How a virus could change the world

Chronicle of an announced crisis

by Robert Seidel

(30. Januar 2021)  In his latest book, Paul Schreyer* attempts to put the Covid-19 crisis in a political context and thus make it more tangible. In doing so, he goes back a long way in the history of US military "biosecurity".

By presenting a series of national and international biological weapons crisis management exercises conducted in the United States, Paul Schreyer shows the reader that the world has not been caught off guard by the current pandemic situation. The management of epidemics and plagues (smallpox, plague, anthrax or corona) has been the subject of systematic training – funded by private foundations – since the late 1990s, in a close alliance between government institutions, the military, intelligence services and the pharmaceutical industry. Exercise scenarios have become increasingly real and, as far as participants are concerned, increasingly important. Over time, other states and international organizations were involved – and eventually also Chinese actors.

Pandemic Exercise "Event 201" – October 2019

The latest of these exercises described by Schreyer is "Event 201". It was held on 18 October, 2019 – ten weeks before the Covid-19 pandemic. The list of participants in this exercise gives an idea on its orientation: Adrian Thomas, Vice President of Johnson & Johnson, one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies; Jane Halton, former Australian Minister of Health and Finance, longtime senior WHO official and Chair of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) initiated by the Gates Foundation, which is an alliance between the pharmaceutical industry, governments and the WHO for vaccine development; Matthew Harrington, president of one of the world's largest public relations firms (Edelmann) and personal advisor to Microsoft; Hasti Taghi, vice president of NBC Universal, the world's third largest media conglomerate; Avril Haines, former deputy director of the CIA, who works for a Washington-based lobby group that connects computer companies with the Pentagon and intelligence agencies.

Big pharma, foundations, population control

Among the representatives present at "Event 201" were also the president of a medical device company, a crisis manager from the German company Lufthansa, a director of the Marriott hotel chain, a senior representative of UPS and a representative of the Central Bank of Singapore. Three senior U.S. officials professionally involved in the fight against the disease were also present. In addition – and Schreyer devotes an entire chapter to this fact – three senior representatives of American foundations involved in the field of global population control – termed now: family planning.

Behavioural control of citizens

A large part of these exercises was devoted to the behavioural control of citizens in the different states: emergency programmes and the influence of the media on them, how to react to the possible resistance of the population to curfews or mandatory vaccinations, etc.

Of course, "Event 201" also focused on the production of vaccines by private companies, largely financed by the state, and on easing the conditions for licensing vaccines.

In the final chapters of the book, Schreyer traces the course of the Covid-19 pandemic in Germany up to mid 2020: the first information from China, the WEF in Davos, media reports from northern Italy, the role of the Johns Hopkins and Robert Koch Institutes, statements by Professor Drosten, containment, vaccinations, etc. The book also includes a review of the development of the Covid-19 pandemic in Germany. Critically, the author highlights the discrepancy between the actual course of the pandemic and the behaviour of the media and government activities. Again, he leaves it to the reader to draw his own conclusions.

The domination of international politics

Schreyer shows that since the beginning – that is, since the late 1990s – there has been a close intertwining of private sector involvement, military know-how and government agencies, both in terms of finance and personnel. Pandemic planning processes have been shown to be driven by the enormous financial resources of U.S. foundations: funds representing, nota bene, the untaxed profits of a few ultra-rich individuals who seek to dominate international politics with these funds.

Schreyer meticulously compiled the facts and sources. He managed to highlight relevant elements of the political context of the covid-19 pandemic. He focuses on the political aspects rather than the medical contexts.

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Not without reason, Schreyer analyses in detail the discussion on "conspiracy theories" at the beginning of his book. In contrast to the accusation that he is a "conspiracy theorist", he makes the following remark: "therefore, even if it may seem trivial, anyone who really wants to improve his knowledge should always analyse the facts in the face of a so-called conspiracy theory. It is not only imprudent, but downright stupid, to dismiss a point of view out of hand just because it does not correspond to one's worldview and questions beliefs that one feels strongly about. (p. 30)

Schreyer, Paul. Chronik einer angekündigten Krise. Wie ein Virus die Welt verändern konnte. [Chronicle of an announced crisis. How a virus could change the world.] Editions Westend Verlag, July 2020

* Paul Schreyer (born 1977) is a journalist. Since January 2020, he has been managing the "Multipolar" website (www.multipolar-magazin.de) together with Stefan Korinth and Ulrich Teusch. His main publications are entitled "Wir sind die Guten" 2014, "Wer regiert das Geld" 2016, "Die Angst der Eliten" 2018.