Operation Misery: Month 6, Week 3, Day 1.

Rihanna will shortly resume her Diamonds World Tour. Although the world has changed significantly since the start of the tour the original plan was for this tour was to completely destroy Rihanna as a popstar and a human being in order to restore the honour to the Gulf Monarchies that they feel they lost during the so called 'Arab Spring.' Despite all the evidence to the contrary Rihanna's CIA handlers would of course like everybody to believe that she helped cause the 'Arab Spring' through songs like "Run This Town."  This plan should also have given the handlers opportunity to assess attitudes to things like honour killing and forced marriage across the Muslim world while the confusion all this created would exert pressure on African governments who are trying to fight Islamic terrorism in Mali. The model for Rihanna's destruction that the handlers are trying to follow is the life of Whitney Houston who died of drug abuse in 2012.

Once a highly successful singer Houston was destroyed by a domestically violent romantic relationship with Bobby Brown that led to her becoming addicted to cocaine and crack cocaine. Despite the handlers best efforts to protect him from prosecution in order to keep him in the game Rihanna's own domestically violent romantic relationship with Chris Brown now seems to be over. As a result the UK are now trying very hard to push the drug use element of the story. Primarily this involves trying to manoeuvre Rihanna into an ever closer friendship with the model Cara Delevinge. Apart from giving the UK a high degree of access to Rihanna's private life Delevinge is a habitual cocaine user so the UK's hope is that the more time they spend together the greater the chance that Rihanna will pick up Delevinge's drug habit. However I doubt the young Ms Delevinge is aware of that part of her role. The question of whether it is possible to be an occasional or even habitual user of a drug like cocaine without becoming a full blow addict like Whitney Houston is of course one of the main discussion points about illegal drug use that the UK is trying to trigger.

As for the tour itself it begins with two concerts in Macau, China on September 13th and 14th (13&14/9/13). Initially these concerts were arranged in an effort to find out if the CIA handlers plan was being successful in confusing the Chinese. By appearing desperate for Rihanna concerts in their country the Chinese were trying to give the impression that they were struggling to follow what was going on meaning that the handlers plan was being successful. However by arranging the concerts for Macau which is considered as a gamblers paradise the Chinese also seemed to be sending the message that the US should only go ahead if they're feeling lucky. The fact that the Chinese were able to respond so elegantly to the US' fishing trip suggests that they're not finding the US' plan at all challenging. 

When Rihanna finally arrives in the country the Chinese will no doubt take the opportunity to inspect her and her core tour party because China are one of the largest contributors to the United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force in Mali. The specific thing that the US are trying to get the Chinese to focus on is the relationships between Rihanna and her core tour party because some are obviously very pro-Chris Brown and anti-me while others are anti-Chris Brown and pro-me. Although human allegiances change on an almost day to day basis the Chinese will be somewhat interested who in Rihanna's core tour party fit into which camp and whether specific opponents of mine are doing so simply because they're immature or because they're the CIA's agent in the room so to speak who is trying to keep Rihanna on course for her mission. 

Apart from my usual and ever present concerns about Rihanna being stopped at international border crossings on suspicion of carrying drugs my main concern about China is that all this attention on her core social relationships could make Rihanna and her tour party quite paranoid. Being a one party surveillance state with informers behind every lamppost China can be quite a paranoid place to begin with so Rihanna could probably do without the extra tension. However China is slowly starting to open up and is now probably now a lot less weird to an outsider then say Azerbaijan. Also any tiny detail the Chinese may learn about Rihanna's core tour party is likely to be outweighed by the reputation boost that will come from being seen not to participate in the US' increasingly unpopular plan. So provided Rihanna and her party act normally, accept offers of excursions and don't try and hide things the Chinese are likely to tread very lightly only having a casual look at what's going on making it one of the safer nations on the tour.

Next up Rihanna will be playing a concert in Manila in the Philippines on September 19th (19/9/13). Rather embarrassingly the Philippines is actually deputising for two of its neighbours - Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Indonesia is the most populated Muslim nation outside of the Arab world. Although the religion is the same cultural differences mean that certain aspects of the religion are interpreted differently. So through the Philippines concert the US is trying to find out Asian Muslim attitudes towards things like honour killing, forced marriage and modesty standards etc in order to compare them to Arab Muslim attitudes that they'd hoped to collect during Rihanna's concerts in Morocco and Turkey. Simply holding the concert in Indonesia would have been a bit obvious. Papua New Guinea is often referred to by the acronym "PNG" which is also the acronym used for the diplomatic term "Persona Non-Grata" which refers to people who have been denied entry to or deported from a country. By keeping Chris Brown in the game the handlers were hoping to raise speculation that he would be joining Rihanna on this leg of the tour raising the question of whether countries on the tour (particularly South Africa) would simply declare him PNG and refuse him entry to their nations. 

Also Papua New Guinea has undergone a recent trend of burning women alive as punishment for being witches. As it was in Europe and the colonial-era US in places such as Salem the allegation of witchcraft is often just an excuse for violence against women and score settling between neighbours. However being a female victim of male violence and currently being in the middle of some score settling between nations Rihanna provides the perfect cipher through which to discuss the current issues in Papua New Guinea. The discussion about witchcraft and magic also helps to bring up that long running discussion about Quantum field theory and whether Rihanna has some sort of special power to control the weather. The fact that the Philippines has recently experienced some devastating flooding certainly adds a interesting dimension to that discussion because it seems somewhat unfair to give the Philippines the task of physically dealing with Rihanna while the political aspects of her visit are mainly focused on their neighbours.

Finally the group of islands that make up Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea represent the main smuggling route from South East Asia to Australia. These smuggling routes mainly deal in people and illegal drugs. The illegal immigration that results from the people smuggling has long been a major issue within Australian politics which I will cover in more detail later. In terms of drugs smuggling business is apparently booming with demand and prices rising on the Australian markets while they're falling on the European market due to the Eurozone crisis. As such during her visit the Filipino government is likely to come under a lot of pressure to make sure that Rihanna and her tour caravan is properly searched at customs. They're likely to withstand that pressure but the usual border rules most certainly apply.

On September 22nd (22/9/13) Rihanna will make a quick detour to perform a concert in Singapore. This performance is part of the festivities surrounding the Formula 1 Grand Prix that more or less shuts down the city state for a weekend so it's really just an opportunity for Rihanna to pick up a big cheque to help cover the cost of the this logistical nightmare of a tour leg. However Singapore is part of the UK Commonwealth so the visit will also allow for the UK to mount a quick inspection of Rihanna following her China and Philippines concerts and before her Australia and New Zealand concerts. Also Singapore has strict rules against and harsh punishments for things like illegal drug use and chewing gum meaning that Rihanna is likely to find it quite a stressful place. Therefore my advice is to arrive at the last minute and leave as soon as possible.

After the quick pit-stop in Singapore Rihanna's tour moves onto Australia with concerts in Perth on September24th (24/9/13), Adelaide on September 26th (26/9/13), Brisbane on September 28th (28/9/13), Melbourne on September 30th (30/9/13) and October 1st (1/10/13) and Sydney on October 3rd and 4th (3&4/10/13). Along with the concerts in South Africa and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) these concerts in Australia are the primary political purpose of the tour with the other concerts really just being there to pad it out to give a degree of disguise. 

Australia will shortly hold a General Election and at the time this tour was being planned the Labor Party which make up the largest part of the governing coalition were led by Julia Gillard who was deeply unpopular with voters making it extremely likely that Labor would lose the election and the Liberal by name but Conservative by nature Party led by Tony Abbott would form Australia's next government which seems likely to be another coalition. Therefore the US and the UK were hoping to use Rihanna's tour as a way of assessing the new government. The US is obviously keen to find out what effect a change of government in Australia would have on its "Pivot towards the Pacific" policy while the UK is interested to see how loyal that government would be towards the Commonwealth Realm of which Australia is a member. 

However since the tour was announced the Labor Party replaced Gillard with Kevin Rudd as their leader meaning they now have a reasonable chance of beating Abbott in the General Election which Rudd recently called for September 7th (7/9/13). As a result it now seems that even if a coalition has be formed it is likely that Australia's election will be sorted out before Rihanna leaves China. Obviously though the US is hoping that all the discussion about Rihanna's tour beginning means that she will at least play a small role in the final days of Australia's election campaign. As the Singapore date is more of a festival appearance rather than a full concert expect a long discussion about whether Rihanna's tour equipment will be travelling from the Philippines to Australia by boat or by aeroplane.

The two big areas of Australian politics that the US are hoping Rihanna will shed light on are the big issues of immigration which Rihanna will call into focus by mimicking the route take by the boat people through islands like the Philippines and the environment. The environmental issue will be highlighted by the discussion about whether quantum field theory means that Rihanna can somehow control the weather which the US used extensively at the COP18/CMP8 Summit as a possible alternative explanation for global warming. As Australia is the world’s largest per capita emitter of greenhouse gases global warming and how to combat it is a massive issue in Australian politics.

The UK's role in the Australian leg of Rihanna's tour is much more sinister though. They intend to make available to the Australians all the detailed information about Rihanna's psychological make-up, social circle and pre-concert routines that they've either been provided with by their US counterparts or collected themselves through the friendship with Cara Delevinge and Rihanna's work with River Island. The test of the new Australian government's loyalty to the Crown will be whether they are prepared to use that information to run a low level harassment campaign against Rihanna in order to put her under as much stress as possible and deliver reputation damaging poor concert performances. So while I appreciate that Australians have more important issues to consider when choosing who to vote for such as an economy that is far too dependent on resources mining that leaves it overly vulnerable to changes in the Chinese economy and the great carbon tax which I support in spirit but would use a free market cap and trade system to achieve the same result Rihanna's - and by extension my - life will be made a lot easier if the Labor Party won another term. That's because they will actually take a degree of pride in defying orders from the UK. That said with the reward from the European leg of Rihanna's tour failing to materialise the UK now seems very worried about the reputational damage that will come from being seen to join in with the US' mission to destroy Rihanna. Therefore if any Australian government were to gently express a lack of desire to attack Rihanna I doubt the UK will force the point too much.

It is though obviously difficult for me to do a full threat assessment of the Australian concerts until I know the result of the election. However the worst case scenario is that aside from the two border crossings any harassment will be low level stuff like noisy hotel neighbours and internal flights getting delayed or local traffic congestion leading to concerts starting late or fans not being able to get in. It is in this period that I would prefer to be in closer, more direct contact with Rihanna. Not because I want all the backstage gossip but because I can actually be quite useful in getting that sort of thing sorted out.

Following on from the concerts in Australia Rihanna will move on to New Zealand for three concerts in Auckland on October 6th, 7th, and 8th (6&7&8/10/13). Although I'm likely to start an argument by saying this Australia and New Zealand are extremely friendly neighbours and their cultures are so similar that you could almost say they're the same country. So although Rihanna will have to cross an international border to get in and out of New Zealand her stay there will be almost exactly the same as her stay in Australia only without the pressure of a newly formed government. In fact based on current form I might even go so far as to say Rihanna could almost be looking forward to a relatively relaxing time. Mind you I could give someone the yips just by saying that.

Due to the time difference from GMT the Philippines concert, most of the Australian concerts and all of the New Zealand concerts are likely to take place during the start of the European working day. Therefore the CIA handlers were hoping that any screw ups will help to spread chaos across the European financial markets which is an ugly place to be at the best of times. As such if Rihanna will insist of screwing up she'd be well advised to avoid doing so during those concerts.

16:30 on 21/8/13.