WASHINGTON , DC -- Yesterday's extraordinary simultaneous ouster of the Secretary of the Air Force and the Air Force chief of staff, followed by the naming of Trilateral Commissioner and Carter administration veteran James Rodney Schlesinger to purge USAF generals and colonels, dramatically documents the fact that power in Washington DC is no long in the hands of the Bush-Cheney-neocon clique, but has passed to the Brzezinski-Trilateral faction. Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced the firing of Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley, citing the failure of the Air Force to maintain the security of strategic nuclear forces, as shown in the infamous rogue B-52 incident of late August 2007, when a B-52 intercontinental strategic bomber with six nuclear armed cruise missiles flew from North Dakota to Louisiana totally outside of the purview of the USAF command control and communications systems. Gates also mentioned that four high-tech electrical nosecone fuses for Minuteman nuclear warheads were sent to Taiwan in place of helicopter batteries, along with other failures. Gates is a leading member of the Principals' Committee, an interagency group which now runs the US government from day to day with scant reference to the discredited outgoing lame ducks Bush and Cheney, who stay on mainly as figureheads. The Principals' Committee has been in charge of the US government since no later than early May, around the time of the Indiana and North Carolina primaries, when the controlled corporate media began trumpeting that Obama was the winner of the Democratic nomination. The Principals' Committee is made up of Pentagon boss Gates, Secretary of State Rice, NSC director Hadley, Joint Chiefs of Staff head Mullen, intelligence czar McConnell, along with a few others. These figures are now marching to the tune of Trilateral Commission bigwigs like Zbigniew Brzezinski, Joseph Nye, and the Rockefeller family. These are the same forces who own and control the Wall Street Manchurian candidate Obama. It is notable that the high- profile purge of the USAF came less than 48 hours after Obama had unilaterally proclaimed himself the Democratic presidential nominee. The rogue B-52 flew with six nuclear cruise missiles from Minot AFB North Dakota to Barksdale AFB Louisiana last August 30. Source reports published by Wayne Madsen suggest that the B-52 was stopped by patriotic low-level USAF personnel. As the issue of whether to allow the plane to fly on to the Middle East went up the chain of command and expanded to involve the intelligence agencies, it transpired that the majority of the government and the establishment did not want the plane to attack targets in the Middle East. The scandal of the rogue B-52 broke on September 5, and a stand-down and nuclear census of the entire USAF soon followed. According to all indications, the B-52 was under the extra-legal control of the Cheney faction, which evidently planned to fly it to the Middle East and quite possibly use one or more of the nuclear cruise missiles in an attack on Iran and/or Syria, probably in cooperation or coordination with the Israeli air attack on Syria which occurred on September 6. The fact that the B-52 was blocked may have represented the last gasp of the Bush-Cheney- neocon faction, and the beginning of the hegemony of a different and far more dangerous group, namely the Brzezinski-Trilateral faction. The Gates purge indicates that the new Trilateral masters of Washington DC do not trust the USAF generals who are so deeply compromised with the Bush-Cheney-neocon faction. The USAF was up to its neck in 9/11, and then in the rogue B-52 affair. The Trilaterals are accordingly driving out the old rogues, and replacing them with new rogue generals of their own, who are loyal to the insane Trilateral agenda. Brzezinski does not want nuclear weapons wasted on Iran, which he intends to turn into an expendable puppet or kamikaze pawn in his apocalyptic showdown with Russian and China. This is what Obama's appeasement of Iran actually aims at: Iran as a US asset to be played against Russia and China. Brzezinski wants to be in control of those nukes, since he may soon need them for use against Russia and China. Those who might celebrate the defeat of the Bush-Cheney-neocon group must rather face the fact that the US has just jumped out of the frying pan of conventional invasions and into the fire of looming thermonuclear confrontations among the great powers. This is the real nature of the change for which Obama is the public symbol. Obama's foreign policy will be dictated in every respect by Trilateral co-founder Brzezinski. Obama is now supported and surrounded by Trilateral members David Rockefeller, Jay Rockefeller, Joseph Nye, Paul Adolph Volcker, Jimmy Carter, and many more. With James "Rodney the Robot" Schlesinger now helping to purge the Pentagon, including its associated intelligence agencies, the Trilateral grip on Washington DC is tightening. Obama's choice of a vice president will be dictated by long-time Trilateral stalwart Jim Johnson. The rogue B-52 incident was forecast by me in an essay entitled "Cheney Determined to Strike in US with WMD This Summer," issued on July 21, 2007, and widely distributed on the internet and in print form. This was followed by the Kennebunkport Warning, which was posted online in the evening of August 26, 2007, less than 72 hours before the rogue B-52 nuclear missiles were loaded. By September 3, the Kennebunkport Warning was posted on 110,000 web sites worldwide. The precision and timeliness of this warning represent an unprecedented intelligence achievement. But now, the danger of a US attack on Iran is very low. Brzezinski's hit list is much more ambitious, and includes Sudan, Pakistan, Burma, and China, all stepping stones to the final reckoning with Moscow. The main possibility of an attack on Iran in the present situation comes from disgruntled Israeli factions like the one around Netanyahu who are aghast that they are being demoted from their previous role as the hub of US strategy to the status of just another expendable pawn in Brzezinski's lunatic plan for confrontation with Beijing and Moscow. The Israelis are horrified by Obama, just as everyone in the world should be. The winning faction of the US-UK establishment does not want the attack on Iran, and the Israelis would be foolhardy to try it on their own. The threats today from former IDF chief and Israeli Transport Minister Shaul Mofaz about an Israeli solo attack on Iran because of the failure of economic sanctions to stop nuclear development are indicative of deep discontent, but the guess here is that they are a bluff. We will soon find out: if the Israelis do not strike Iran in the next few weeks, they will have lost their chance as the Trilaterals continue to consolidate their power. Webster Tarpley is the author of Obama - The Postmodern Coup: The Making of a Manchurian Candidate.