African Blood: A Commodity Obama and the Clintons Excel In Trading In

By Phil Butler

Outgoing US President Barack Obama has just ordered a contingent of US troops into South Sudan. The story is barely mentions in mainstream media today, but the implications are dramatic, and implicative. Another regime put in place with the help of the US and the UN, is in chaos. At the center of the Sudanese conflict is a familiar resource, energy lying beneath that nation's blood soak sands of Africa.

USA Today carries the story within the Google News matrix of "Obama" stories today. According to the story, the American president ordered 47 US troops to secure the US Embassy via airlift on Tuesday, and another 130 soldiers are on standby in nearby Djibouti. Citing a "sudden and serious in the security situation in the capital," Obama's State Department also ordered all non-essential personnel out of the capital. USA Today pointed out the move by Obama to notify Congress , as required according to the War Powers Resolution, which requires notification of the movement of combat troops into a new country.

This sub-Saharan African nation was carved out of Sudan in 2011 after a U.S.-supported referendum backed its independence from Sudan. The country has been in a crisis since even before 2011, but as of 2013, rival political factions have been warring continually. As we've seen in Libya, Syria, and elsewhere where oil and natural gas are in the equation, Sudan being ripped apart is another "coincidental" crisis where energy plays a big role. The reader should take note that the oil in question, is in South Sudan. The history of Sudan is a turbulent one, but breaking down Obama's moves there is fairly simple. For decades Western intelligence agencies backed the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) in a bid to divide the country north and south. The so-called "Four Horsemen of Oil" were to be the beneficiaries of making this new oil rich nation. Africa's longest running civil war came to a head when Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was pressured into ceding the southern part of his country to the US/IMF/World Bank constituency, led by the Obama administration's State Department.

2 million dead later, and a familiar group of players emerge as winners in the global crisis for gain game. The Obama troop moves of today are directly linked to these players. Within days of declaring itself a sovereign nation, South Sudan's state oil company, Nilepet formed a joint venture with Glencore International Plc to market its oil. Glencore is controlled by the Rothschild banking family. The PetroNile joint venture will be 51 percent controlled by Nilepet and 49 percent by Glencore. Wherever there is upheaval and crisis, the same players emerge as instrumental in the chaos and in the killing. These Rothschild holding companies and subsidiaries make profits off not just the energy underneath these crisis, they profit from everything from pharma to food and even weapons. This Guardian piece tells of Glencore selling the wheat to feed starving Sudanese.

The business of creating more wealth for notorious bankers worldwide, it is comprehensive. These investment houses create conflict, arm conflict, help destroy environments and infrastructures, create debt and hunger, and then win margins off what they helped create. The network is more extensive than anyone imagines, and includes virtually every major political figure in the west. South Sudan's difficulties can be directly linked to negotiations over these oil fields. Not long after the Glencore deal was signed, the new nation reconsidered the offer, and entertained Chinese and French deals. This inextricably led to more violence. Then in 2012, just before the real civil war began, Deputy Minister for Petroleum Elizabeth James Bol told Reuters Glencore's bid would be reconsidered. In the midst of all this energy interplay, the détente dealers were all over Sudan, and later South Sudan. Obama's administration has blood and oil soaked hands over this one too.

This WikiLeaks document from the Hillary Clinton emails reveals the crux of the North and South Sudan crisis, which is no different from the crises in Libya or Syria, for that matter. The Carter Center, Clinton as Secretary of State, familiar CIA complicit organizations like USAID and others, played a key role in breaking Sudan in half. This fragment from the January 2011 document sets the stage:

"Regarding oil, Amum said that China produces about 70% of the oil, Japan 15%, N. Sudan 10%, and India a small amount. 2% of the total goes to Unity and Upper Nile states and the other 98% retained in Sudan is divided 50:50 between N. and S. Sudan. This agreement ends with the CPA on July 9, after which the South will be generous in allocating a certain amount of oil revenue (not a percentage) to the north to com- pensate for services rendered in pipelines and refineries."

Reading these lines the power play in between Glencore, the Chinese, and other interested investors comes to the forefront. But the politicians these powerful institutions are using, is our story today. This WikiLeaks Global Intelligence file released in 2012 mentions Secretary of State Clinton as well, only for fueling the questionable regime in Ethiopia, while hunger aid misuses were at the forefront. The cable reveals the depth the Ethiopian catastrophe in a new light via an excerpt from commentary by Prof Alemayehu G Mariam entitled "Starve the beast, feed the people" published in English by Ethiopian opposition website Ethiomedia. It calls to question the Meles Zenawi regime abuses of billions paid by US taxpayers to help starving Ethiopians, which never alleviated the crisis. Turning back to South Sudan, Clinton's role there is something she summed up on her trip in 2012. When tensions in between north and south rekindled, and oil stropped flowing (when the deals turned sour for Glencore) Clinton told reporters; "We need to get those [oil] resources flowing again." The connections in between Glencore and other investor entities, and the likes of Obama and Clinton, are usually only supposed. But we can illuminate further here.

Another Stratfor cable at WikiLeaks goes in depth on the formation of Glencore, and on the extreme secrecy under which its executives operate. The cable speaks of an uptight reputation management firm known as Schillings, and spotlights Glencore CEO Ivan Glasenberg, the commodities trading legend. A fragment from the communiqué speaks volumes about Glencore, Glasenberg, and what is really going on in crisis areas:

"In commodities, Glasenberg's name enjoys instant recognition. This is unsurprising, given his company's role in supplying the basic materials that heat, feed, move and house the world. Oil, gas, coal, aluminium, bauxite, nickel, iron ore, zinc, copper, grain, rice, sugar: Glencore and its subsidiaries have a hand not just in buying and selling all of these, but in producing, extracting and transporting them."

This rabbit hole is one of the deepest this researcher has ever found, but the linkage in between Hillary Clinton and Glencore is easy as pie. Some will recall former President Bill Clinton granting a pardon to a man named Marc Rich, who founded Glencore. Clinton let Rich, now deceased, off the hook for over the then-biggest tax evasion case in US history and over busting sanctions with Iran. The New York Post article about Rich's death bears a quote from our Mr. Glasenberg, who expressed Glencore Xstrata's deep sorrow. Clinton's pardon of the then fugitive Rich, was described by the presidential friendly New York Times as, a "shocking abuse of presidential power". Donations by Rich via his ex-wife and through various Clinton political campaigns ensued. The scandal that never really was implicated UBS, the Clintons, and various politicians and business people involved in big energy. And this is where our story gets interesting.

According to this report, Rich associates continued to shower the Clinton's with "gifts" even after the commodities wizard's death in 2013. Of particular note, Lebanese-Nigerian billionaire Gilbert Chagoury (a close Rich associate) was later convicted in Geneva of money laundering and aiding a criminal organization in connection with the billions of dollars stolen from Nigeria during the reign of dictator Gen. Sani Abacha. The parallels here being uncanny, I know the reader is caught up with me now. Chagoury has been a supporter of Bill and Hillary Clinton since the 1990s. He has funded their election campaigns and is a major donor to the Clinton Foundation. The man was detained by Homeland Security for being on a "no fly" list! For brevity sake, it was about ties to Chagoury Group that US Senator David Vitter called Clinton to task for over her reluctance in designating Nigeria's "Boko Haram" insurgents terrorists. The more one looks into Hillary Clinton's trips and meetings, and her associations, the most understandable her reluctance to share emails becomes. Al Capone the notorious mobster had less dubious associations and business deals. Chagoury donated between $1,000,001 and $5,000,000 to the Clinton Foundation and pledged $1 billion to the Clinton Global Initiative in 2009 through the Chagoury Group. His relationship with the Clintons stretches back to the 1990s, when he contributed nearly half a million dollars to a voter registration group that helped re-elect President Bill Clinton in 1996.

Every time I hear Barack Obama has sent for coffee, I shudder. The closer he gets to November, the more blatant and dangerous his dictates seem to be. Killing in America is an epidemic. Tensions are at an all time high. The income gap is massive, and the rich have never, ever been richer. Wall Street is completely insulated, and the bankers and corporate elite now make all the rules. No manner of dirty dealing revelation seems noteworthy enough, to bring these leaders to accountability. Now South Sudan is boiling over again. Troops go in, and we can expect a new Glencore or other commodities deal soon. At least this seems to be the pattern. The whole stinking mess links billionaires, the Panama Papers, the Clintons, and Obama by proxy, to bloodletting on every continent except Antarctica. The end truth may reveal Obama protecting baby penguin killers by the time all is said and done.

Tony Hayward. Does anyone reading recall his part in the BP Gulf oil tragedy? Hayward is the non-executive chairman of Glencore. I will wager no one reading this knows a man named Peter Grauer. He's another board member of Glencore, as well as head of the Bloomberg L.P. Board, who replaced Michael Bloomberg in 2001. Grauer is also the founder of an offshore group know as aPriori Capital Partners, where current Secretary of State John Kerry's family's investments have been linked by the famous Panama Papers. This Daily Caller piece says Kerry only derives about $50,000 a year from the Caymans investments though. Peter Coates is another board member with "interesting" credentials. The Chairman of the Stoke City Football Club is also the dad of the girl who founded Bet365, one of the world's biggest gambling companies (Pete Rose, eat your heart out).

The "rabbit hole" I mentioned, it's unending literally. Through people like Glencore board member Leonhard Fischer leverage even the high insurance rates people pay to travel to places made dangerous by politicians like the Clintons. Fischer was the CEO of Credit Suisse EMEA in 2006 to 2007, left to join an entity called Ripplewood Holdings LLC, which in turn has members on boards from Colgate to tentacles into Save the Children in Ethiopia. I've not the time now to delve in and follow all these breadcrumbs, but it's safe to say these people have fingers in every profit pie on this planet. Moving on to William Macaulay, we find the non-executive board member of Glencore most closely associated with energy. Macaulay is the CEO and Chairman of First Reserve Corporation, the world's largest Private Equity fund specialized in the energy industry, with $21.5 Bn. under management. I guess the reader can already guess the name of the fund associated with South Sudan (PDF) and the 21 investors of the so-called "Sudan Engagement Group". Former Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack sits on Glencore's board too. He was neck deep in the 2008 financial crisis patching up MS, and is also aligned via Bloomberg etc. Since 2012 he has been an adviser to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, the leverage buyout sharks that have consolidated massive wealth since the financial crisis began. Like I said, it never ends.

Barack Obama sends troops someplace, Glencore and other big investors reap profits from every conceivable angle, and somehow nobody really is able to make all the connections. The Syria chaos is about Glencore selling nourishment for the unfortunate there, to the United Nations' World Food Programme, and the profit will end up being called a humanitarian effort. In the meantime, Barack Obama may well be squeezing Glencore over its Keystone Pipeline woes too. At this point in human history, nothing is out of the realm of possibility. Bankruptcy for Glencore and/or Deutsche Bank might be the global economic meltdown warning causing the west's "all or nothing" approaches to regime change of late. Maybe now we can see the massive force behind electing the most unscrupulous woman in politics, President of the United States.

Phil Butler