Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) also provided assistance in welfare, food, education, and healthcare. Brazil used foreign loans to create new industries and provide jobs, but it, along with many other countries, became ensnared in a web of indebtedness that was impossible to repay.

By the 1990s rich nations promised but often failed to deliver increased foreign aid and to forgive or restructure the debts of these nations, especially the poorest in Africa. Other nations had some modest successes in adopting appropriate technology to establish small, inexpensive grassroots projects.

Population growth also contributed to economic problems. In Kenya the population doubled every 18 years and in Egypt every 26 years, compared to every 92 in the United States. By 2000 the world’s population had exceeded 6 billion, from 1 billion in 1800. It was expected to reach 9 billion by 2054.

In poor countries high infant mortality contributed to the desire to have many children in hopes that at least some would survive to adulthood and be able to care for their parents, especially their mothers, in their old age. To limit its population China adopted a draconian one-child policy and strictly enforced it through its totalitarian system.

India adopted numerous approaches in attempts to limit population growth; these were often accepted by urban elites, but peasants continued to value large families. In societies where women had low status, having children, especially boys, brought status and the hope of some security.

The educational status of many improved, and literacy rates improved, although in many countries boys enjoyed higher rates of education than girls. While programs to empower women were often successful, they were also resisted by traditional and religious leaders.

Women’s work continued to be undervalued and underpaid. Child labor was yet another problem. Globalization and privatization in the late 20th century actually caused some nations to become poorer as prices for agricultural goods and raw materials dropped.

In some Global South nations, such as India, a few people became millionaires, but most remained desperately poor. In the 1990s, incomes in 54 nations actually declined, and in Zimbabwe life expectancy fell from 56 to 331, compared to over 80 in the United States and Japan. Disease, especially AIDS, contributed to further economic and social problems, particularly in many southern African countries.

At the 2000 Millennium Summit, world leaders agreed to institute programs aimed at cutting in half the number of people living on under $1 a day and at halving the number of people suffering from hunger by 2015. Five years later the commitments of the donor nations, especially the United States, had fallen short of the promises made, and it remained uncertain whether the goals would be met.