A History of Central Banking and the Enslavement of Mankind

[Woodsman]

A History of Central Banking and the Enslavement of Mankind

~Stephen Mitford Goodson

I picked up a copy after reading this review on SOTT:

http://www.sott.net/article/291745-Book-review-A-History-of-Central-Banking-and-the-Enslavement-of-Mankind

It appears to be one of those self-limiting efforts. That is, Goodson offers a compelling and detailed historical account of how money and banking have been corrupted over the centuries, presenting two sides of a battle, (with one side mandating state-ownership of banking with extremely limited or no interest charges allowed, and privately owned banking which makes usury its central defining feature.)

It's an easy read, there are lots of little facts I'd never heard before and his notes are well-annotated. Goodson shows very clearly that periods where money is used without interest charges, countries and populations prosper enormously, versus times where private bankers gain control, (always through scheming and murder), lead almost immediately to prolonged periods of war and vast suffering. The contrast is very stark, and the reader quickly recognizes that how we employ money is truly the prime engine which defines the shape of history.

Of the 15th Century, he writes:

"With tolerable taxes, no state debt and no interest to pay, England enjoyed a period of unparalleled growth and prosperity. The average labourer worked only 14 weeks and enjoyed 160 to 180 holidays. According to Lord Leverhulme, a writer of that time, "The men of the 15th century were very well paid", in fact so well paid that the purchasing power of their wages and their standard of living would only be exceeded in the late 19th century. A labourer could provide for all the necessities his family required. They were well clothed in good woollen cloth and had plenty of meat and bread."

(How does that hold with recorded history?)

However...

A bit of Googling around reveals that Goodson is a white South African with feet in the political world, and he is apparently an outspoken proponent of Hitler, (He liked Hitler for maintaining state-owned banking and debt forgiveness schemes), but he claims that the Holocaust never happened and is part of a scheme to fleece the German government via war crime compensations.

It's hard to take him straight after that.

Has anybody else read this book?

 

[Woodsman]

I'm still pondering this book. The repeated tale of state-owned banking creating conditions approaching paradise-on-Earth qualities of living for whole populations only to be undermined and destroyed by private banking scams through covert social engineering and assassinations, (again and again!), is enough to make one quite angry and frustrated.

The world could be an amazing place to live were it not for the psychopathic machinations of a small number of bankers!

This is what the author tells us about Russia...

Quote:

The State Bank of the Russian Empire.

Meanwhile across the Atlantic a different system of finance, viz. state banking, had been adopted. From September 1814 to June 1815 the Congress of Vienna was held in order to settle the issues arising from the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars and the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire. Behind the scenes, Nathan Mayer Rothschild proposed the formation of a new world order concentrated around central banking. All the major powers, with the exception of Russia, were indebted to the Rothschild banks. Tsar Alexander I (1801-25) refused to comply with Rothschild’s devious scheme and derailed it. Instead, he established The Holy Alliance between Austria, Prussia and Russia, which was signed on September 26, 1915 by Emperor Francis I of Austria, King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia and Tsar Alexander. He also rejected Rothschild’s offer to set up a central bank in Russia. Whether it was because he distrusted this shady banker or was aware of the perils of central banking is not known, but he wisely declined. However, his prudent behavior incurred the vindictive and unrelenting wrath of the Rothschilds, who according to Major-General Count Cherep-Spiridovich were responsible for the assassination of the last five Tsars and would seek to obtain their Talmudic vengeance in spectacular fashion 102 years later.

On June 12, 1860 The State Bank of the Russian Empire was founded with the aim of boosting trade turnovers and the strengthening of the monetary system. Up to 1894 it was an auxiliary institution under the direct control of the Ministry of Finance. In that year it was transformed into being the banker of the bankers and operated as an instrument of government's policy. It minted and printed the nation's coins and notes, regulated the money supply and through commercial banks provided industry and commerce with low interest rate loans. Its vast gold reserves, the largest in the world, exceeded the bank note issue by more than 100%, except for the year 1906. By 1914 it had become one of the most influential lending institutions in Europe.

Not unexpectedly Russia had the smallest national debt in the world. The following table reflects the number of rubles of debt per inhabitant. [Not included. -ed.]

By 1914 83% of the interest and amortization of the national debt, of which less than 2% was held abroad, was funded by the profits of the Russian State Railways. In 1916 the total length of the main lines was 100,817 verst or kilometers. Russian commercial and canal tonnage of 11,130,000 in 1910 exceeded British merchant tonnage of 10,750,000.

In 1861 Tsar Alexander II (1855-81) abolished serfdom, which at that time affected 30% of the population. By 1914 very little land remained in the possession of the Russian estate owners, who were mainly the nobility. 80% of the arable land was in the hands of the peasants, which had been ceded to them for a very small sum. This land was held in trust by the village commune or mir. However, after the passing of the Stolypin Act in 1906, peasants could obtain individual title with hereditary rights. By 1913, two million families had availed themselves of this opportunity to ac1uire what became known as “Stolypin farms.” Nearly 19,000,000 acres (7,689,027 hectares) were alloted to these individual peasant proprietors by the land committees. The Peasants’ State Bank, which was described at that time as the “greatest and most socially beneficent institution of land credit in the world” granted loans at a low rate of interest, which was in effect a handling charge. Between 1901 and 1912 these loans increased from 222 million rubles to 1,168 billion rubles.

Agricultural production soared so that by 1913, Russia had become the world’s bread basket as the following table reveals. [not included].

Russian agricultural production of cereals exceeded the combined production of Argentina, Canada and the United States by 25%. In 1913 Russia had 37.5 million horses - more than half of all those in the world. She also produced 80% of the world’s flax and provided more than 50% of the world’s egg imports. Mining and industrial output also expanded by huge margins. Between 1885 and 1913 coal production increased from 259.6 million poods (16.38 kg) to 2,159.8 million poods, cast iron production rose from 25 million poods in 1890 to 1,378 million poods in 1913 and petroleum production rose from 491.2 million poods in 1906 to 602.1 million poods in 1916. From 1870 to 1914 industrial output grew by 1% per annum in Great Britain, 2.75% per annum in the United States and 3.5% per annum in Russia. During the period from 1890 to 1913 industrial production quadrupled and Russian industries were able to satisfy 80% of internal demand for manufactured goods - a perfect example of autarky. Throughout the last 20 years of peacetime imperial rule (1895-1914) the increase in Gross Domestic Product averaged 10% per annum.

With the Russian State bank creating the people's money out of nothing at almost zero interest; as opposed to the rest of the world where central banks allowed parasitic private banks to create their nation's money supply at usurious rates of interest, it comes as no surprise to find that in 1912 Russia had the lowest levels of taxation in the world. These very low rates of taxation also attest to the efficiency of the Russian government. Furthermore throughout this period of state banking there was no inflation and no unemployment.

[...]

An independent study by British lawyers concluded that the Russian Code of Laws and judiciary were “the most advanced and impartial in the world.”

Elementary education was obligatory and free right up to university level, where only nominal fees were charged. Between 1906 and 1914 10,000 schools were opened annually. Russian universities were renowned for their high academic standards.

In labor relations the Russians were pioneers. Child labor was abolished over 100 years before it was abolished in Great Britain in 1867. Russia was the first industrialized country to pass laws limiting the hours of work in factories and mines. Strikes, which were forbidden in the Soviet Union, were permitted and minimal in Tsarist times. Trade union rights were recognized in 1906, while an Inspectorate of Labor strictly controlled working conditions in factories. In 1912 social insurance was introduced. Labor laws were so advanced and humane that President William Taft of the United States was moved to say that “the Emperor of Russia has passed workers' legislation which was nearer to perfection than that of any democratic country.”

The people of all races in the Russian empire had an equality of status and opportunity, which was unparalleled in the modern world. His Imperial majesty Tsar Nicholas II (1894-1917) and his state bank had created a workers' paradise that was unrivaled in the history of mankind.

On November 7, 1917, the Rothschilds, fearful that replication of this extraordinary example of freedom and prosperity would destroy their malevolent banking empire, instigated and financed a Judeo-Bolshevik revolution in Russia (50), which wrecked and ruined a wonderful country and resulted in the deaths by murder and starvation, according to Alexander Solzhenitsyn, of 66 million innocent people. (51)


50 - W.S.L. Churchill, Zionism versus Bolshevism. A Struggle for the Soul of the Jewish People, Sunday Illustrated Herald, February 8, 1920. Churchill blamed the revolution on a “world conspiracy for the overthrow of civilisation and for the reconstruction of society on the basis of arrested development, of envious malevolence and impossible equality, [which] has been steadily growing... It has been the mainspring of every subversive movement during the Nineteenth Century; and now at last this band of extraordinary personalities from the underworld of the great cities of Europe and America have gripped the Russian people by the hair of their heads and become practically the undisputed masters of that enormous empire.”

51 - According to Swiss historian Jurgen Fraf, Solzhenitsyn employed a statistician who calculated the number of deaths at 66 million. In The American Hebrew Magazine of September 10, 1920 it was stated that "The Bolshevik Revolution in Russian was the work of Jewish planning and Jewish dissatisfaction. Our Plan is to have a New World Order. What worked so wonderfully in Russia is going to become Reality for the whole world."

 

[Niall]

I think the author is onto something by highlighting the recurring pattern of 'one good man' vs entrenched oligarchy.

But he's incorrect in identifying 'them' as Jews, and you can see it in the way he has to stretch 'facts' around 'the policy'. Gavrilo Princip, for example, was not Jewish.

Caesar did not 'kick out Jewish moneylenders'. Jews were not part of the Roman oligarchy.

Tsarist Russia did some amazing things, but some of its tsars were either nuts, or just not clever or strong enough to understand and perform their job (to protect the ordinary people from predatory nobles and foreign intrigue).

Goodson's three 20th century examples (Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan) might have implemented good banking practises at home, but look at what they did with them abroad. Sure, we can argue, as Goodson implies, that they were goaded into waging destructive wars, but that they 'took the bait' only strengthens the case that those regimes were led by character-disturbed people.