Spare a thought for all the governments wanting to cash in on the multi-trillion-dollar bonanza of the fifth generation of wireless technology or 5G while pacifying the half of their population who are anxious about its dire health and environmental consequences and keeping in ignorance the other half of the population who do not yet oppose its introduction because they are uninformed about its dangers.
Various governments have adopted different strategies to tackle this challenge, any of which may serve as a template for other governments to use. Let us take some instructive examples from Austria, France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Governments that have been dilatory in availing themselves of the surveillance and control potential of 5G to quash dissent may wish to choose a strategy from the following list that they feel is most compatible with the national character and situation of their country and therefore most likely to meet their need for a smooth and rapid 5G rollout.
Austria: brute force and public ignorance
The most advisable strategy for any cautious government is to ensure that the population remains uninformed of the dangers of 5G. This is relatively simple to achieve by using brute force to rapidly sign into law legislation forcing the entire population to accept “smart” meters with no possibility of refusal, as the Austrian government did in 2018, and issuing a Gesteznovelle or amendment to a law allowing 5G antennas to be installed on all public buildings, including nurseries, kindergartens and schools. This results in a quick 5G rollout, which can then be portrayed as a triumph in the race to digitalization and its claimed benefits of more jobs, faster downloads, low latency, fourth industrial revolution, core cloud, cutting edge technology, or any other similarly hyperbolic promotional rhetoric designed to con the public (or, in PR language, “capture the public imagination”).
Complicity with the media conveniently ensures that no whisper of the dangers inherent in a new and untested technology penetrates the public sphere. The population remains in ignorance, is not given the option to refuse 5G infrastructure and is propagandized to believe that their country is at the forefront of the modern age. This strategy has much to recommend it and avoids all controversy, long-winded debate, troublesome negotiations, annoying delays and unnecessary costs. Well done, Austria, for demonstrating how easy the 5G rollout can be when such a simple and highly effective strategy is adopted!
France: trickery and opportunism
Since France´s 5G rollout strategy is not yet complete, the above scenario remains at the level of speculation; only time will tell if indeed this strategy turns out to be the one employed. Whatever the case, it would have been a strong contender for most inventive strategy had it not been a longstanding and now rather tired strategy of disaster capitalism, these days greatly facilitated by the advent of directed energy weapons.
Switzerland: intricacies of the exclusion clause and amended subparagraph
Switzerland´s public servants are to be commended for demonstrating a mental dexterity that has enabled them to solve the conundrum of introducing 5G while facing an educated and informed citizenry. It has provided a useful template for the benefit of similarly unfortunate governments. Switzerland´s approach involves the devious use of exclusion clauses and innocent-looking subparagraphs.
Switzerland follows the exposure levels set out in the so-called safety guidelines of the so-called International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (more about these “guidelines” and ICNIRP later). The problem for the Swiss government is that Switzerland has precautionary exposure levels for single transmitters (base stations) that are 10 times lower than the ICNIRP levels.
As the public and cantonal lawmakers gradually started to grasp the scale of the threat from the completely untested 5G, the federal government’s dilemma grew. First came a people´s petition to force a parliamentary debate on 5G signed by 56,000 Swiss, then the cantons of Vaud, Jura and Geneva adopted moratoria on the 5G rollout. These were closely followed by Neuchâtel, which posed a series of questions to the federal government regarding the safety of 5G technology.
Cantonal lawmakers and Swiss citizens were outraged when the majority state-owned Swisscom defied the opposition to 5G by using existing antennas installed for previous generations of wireless technology to impose 5G on 102 locations in Switzerland. They will doubtless be further outraged when they learn that Swisscom has known about the non-thermal effects of electromagnetic radiation since at least 2004, when it filed a patent on a method and system for reducing electro smog in wireless local networks. This reveals that Swisscom has rolled out 5G on the Swiss population in full knowledge of its ability to cause damage to DNA and increase cancer risk.
Given that more than half the Swiss population considers the radiation emitted by mobile phone antennas to be dangerous or rather dangerous (Office fédéral de la statistique (OFS), Omnibus 2011, 2015), the modifications to the ordinance have two significant purposes: (1) to establish a system of monitoring public exposure to NIR (sect. 4.1.1) in accordance with the Aarhus Convention, which obliges ratifying states to inform the public about pollutants and their effects on people and the environment, and (2) to fill the gaps in regulation that impede the deployment of 5G (sect. 2).
Point 1, the monitoring system, sounds promising until we are told later on in the report that the Federal Office for the Environment (OFEV) would be tasked with informing the public periodically of the extent of their exposure to NIR and the state of the science on the effects of NIR, but that no coordination with the Federal Office of Public Safety would be required since “no biological marker or modification of a biological marker presenting a link with NIR or its effects on health has been identified to date [sic]” (sect. 4.1.1).
The great advantage of this strategy, we are told, is that the public would thereby be informed “in an objective manner about its exposure to NIR and its origin, and the current margin as compared to the limits set out in the ordinance, which would contribute to taking the passion out of the debate and the perception of risk”. And most satisfyingly, OFEV would always be in a position to justify to the public why the current exposure limits were in line with science and testing (sect. 4.1.2). In other words, it would be a closed circle and no examination of the real health and environmental dangers of NIR would be possible.
Point 2 is equally a master-stroke, for filling in the gaps in regulations that impede the deployment of 5G turns out to mean that the modified ordinance should include a principle of evaluation of “beam-forming” antennas and that “mobile phone antennas that emit during less than 800 hours per annum” should be exempted from the requirement to “respect the preventative exposure limits” (sect. 2).
This sleight of hand enables the federal government to exclude all 5G antennas from regulation, since they are all beam-forming and, if their emissions are calculated on the basis of their “directionality”, as implied by the chap. 62, additional subpara. 6, which states that “[The term] beam-forming antennas is intended to mean the radiating direction or the antenna pattern is adjusted automatically at short intervals”, it appears that it could be not the entirety of the emissions that would be subject to calculation, but solely each direction of emission. 800 hours would permit two months of emissions per annum per stationary antenna, but if each degree of emission of, for example, 180 degrees of movement of a directional antenna were to be permitted 800 hours, then no 5G antenna, all of which are directional, could exceed 800 hours of emissions and therefore none would come within the ambit of the modified ordinance.
Et voilà! As if by magic, the Swiss federal government checkmates the Swiss people and their cantonal governments to enable 5G!
It is to be noted here that, thanks to the diligence of Swiss NGO Gigaherz, Swiss telephone companies have already been caught in the act of illegally irradiating the Swiss people, when antennas hidden under manhole covers were found in 2018 to be transmitting way in excess of their permitted limits.
Who would know if the millions of beam-forming antennas throughout Switzerland were exceeding the permitted exposure limits or transmitting in excess of 800 hours? Would anyone want to risk exposure by taking up position within their vicinity, given that the new beam-forming antennas are “especially used with the high frequencies auctioned in early 2019” (sect. 4.3)?
No wonder Switzerland is famous for its high-class and high-tech products! Its skill and meticulousness in drafting such a Byzantine 5G rollout strategy trumps all!
United Kingdom: strict legalism and authoritative assertions
The United Kingdom can always be relied upon for its professed adherence to the rule of law. Thus enquirers as to the safety of 5G, both members of the public and parliamentarians, are treated to lengthy disquisitions on the reliability of the so-called science produced by the various official bodies responsible for assuring the public that they are duly protected from electromagnetic radiation (EMR). As in the popular British children´s party-game, this may be termed a “pass-the-parcel” strategy and is greatly facilitated by the existence of a large number of organizations with acronyms that may be conveniently juggled as needed.
Answers to questions in parliament or from the public are drafted along the following lines: Public Health England relies on AGNIR [if this body has unfortunately been disbanded due to allegations of conflict of interest, incompetence, lack of qualified experts, falsified science or any other reason, the name of another body such as ICNIRP or SCENIHR may be substituted here] to supply the scientific evidence showing the safety of wireless telecommunications technologies since [add appropriate date]. The World Health Organization endorses the safety guidelines set forth by [name of body] in setting its EMR safety guidelines. Should Public Health England be made aware of any changes in the science, it will amend its policies accordingly.
It may easily be seen that the UK strategy is an astute one since it serves simultaneously to impress and mystify, for no one has any clue as to the meaning of the various acronyms or the tainted reputations of the various bodies named, especially when they hail from another country. Such is the case, for example, with the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection or ICNIRP, which is in reality just a little club of male scientists in Germany that appoints its own members without supervision or consultation with anyone and mysteriously receives funding from, and is housed by, the German government, conveniently in the same building with the German Federal Office for Radiation Protection. Nor would any UK citizen be likely to wonder how it came to be that the little club´s guidelines were adopted and endorsed not only by the UN´s World Health Organization, but also by its International Telecommunication Union.
Great work, United Kingdom! Deceiving the public while sounding sincere and trustworthy is quite an achievement. A note of caution, though, for other governments considering employing a similar strategy: it does necessitate a certain level of gullibility among the general public and is therefore unlikely to be effective in the case of populations already skeptical about government pronouncements.
United States: big spending by lobbyists to enable capture of government agencies
As may be expected of the United States, the preferred 5G rollout strategy involves money and muscle. The imposition of 5G without public consent or consultation was made possible long in advance by regulatory capture by industry, which ensured that laws were changed to prohibit injury to health and environmental damage being taken into account to prevent or hinder the rollout of 5G.
Combined with corporate control of the media, preferably by telecommunications companies, and manipulation of lawmakers by armies of highly paid lobbyists, the strategy of regulatory capture is much to be admired, since – barring the appearance of a lawmaker with integrity and the existence of alternative media – it becomes almost impossible for the public to learn that 5G was never tested for health or safety and poses an existential threat to the entire planet.
In a country such as the US that believes itself a bastion of freedom, the public are unlikely to find plausible the idea that they are being hoodwinked in this way over such a dangerous technology and the 5G rollout may therefore be expected to proceed relatively unhindered. Should any information on the adverse effects of 5G leak out, recourse may be made to the oft-used and handy “blame-it-on-the-Russians” narrative. It should be noted, however, that this strategy requires considerable advance planning and the easy availability of funds sufficient to make your point of view the only one visible to lawmakers. It will therefore not be within the means of all countries. Nevertheless, this one has to qualify for the prize in the “heavy-handed but effective” category.
International aid and assistance
Implementation of the above strategies is likely to be facilitated by recourse to the assistance of international organizations. If the aim is to impose a global telecommunications technology capable of “blanketing” the Earth, as stated in the literature on 5G, especially one involving transmissions by satellites, it would be indispensable to enlist the aid of the United Nations. An appropriate Secretary-General would have to be appointed, preferably someone benefitting from a professional background as an electrical engineer and physicist. Timing here is all, for such an opportunity arises only once every eight years.
The UN Secretary-General also has the prerogative of “spontaneously” appointing, for example, an international Panel on Digital Cooperation, which could include all the international proponents of 5G in one go, while conveniently excluding any difficult people such as scientists or physiciansknowledgeable about the deleterious biological effects of EMR. The Panel´s terms of reference would want to ensure its separation from the usual work of the UN, again obviating time-wasting questions that might be posed by UN officials or other concerned experts. The members of the Panel would automatically gain access to all UN member states, thereby profiting from the opportunity of one-sidedly convincing them of the benefits of 5G while conveniently failing to mention any possible downsides to the technology.
The generally favorable worldwide public view of UN activities combined with universal ignorance about those activities and their purposes makes seeking such international assistance distinctly advantageous.
A smorgasbord of opportunities for rolling out 5G
5G IS A GOOD THING BECAUSE WE SAY SO AND YOU WILL DO AS YOU HAVE BEEN INSTRUCTED OR LIVE TO REGRET IT WHEN WE CONTROL EVERYTHING
Signed:
Sophia
pp. A.I.
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Claire Edwards, BA Hons, MA, worked for the United Nations as Editor and Trainer in Intercultural Writing from 1999 to 2017. Since May 2018, she has collaborated with Arthur Firstenberg to publish the International Appeal to Stop 5G on Earth and in Space (www.5gspaceappeal.org), which is available in 28 languages. The Appeal has attracted over 94,000 individual and group signatories from more than 170 countries. Claire warned the Secretary-General about the dangers of 5G during a meeting with UN staff in May 2018, calling for a halt to its rollout at UN duty stations.
