The beast of the end times is going to arise in and control 10 nations of the Middle East. The Bible describes him not as a charismatic problem solver but as a vicious warring tyrant who is motivated by deception when he makes a peace covenant with Israel. See what the "Oracle of the Orient" says about the nations where the beast will rule from. RS.Com

Highlights from the Washington Times May 18, 2001

China with its huge population and growing intellectual base will in the next two or three decades equal or surpass the US as a global superpower. There is not a single Asian leader who thinks that the US could stop China for very long if they decide to take back Taiwan. Mr. Lee said, "You can not stop {the Chinese}. Shanghai is now a city of almost 15 million and still streaming in, as well as into Shenzhen. Its new Silicon Valley attracts the cream of the crop... Take your Ivy League and West Coast universities and multiply by five and then imagine that concentrated in two cities." "There is nothing that" Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong have done "that China can't do better in the years to come."

The biggest threat to global stability, Mr. Lee concluded, will be the challenges to the status quo from China and India. After that "I would say the {Persian} Gulf." "This is the real tinderbox in the foreseeable future. The Muslim nuclear weapon-which already exists in Pakistan-will travel to other Muslim countries in the years to come. Rational people don't worry me. China is rational, so is India, America and Europe and the rest of the world. But not the Islamist fundamentalist extremist. I am very worried because this fanaticism is growing into Indonesia, which is next door to us."