Pepe Escobar for the Saker blog
A powerful feeling rhythms your skin and drums up your soul as you’re immersed in a long walk under persistent snow flurries, pinpointed by selected stops and enlightening conversations, crystallizing disparate vectors one year after the start of the accelerated phase of the proxy war between US/NATO and Russia.
That’s how Moscow welcomes you: the undisputed capital of the 21st century multipolar world.
A long, walking meditation impregnates on us how President Putin’s address – rather, a civilizational speech – last week was a game-changer when it comes to the demarcation of the civilizational red lines we are all now facing. It acted like a powerful drill perforating the less than short, actually zero term memory of the Collective West. No wonder it exercised a somewhat sobering effect contrasting the non-stop Russophobia binge of the NATOstan space.
Alexey Dobrinin, Director of the Foreign Policy Planning Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Russia, has correctly described
Putin’s address as “a methodological basis for understanding, describing and constructing multipolarity.”
For years some of us have been showing how the emerging multipolar world is defined – but goes way beyond – high speed interconnectivity, physical and geoeconomic. Now, as we reach the next stage, it’s as if Putin and Xi Jinping, each in their own way, are conceptualizing the two key civilizational vectors of multipolarity. That’s the deeper meaning of the Russia-China comprehensive strategic partnership, invisible to the naked eye.
Metaphorically, it also speaks volumes that Russia’s pivot to the East, towards the rising sun, now irreversible, was the only logical path to follow as, to quote Dylan, darkness dawns at the break of noon across the West.
As it stands, with the wobblin’, ragin’ Hegemon lost in its own pre-fabricated daze, the real runners of the show feeding burning flesh to irredeemably mediocre political “elites”, China may have a little more latitude than Russia, as the Middle Kingdom is not – yet – under the same existential pressure Russia has been put under.
Whatever happens next geopolitically, Russia is at heart a – giant – obstacle on the warmongering path of the Hegemon: the ultimate target is top “threat” China.
Putin’s ability to size up our extremely delicate geopolitical moment – via a dose of highly concentrated, undiluted realism – is something to behold. And then Foreign Minister Lavrov provided the sweet cherry on top, calling the hapless US ambassador for a hardcore dress down: oh yeah, this is war, hybrid and otherwise, and your NATO mercenaries as well as your junk hardware are legitimate targets.
Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of the Security Council, now more than ever relishing his “unplugged” status, made it all very clear: “Russia risks being torn apart if it stops a special military operation (SMO) before victory is achieved.”
And the message is even more acute because it represents the – public – cue to the Chinese leadership at the Zhongnahhai to understand: whatever happens next, this is the Kremlin’s unmovable official position.
The Chinese restore the Mandate of Heaven
All these vectors are evolving as ramifications of the bombing of the Nord Streams, the only military attack – cum industrial terrorism – ever perpetrated against the EU, leave the Collective West paralyzed, dazed and confused.
Perfectly in tandem with Putin’s address, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs chose the geopolitical/existential moment to finally take the gloves off, with a flourish: enter the
US Hegemony and its Perils essay cum report, which became an instant massive hit across Chinese media, examined with relish all across East Asia.
This blistering enumeration of all the Hegemon’s lethal follies, for decades, constitutes a point of no return for trademark Chinese diplomacy, so far characterized by passivity, ambivalence, actual restraint and extreme politeness. So such turnaround is yet another proud “achievement” of the outright Sinophobia and mendacious hostility exhibited by American neocons and neoliberal-cons.
Scholar Quan Le notes that this document may be regarded as the traditional form – but now filled with contemporary wording – the Chinese Sovereigns used in their millenary past before going to war.
It is in fact an axio-epistemo-political proclamation justifying a serious war, which in the Chinese universe means a war ordained by a Higher Power capable of restoring Justice & Harmony in a troubled Universe.
After the proclamation the warriors are equipped to strike mercilessly at the entity judged to be troubling the Harmony of the Universe: in our case, the psycho Straussian neo-cons and neoliberal-cons commanded as rabid dogs by the real American elites.
Of course in the Chinese universe there’s no place for “God” – much less a Christian version; “God” for the Chinese means the Beauty-Goodness-Truth trinity, Timeless Heavenly Universal Principles. The closest concept for a non-Chinese to understand is Dao: the Way. So the Way to the Beauty-Goodness-Truth trinity represents symbolically Beauty-Goodness-Truth.
So what Beijing did – and the Collective West is completely clueless about it – was to issue an axio-epistemo-political proclamation explaining the legitimacy of their quest to restore Timeless Heavenly Universal Principles. They will be fulfilling the Mandate of Heaven – nothing less. The West won’t know what it hit them until it’s too late.
It was predictable that sooner or later the heirs of Chinese civilization would have had enough – and formally identify, mirroring Putin’s analysis, the upstart Hegemon as the premier source of chaos, inequality and war across the planet. Empire of Chaos, Lies and Plunder, in a nutshell.
To put it bluntly, in streetwise language, the hell with this Americana crap of hegemony being justified by “manifest destiny”.
So here we are. You want Hybrid War? We will return the favor.
Back to the Wolfowitz Doctrine
A former CIA advisor has issued a quite sobering report on a pebble along the rocky way: a possible endgame in Ukraine, now that even some elite-run parrots are contemplating a “way out” with minimal loss of face.
It’s never idle to remember that way back in 2000, the year Vladimir Putin was first elected as President, in the pre-9/11 world, rabid neocon Paul Wolfowitz was side by side with Zbig “Grand Chessboard” Brzezinski in a huge Ukraine-US symposium in Washington, where he unabashedly raved about provoking Russia to go to war with Ukraine, and committed to finance the destruction of Russia.
Everyone remembers the Wolfowitz doctrine – which was essentially a tawdry, pedestrian rehash of Brzezinski: to keep permanent US hegemony it was primordial to pre-empt the emergence of any potential competitor.
Now we have two nuclear-powered, tech savvy peer competitors united by a comprehensive strategic partnership.
As I finished my long walk paying due respect by the Kremlin to the heroes of 1941-1945, the feeling was inescapable that as much as Russia is a master of riddles and China is a master of paradox, their strategists are now working full time on how to return all strands of Hybrid War against the Hegemon. One thing is certain: unlike boastful Americans, they won’t outline any breakthroughs until they are already in effect.
The China-Russia relationship is elevated to ‘coordination’ of their strategic cooperation. It seems to be uncoordinated in the diplomatic sphere of late. China desperate to save the EU market and the logistical plans it had for BRI to use Ukraine’s geological positions and attributes.
The meeting in the Spring between President Xi and President Putin will have to return to ‘coordination’, in means and messaging. China has to accept Russia’s goals for the SMO. Just as Russia accepts China’s goals regarding Taiwan.
There is no substitute for Russian victory. China’s destiny is tied existentially to Russia’s success against the combined West, NATO, US, Ukies, et. al.
Larchmonter445 – I always enjoy reading your comments. A true voice of reason.
I am a real supporter of China but YouTube in your comment sounds as though it’s one of disappointment with Chinese recent attitude. I really hope the relationship between Russia and China only grows stronger. Together these two can bring the hope the world needs.
Looking forward to continuing reading your comments.
@Larchmonter: “There is no substitute for Russian victory. China’s destiny is tied existentially to Russia’s success against the combined West, NATO.”
Hence China should supply arms to Russia. The combo would scare off NATZO, which never won a war against any nation bigger than Serbia or Libya. In fact Russia alone scares NATZO. So does Iran. But a nuclear Russian-China combo (with Iran?) would cool the ardour of “the combined West” for war.
I think those Western crazies who dream of a glorious Wagnerian Gotterdammerung — the Samson Option — will become unpopular when the West realizes that MAD is no longer MAD. Assured Destruction will no longer be Mutual — it will be Samson alone who rides into the funeral pyre. Like Hitler said, when Nazi Germany — having failed to match up against the industrial, military and ideological power of Communist Russia — allowed the Red Flag to be flown over Berlin rather than setting fire to the place:
“The rotten, no-good, cowardly German people were unworthy of my genius. I should have led the Russians. They are the real Superman” — Adolf Hitler, last words.
Most people havn’t enough imagination to face reality; but a formal alliance between Russia, China and Iran would be a combo so big that even the most obtuse Westerner could foresee the consequences of attacking them.
“The Americans say they will give the Philippines wonderful weapons if we will fight China. Do they think we are stupid?” — our Filipina carer.
Not everybody is so stupid (or deliberately misled) as the Ukrainians have been. When NATZO poured all those weapons into Ukraine between 2014 and 2022, and built up all those heavy fortifications which Russia is now dismantling, I am sure that NATZO was promising that “our irresistible armed might” would come to Ukraine’s aid, Little did the Ukies know how afraid NATZO is of facing a real war between equals. Even more so, of facing a formal alliance between Russia and China — a war where NATZO, for the first time in its rotten, no-good, cowardly existence, would be outnumbered. No wonder Uncle $cam is making overtures to India as a possible counter heavyweight in the NATZO camp. As long as India remains neutral, NATZO will not start WW3 (not even a sneaky nuclear first strike) against Russia + China.
Nice. Zbigniew Brzezinski changed his tune as the years went on. By 2014 he said that Ukraine should not be allowed in NATO because that would end in a war, and in 2016 he said he wanted the US to accept a multi-polar world. He despised the neocons and blamed them for the global south turning against America. He stated in a speech and article in 2016 that China and Russia should be partners of America instead of the path America was going down by trying to enforce a unipolar world order. He still promoted America as a hegemon, but wanted Russia and China to share that power in a joint effort to make the world peaceful. But US policy makers had by then come fully under the control of neocons and ignored him.
Brzezinski is descended from a family of Polish minor aristocracy, that explains his initial hatred of Russia.
After suppressing a Polish revolt in 1794, the three powers conducted the third partition in 1795. Poland vanished from the map of Europe until 1918; Napoleon created a Grand Duchy of Warsaw from Prussian Poland in 1807, but it did not survive his defeat.
A Polish Republic was proclaimed on November 3, 1918.
Thank you for the article, which taught me so much about the ‘tawdry’ tactics of the neocons.
I doubt Zbig changed his tune. He’s idea was to corrupt and eat Soviet Union/Russia from inside, like cancer. It worked flawlessly, until young guns (neocons) stepped in with guns blazing against multiple weak opponents. Yelling threats to Russia and China.
Now, when noise waked up Bear and Dragon, his master plan is ruined. Imagine frustration of an old man, watching his lifelong dream shattered by a bunch of spoiled brats.
As far as Zbiggy is concerned, I experience only schadenfreude.
No. “Schadenfreude” is what i feel when think about Zbig. In his case it is only a mask that hides utter disappointment.
Gonzo journalism at its best. Pepe, you are a delight to read.
And how fitting it is that your post closes out my years of beginning my mornings with The Saker.
THE ONLY LEGAL PATHWAY TO WAR IS SELF DEFENCE https://iclaw.com/legality-of-war.
And the UN has a series of laws designed to ensure this.
Under these UN laws, Russia’s SMO was 100% lawful because first, its borders were becoming vulnerable due to Ukrainian ethnic cleansing of Russian speaking Ukrainians in the Donbas. Second, NATO had encroached 1000 miles over its agreed geographic limits and third, Ukraine posed a serious threat by providing a safe haven for NATO and the US warmongers to prepare to launch an attack on Russian territory.
Russia gave clear warning of its intentions to manage these issues and offered to negotiate peace.
The sociopathic US, however, chose to ignore these legal niceties and, in its lawless lust for power, chose to support the ongoing crimes against humanity (the ethnic cleansing of Russian speaking Ukrainians in the Donbas) that Ukraine had been perpetrating for the past eight years.
Thankfully, the Chinese, currently a pivot point for reason and balance in a world gone mad, are fully aware of these facts and are standing firm against the barrage of toxic hot air being breathed on them by the US Antichrist!
So we now have TWO MASSIVE PILLARS OF LOGIC AND HUMANITY – Russia and China, standing firm against the blasts sulphurous fumes now emanating from the degenerate and decaying corpse of the sociopathic West!!
Is this the basis for a HYBRID WAR or worse; a HYBRID NUCLEAR WAR?
Not if the Two Pillars (Russia and China) play their cards right and USE THE UN LEGAL FRAMEWORK to control the US Beast and its sociopathic disregard of the law.
The rules designed to ensure global safety and security exist, and now is the time to use them.
So let’s make that our mission – educate, inform and inspire both THE PILLARS and those of good faith to rely on the law to keep us safe and possibly avert a nuclear armageddon!
How can you use law to control those who are laws only unto themselves?
Law provides the State with the authority over the use of force, including deadly force. With regard to 404 the Russians have followed most precisely the Law, and continue to do so with respect to the legal requirement of proportionality and defense. Note, in the US the legal authority of the State for the use of force is severely limited by the Basic Law, even permitting the people’s right to revolution. That, alas, is now considered “quaint” and “dangerous” to even read. If the US were to return to its Basic Law it would collapse instantly into revolution…
Best! P
Excellent article, as always! We who read this have the mission to break the lies concerning Russia.
Some of us have been breaking those lies for years as the overall tale is quite old. The utterly vapid diplomacy of the West is so full of itself that’s it’s essentially blind. Somehow the Age of Plunder must be continued, but those who once did the plundering are now the ones being plundered.
Dr K… If you are so disposed I would be happy to receive an email from you, provided the moderator obliges. Still have the boat?
Best! P
add to my moniker at actionnet.net
China now realizes that Russia is defeating Ukraine and NATO. EU will bifurcate as a result. USA will implode due to its own internal dynamics. The EurAsian landmass is emerging as the new center of global power and that Russia will sit at its apex – the head of the table. Russia will dictate the new security architecture for Europe and the contiguous EurAsian landmass. China has been busy adopting western technologies for civilian and military use and just realized that Russia is technologically ahead of both the West and itself. So China’s recent flurry of diplomacy is to ensure its economic interests are safeguarded and to insert itself into the dialogue for the new world order dominated by EurAsian Community and led by Russia.
Dominate this, dictate that, top of the table, boss of the world: this is US thinking, and USUKisrael thinking. Both China and Russia are above that; they are hoping for mutual agreement and benefit for all their partners, even Europe and Japan if they can behave.
The next act of our ongoing drama will occur in India, the G-20 Foreign Ministers Meeting on 1-2 March. The Global Times article discussing it reflects the change in rhetoric Pepe discusses, “The US, West’s escalating tussle with Russia casts shadow on upcoming G20 foreign ministers meeting”:
Pepe alludes to Medvedev’s op/ed in Izvestia I translated and posted here that needs to be read just as much as Putin’s 21 Feb speech, and also most certainly Putin’s 30 September 2022 speech. And then of course there’s the 4 February 2022 China/Russia Joint Declaration. Those four combined with China’s four most recent policy announcements that began with Wang Yi’s Munich speech are mandatory for understanding what’s happening in the Big Picture.
I’ve yet to coalesce my thoughts into one main bit as Pepe’s done here; for now they exist as recent commentary on my VK wall, which Pepe has read and knows. I wrote the following a week ago:
“The key to making the GSI a reality is the elimination of hegemony, which makes the GSI an adversary of the Outlaw US Empire and its vassals who remain the planet’s only hegemons. So, expect its acceptance to be along those lines as 80 nations already are in favor.
“I’ve commented elsewhere that there’re no differences between the two partners on this as they both know the Outlaw US Empire will never willingly submit to the principle of invisible security that its broken so many times already. What we have is a different version of good cop/bad cop on the international stage with China the former and Russia the latter. Recall Russia’s offer of December 2021 was completely premised on the indivisible security principle that was previously embodied in three OSCE Treaties and is part of the UN Charter’s basis which both Russia and China have pledged to defend and started an organization aimed at doing just that. So, Good Cop China draws RoW to the GSI–80 nations already–while Russia attrits the Outlaw US Empire and its vassals’s ability to exert hegemony. Notice how the Empire hasn’t tried to ridicule Russia over its organizing the Friends of the UN Charter bloc.
“Drawing the nations together in a clear bloc based on the GSI against the Empire and its vassals is required to accomplish political and economic changes to the international order in order to make the GSI functional. What is fundamental to making the principle work is no hegemony can be allowed within the system. If hegemony still exists, then it must be kept outside and contained in its own bloc until the bloc dissolves from its own contradictions.
“The above scenario is what I see being put into motion. Remember, there’s a massive geoeconomic part to the equation that’s partly governed by geography–the two oceans still work as they always have–insulating buffers. There’s also a massive financial component which will serve as a weapon to force the Empire to retreat that comes from implementing the GSI. I don’t recall when I first called our circumstances a Hybrid Third World War, but that’s what it is and those playing the Long Game have command.”
Well, it’s the end of an era.
I guess this is my last post to the Saker blog.
Thanks to Pepe for his almost mystic invocation of . . . what comes next.
It seems to be a fitting exit speech for the Vineyard of the Saker blog.
The timing seems sadly right for the lights to dim and the curtain to fall on this particular stage.
.
It will be unipolar, or it will be no more!
@ Pepe
Obrigado, Pepe, as always.
Glad you got Dobrinin’s accretion to Putin’s civilizational concept, a cornerstone in the new vision of Russia as an axis of the multipolar world.
I thank you for expanding on your former article, as requested, your take on China’s Mandate of Heaven vis-à-vis the Hegemon and its Perils, is superb.
Underlying China’s position before the US, is Mao’s definition of the Empire as a “paper tiger,” always floating somewhere in China’s military thought. Korea’s experience, fighting the US as an underdog, forcing it to a draw, was a military achievement that for the Chinese, proved Mao’s maxim.
Putin’s civilizational concept grasps Russia’s thousand years plus in a nutshell. He’s saying “we Russians are a unique culture, and we want to preserve it as it is, we inherited it from our forefathers, we just want to pass it on to our children, and whoever threatens that, will suffer the same fate of others that came before them.”
There are no claims of superiority in Putin’s statement, there is, however, an appeal to preserve a unique civilization and culture.
The civilizational framework can, by extension, be applied to China, another unique civilization. The fact Russia and China are at the forefront confronting the Hegemon is not coincidental, there is also a Mandate of Heaven in their geopolitical positions.
China will help Russia, by all means, if worse comes to worse. If NATO intervenes in Ukraine, their next step in their “Russia has to be defeated” narrative, China, North Korea, and other countries might join the frey. China’s foreign policy is not going to be decided by the US, Chinese Zakharova Mao Ning told the rabid US pack.
https://t.me/kedmi/34619
“China will not tolerate US threats over allegations of providing military assistance to Russia.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry said that Washington “does not have the slightest right to attack Chinese-Russian relations.”
“The actions of the United States lead to endless wars and conflicts, this is very hypocritical. We urge the States to think, proceed from the interests of all countries, and promote negotiations, ”Mao Ning said at a briefing.”
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There you go.
Hybrid War in steroids.
On another note, we can trust, however, this will be a better year than last one.
According to Russian Buddhist monks, the year of the Black Water Rabbit will be much better for Russia.
Inshallah.
https://ria.ru/20230225/buddiyskie-1853713248.html
“It will be the other way around.” What Buddhist monks prophesy to Russia
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Muito obrigado for the follow up, very much appreciate the “cherry-picking” on my comments to your last article.
I’ll see you at “The Craddle,” PressTV, or somewhere else.
Enjoy the “21st century capital of the multipolar world.”
Look forward to the Valdai reports.
Lone Wolf
In honor of the greatest blog in the world, some clips of the greatest electric guitar player who ever lived…
https://youtu.be/avcyYNbs2VA
λάθε βιώσας!
Excellent article. Was a pleasure reading this blog with its reporters and international community of commenters.
Some videos for today.
Colonel Douglas Macgregor states that now over 2,500 Polish mercs have died:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/qU2dpVO314j4/
Two minutes of US Neocons threatening to blow up the Nord Stream pipelines (for anyone who still has any doubts over who was responsible for these terrorist attacks):
https://www.bitchute.com/video/RMxr1H0ciIN2/
RT follows ‘Grad’ rocket launcher crews on the frontline:
https://odysee.com/@RT:fd/Zhdanov_Grad_2702:4
Russian marines fighting the enemy near Ugledar (on the southern DPR front lines):
https://www.bitchute.com/video/eNVk3BPritIy/
Russian forces assaulting enemy trench near Kremennaya (on the northern LPR front):
https://www.bitchute.com/video/BOo834ZzfE0k/
Russian D-30 howitzer in action:
https://rutube.ru/video/1167ebd074014203e128a756ab790d41/
Russian T-90 tank in action:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/UAigyvNdikfF/
Kiev regime Grad launcher blows itself up:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/CtwNCwgw3mti/
50,000 Germans protest against Washington’s anti-Russia proxy war:
https://odysee.com/@RT:fd/BERLIN:23
@ Nate
Thanks, Nate.
I’ll miss your selection.
Lone Wolf
Me too.
I was just getting started at being addicted to it.
I hate that this venue is going away. It’s tragic that one of the major bricks in the new honest media is about to be lost. I have a terrible feeling in my gut about all this. We will one and all feel great regret when the deed and The Vineyard is done. Pretty awful.
Yes, it’s sad, but the original purpose was to stop or slow the war. It may have succeeded in some degree, but the war is now a bald fact…thoroughly established and expanding…they say Russia plans for a 30 month war, which could become 60 months quite easily, or more. Hence it seems to me that Saker’s freezing of blog ought to be thought of as a “commencement”…the ending of one phase and the beginning of another – the character of which is yet to be known… So? So tomorrow will come and we shall act according to our character and our perceptions. The development of accurate perceptions is, I suspect, the best foundational effect of the blog over its lifetime.
Best! P
@ Mr P on February 28, 2023 · at 6:12 am EST/EDT
Yes, it’s sad, but the original purpose was to stop or slow the war. It may have succeeded in some degree, but the war is now a bald fact…thoroughly established and expanding…they say Russia plans for a 30 month war, which could become 60 months quite easily, or more. Hence it seems to me that Saker’s freezing of blog ought to be thought of as a “commencement”…the ending of one phase and the beginning of another – the character of which is yet to be known… So? So tomorrow will come and we shall act according to our character and our perceptions. The development of accurate perceptions is, I suspect, the best foundational effect of the blog over its lifetime
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Spot on, with a few exceptions.
I disagree the goal of the Saker’s blog was to stop or slow the war. As essential as the blog became in the geopolitical arena, the Saker doesn’t have the power to start, stop, or slow a war, any war.
As he stated when he announced the closing of the blog, his role was to warn the Collective West’s ruling elites they were sowing the seeds of a war.
This war. The current war.
The Saker, Martyanov, et al, saw it coming long ago, and they have been hammering at the futility of such a war.
Needless to say, they were never heard.
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“…So? So tomorrow will come and we shall act according to our character and our perceptions. The development of accurate perceptions is, I suspect, the best foundational effect of the blog over its lifetime”
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I fully agree with that statement.
Many posters saw the blog as a substitute or replacement for their own thought process.
That was very much in evidence with some of the many questions the Saker had to put up with. Obviously, they started looking at the blog as a magister dixit, and at the Saker as a sort of “guru.”
Now they are on their own, and if the blog helped them in the “development of accurate perceptions,” the blog -and the Saker, have fulfilled their task.
As one of my teachers used to say, “cemeteries are full of irreplaceable people.” He repeated that frequently, so we, the students, wouldn’t develop a personality cult, or attachments of any sort.
I believe closing the blog is a smart move for the Saker, his health (physical, mental, spiritual), and his family’s future.
There is a time to speak, and a time to be silent.
Like Prophet Isa (A.S., aka Jesus), who withdrew to the desert for solitude, meditation, and recharge, years of being under attack from an enemy that knows no bounds, causes wears and tears to the spirit.
I truly support his decision, in fact, I believe it is a very smart move. The Saker, as usual, is seeing ahead, way ahead, as Allah (SWT) gifted him with that virtue.
All our lives are in the balance as I write, in the hands of hatemongers, warmongers, human detritus with no qualms about killing millions to preserve their “garden.”
We all need to prepare for what is coming, and for that, we need to have a life.
All the Saker has done is to take his life back, in preparation for what is coming, which is…..
May Allah (SWT) bless the Saker, his family, and his future.
May he walk in balance.
And Allah (SWT) knows best…
Lone Wolf
PS: I owe an apology to the Saker, for during the times his articles were posted at UNZ Review, I labeled him a “doomsday” guy a couple of times, for the frequency with which he brought the war issue to the fore. Also, I stayed away from his blog, for that, and other reasons. Eventually I made it here on the best timing, as the confluence of history was settling down in Ukraine. Glad I did. I have also been benefited with the “development of accurate perceptions.” And for that, I am grateful.
Peace on u mr Escobar and (and shout out to) Larry Romanoff (yes God exists) and all the other writers that blazed a trail: (right here in Sakerville- I inadvertently became a small part of)
One …Bigggg…. Hhhhhuuuggggg . . .
Thank you!
Audience keeps up applause and whistles noises howlers
(indefinitely….
Long time reader, and very sad to see the saker closing. Initial attractor was the great Pepe , since then over the years have really appreciated the wide range of writers, angles and commenters. Avanti!!
I’d like to recommend to my friends in these comments a little known 20th century Japanese thinker, Hisamatsu Shin’ichi. He was a master of both traditional Buddhist thought and of modern western philosophy, a member of the great Kyoto School.
Hisamatsu was a prophetic thinker who understood the needs of our age far better than most. He saw the turning of the Modern Age (characterised by the proliferation of Reason and the scientific method, which disrupted the religious and theological traditions of the Middle Ages) into the Postmodern Age, which has already arrived and which will culminate in the reconciliation of the religious principle of the Middle Ages and the scientfic principle of the Modern Age, the union of the One (wholeness, unity) and the Many (diversity, individuality).
Quote:
“Then Hisamatsu speaks of Postmodernist philosophy, a philosophy that is one with and inseparable from religion. It is the kind of philosophy that contains manyness in oneness, a manyness based on oneness. In the Middle Ages there was false oneness, for it excluded manyness. In the Modern Age there is manyness alone, without oneness. According to Postmodernist philosophy, Hisamatsu says, oneness contains manyness in it, and manyness has oneness as its basis; that is the kind of philosophy which did not exist either in the Middle Ages or in modern times. Thus, in the Postmodernist age, oneness comes first — transcendental oneness. This oneness contains manyness, and manyness is the functioning of oneness. Besides, this manyness is not just manyness; it has oneness as its basis. That is how the Postmodernist age differs from both the Middle Ages and the Modern Age. It covers the defects of both ages. Hisamatsu says that is what the Postmodernist age is, and that is why it is inevitable.”
(Source: http://www.fas.x0.com/writings/fasj/fj97postmoderne.html)
As you can see, Hisamatsu’s conception of Postmodernity is much more positive and less nihilistic than that pioneered in French and American universities (e.g. the Deconstructionism of Derrida, which is useful for critiquing ideologies but not for building up anything positive). Hisamatsu’s concept of the True Man, both Buddhistic and Humanistic, parallels Heidegger’s notion of Dasein which Dugin sees as a human-existential foundation for a multipolar world. Please read the above-quoted source for a wider exposition of Hisamatsu’s philosophy, and you may find like articles here:
http://www.fas.x0.com/articlee.html
You will find that Hisamatsu has anticipated notions of ‘multipolarity’ much sooner than others.
Finally, here is Hisamatsu’s “Vow of Humankind”, an oath which I believe all “people of good will” (as the Angels of the Nativity have said) should be able to make in good conscience . . .
“The Vow of Humankind”
Calm and composed,
Awakening to our true Self,
Being fully compassionate humans,
Making full use of our abilities,
According to our respective vocations,
Discerning suffering both individual and social,
and its sources.
Recognizing the right direction
In which history should proceed,
Joining hands as kin beyond the differences
Of race, nation, and class.
With compassion, vowing to bring to realization
Humankind’s deep desire for emancipation,
Let us construct a world that is true and happy.
“Putin’s ability to size up our extremely delicate geopolitical moment – via a dose of highly concentrated, undiluted realism – is something to behold. And then Foreign Minister Lavrov provided the sweet cherry on top, calling the hapless US ambassador for a hardcore dress down: oh yeah, this is war, hybrid and otherwise, and your NATO mercenaries as well as your junk hardware are legitimate targets.”
From
Pepe Escobar
/the-stage-is-set-for-hybrid-world-war-iii/
Larry Anderson said he heard that directly in the Putin speech, about hitting American facilitators and combatants in Ukraine. So it’s good that Lavrov really did add the cherry on top. No one could claim they were too stupid to get it, but undoubtedly some are, and they will all plead ignorance, judging by past performance.
It’s like some journalism claims that Russia is conducting genocide in Ukraine. They have no clue what saturation bombing would look like in this day and age, or nuclear war.
As for the threat of nuclear war, and the agenda of killing Russians, there’s a clear message there that Americans could be likewise killed in a nuclear war. Their delusions of invulnerability are not challenged because of their illusions around nuclear weapons based on their stupidity about nuclear weapons.
Their reaction to any discussion of the subject is to feel threatened and accuse the educator of being threatening. Indeed it is a threat, but being threatened and feeling threatened by an existential threat is a rational reaction. Living in, of and by fear is not rationality.
As for Putin, he is the best leader the west has, as Paul Craig Roberts has said, so naturally they feel threatened. Roberts may have changed his opinion in some ways, and naturally he thinks Putin is making some mistakes, as being too rational to be an effective political and military leader but Putin gets nuclear weapons, and he learned the lessons of the Cold War.
“Our nuclear weapons doctrine does not provide for a pre-emptive strike…. there is no provision for a pre-emptive strike in our nuclear weapons doctrine. Our concept is based on a reciprocal counter strike. We are prepared and will use nuclear weapons only when we know for certain that some potential aggressor is attacking Russia…Only when we know for certain – and this takes a few seconds to understand – that Russia is being attacked we will deliver a counter strike. This would be a reciprocal counter strike. Why do I say ‘counter’? Because we will counter missiles flying towards us by sending a missile in the direction of an aggressor. Of course, this amounts to a global catastrophe but I would like to repeat that we cannot be the initiators of such a catastrophe… any aggressor should know that retaliation is inevitable and they will be annihilated. And we as the victims of an aggression, we as martyrs would go to paradise while they will simply perish because they won’t even have time to repent their sins.”
Vladimir Putin
Wikiquote
But who can learn from rationality?
Proverbs 26:3 (KJV)
A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool’s back.
PCR might be right.
Putin Went to War but Refuses to Fight
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2023/02/27/putin-went-to-war-but-refuses-to-fight/
But I’m not so sure. Putin actually made sure the military and teachers got paid after the Yeltsin years. That didn’t restore the Russian conventional military forces to their former glory, as per Eric Margolis.
“The Red Army’s 100 divisions and 50,000 tanks so frightened Europe that the Swiss and Dutch had even continued building border forts against Soviet attack until the mid 1980’s.”
https://ericmargolis.com/2011/12/the-man-who-prevented-world-war-iii/
What Putin’s strategy was was to give him a cadre of veteran soldiers from his initial very small SMO force and to demilitarize, denazify and degrade Ukrainian forces for a negotiated agreement in the process and ASAP, in my opinion.
The western strategy was to mischaracterize, insult, slander and degrade Putin and his administration so much so in the NATO alliance public eye, that negotiation would be impossible, and NATO unity would be made sacrosanct and undefinable.
They say that the Russian public space is censorship, propaganda and information control, but the joke is on us. We in the west make Goebbels look like a Gerbil.
Sorry, that was Larry Johnson, not Larry Anderson who said that he heard that directly in the Putin speech, about hitting American facilitators and combatants in Ukraine.