By Pepe Escobar and first posted at Asia Times
Moscow is painfully aware that the US/NATO “strategy” of containment of Russia is already reaching fever pitch. Again.
This past Wednesday, at a very important meeting with the Federal Security Service board, President Putin laid it all out in stark terms:
We are up against the so-called policy of containing Russia. This is not about competition, which is a natural thing for international relations. This is about a consistent and quite aggressive policy aimed at disrupting our development, slowing it down, creating problems along the outer perimeter, triggering domestic instability, undermining the values that unite Russian society, and ultimately to weaken Russia and put it under external control, just the way we are witnessing it transpire in some countries in the post-Soviet space.
Not without a touch of wickedness, Putin added this was no exaggeration: “In fact, you don’t need to be convinced of this as you yourselves know it perfectly well, perhaps even better than anybody else.”
The Kremlin is very much aware “containment” of Russia focuses on its perimeter: Ukraine, Georgia and Central Asia. And the ultimate target remains regime change.
Putin’s remarks may also be interpreted as an indirect answer to a section of President Biden’s speech at the Munich Security Conference.
According to Biden’s scriptwriters,
Putin seeks to weaken the European project and the NATO alliance because it is much easier for the Kremlin to intimidate individual countries than to negotiate with the united transatlantic community … The Russian authorities want others to think that our system is just as corrupt or even more corrupt.
A clumsy, direct personal attack against the head of state of a major nuclear power does not exactly qualify as sophisticated diplomacy. At least it glaringly shows how trust between Washington and Moscow is now reduced to less than zero. As much as Biden’s Deep State handlers refuse to see Putin as a worthy negotiating partner, the Kremlin and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have already dismissed Washington as “non-agreement capable.”
Once again, this is all about sovereignty. The “unfriendly attitude towards Russia,” as Putin defined it, extends to “other independent, sovereign centers of global development.” Read it as mainly China and Iran. All these three sovereign states happen to be categorized as top “threats” by the US National Security Strategy.
Yet Russia is the real nightmare for the Exceptionalists: Orthodox Christian, thus appealing to swaths of the West; consolidated as major Eurasian power; a military, hypersonic superpower; and boasting unrivaled diplomatic skills, appreciated all across the Global South.
In contrast, there’s not much left for the deep state except endlessly demonizing both Russia and China to justify a Western military build-up, the “logic” inbuilt in a new strategic concept named NATO 2030: United for a New Era.
The experts behind the concept hailed it as an “implicit” response to French President Emmanuel Macron’s declaring NATO “brain dead.”
Well, at least the concept proves Macron was right.
Those barbarians from the East
Crucial questions about sovereignty and Russian identity have been a recurrent theme in Moscow these past few weeks. And that brings us to February 17, when Putin met with Duma political leaders, from the Liberal Democratic Party’s Vladimir Zhirinovsky – enjoying a new popularity surge – to United Russia’s Sergei Mironov, as well as State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin.
Putin stressed the “multi-ethnic and multi-religious” character of Russia, now in “a different environment that is free of ideology”:
It is important for all ethnic groups, even the smallest ones, to know that this is their Motherland with no other for them, that they are protected here and are prepared to lay down their lives in order to protect this country. This is in the interests of us all, regardless of ethnicity, including the Russian people.
Yet Putin’s most extraordinary remark had to do with ancient Russian history:
Barbarians came from the East and destroyed the Christian Orthodox empire. But before the barbarians from the East, as you well know, the crusaders came from the West and weakened this Orthodox Christian empire, and only then were the last blows dealt, and it was conquered. This is what happened … We must remember these historical events and never forget them.
Well, this could be enough material to generate a 1,000-page treatise. Instead, let’s try, at least, to – concisely – unpack it.
The Great Eurasian Steppe – one of the largest geographical formations on the planet – stretches from the lower Danube all the way to the Yellow River. The running joke across Eurasia is that “Keep Walking” can be performed back to back. For most of recorded history this has been Nomad Central: tribe upon tribe raiding at the margins, or sometimes at the hubs of the heartland: China, Iran, the Mediterranean.
The Scythians (see, for instance, the magisterial The Scythians: Nomad Warriors of the Steppe, by Barry Cunliffe) arrived at the Pontic steppe from beyond the Volga. After the Scythians, it was the turn of the Sarmatians to show up in South Russia.
From the 4th century onward, nomad Eurasia was a vortex of marauding tribes, featuring, among others, the Huns in the 4th and 5th centuries, the Khazars in the 7th century, the Kumans in the 11th century, all the way to the Mongol avalanche in the 13th century.
The plot line always pitted nomads against peasants. Nomads ruled – and exacted tribute. G Vernadsky, in his invaluable Ancient Russia, shows how “the Scythian Empire may be described sociologically as a domination of the nomadic horde over neighboring tribes of agriculturists.”
As part of my multi-pronged research on nomad empires for a future volume, I call them Badass Barbarians on Horseback. The stars of the show include, in Europe, in chronological order, Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Huns, Khazars, Hungarians, Peshenegs, Seljuks, Mongols and their Tatar descendants; and, in Asia, Hu, Xiongnu, Hephtalites, Turks, Uighurs, Tibetans, Kirghiz, Khitan, Mongols, Turks (again), Uzbeks and Manchu.
Arguably, since the hegemonic Scythian era (the first protagonists of the Silk Road), most of the peasants in southern and central Russia were Slav. But there were major differences. The Slavs west of Kiev were under the influence of Germania and Rome. East of Kiev, they were influenced by Persian civilization.
It’s always important to remember that the Vikings were still nomads when they became rulers in Slav lands. Their civilization in fact prevailed over sedentary peasants – even as they absorbed many of their customs.
Interestingly enough, the gap between steppe nomads and agriculture in proto-Russia was not as steep as between intensive agriculture in China and the interlocked steppe economy in Mongolia.
(For an engaging Marxist interpretation of nomadism, see A N Khazanov’s Nomads and the Outside World).
The sheltering sky
What about power? For Turk and Mongol nomads, who came centuries after the Scythians, power emanated from the sky. The Khan ruled by authority of the “Eternal Sky” – as we all see when we delve into the adventures of Genghis and Kublai. By implication, as there is only one sky, the Khan would have to exert universal power. Welcome to the idea of universal empire.
In Persia, things were slightly more complex. The Persian Empire was all about Sun worship: that became the conceptual basis for the divine right of the King of Kings. The implications were immense, as the King now became sacred. This model influenced Byzantium – which, after all, was always interacting with Persia.
Christianity made the Kingdom of Heaven more important than ruling over the temporal domain. Still, the idea of Universal Empire persisted, incarnated in the concept of Pantocrator: it was the Christ who ultimately ruled, and his deputy on earth was the Emperor. But Byzantium remained a very special case: the Emperor could never be an equal to God. After all, he was human.
Putin is certainly very much aware that the Russian case is extremely complex. Russia essentially is on the margins of three civilizations. It’s part of Europe – reasons including everything from the ethnic origin of Slavs to achievements in history, music and literature.
Russia is also part of Byzantium from a religious and artistic angle (but not part of the subsequent Ottoman empire, with which it was in military competition). And Russia was influenced by Islam coming from Persia.
Then there’s the crucial influence of nomads. A serious case can be made that they have been neglected by scholars. The Mongol rule for a century and a half, of course, is part of the official historiography – but perhaps not given its due importance. And the nomads in southern and central Russia two millennia ago were never properly acknowledged.
So Putin may have hit a nerve. What he said points to the idealization of a later period of Russian history from the late 9th to early 13th century: Kievan Rus. In Russia, 19th century Romanticism and 20th century nationalism actively built an idealized national identity.
The interpretation of Kievan Rus poses tremendous problems – that’s something I eagerly discussed in St. Petersburg a few years ago. There are rare literary sources – and they concentrate mostly on the 12th century afterwards. The earlier sources are foreigners, mostly Persians and Arabs.
Russian conversion to Christianity and its concomitant superb architecture have been interpreted as evidence of a high cultural standard. In a nutshell, scholars ended up using Western Europe as the model for the reconstruction of Kievan Rus civilization.
It was never so simple. A good example is the discrepancy between Novgorod and Kiev. Novgorod was closer to the Baltic than the Black Sea, and had closer interaction with Scandinavia and the Hanseatic towns. Compare it with Kiev, which was closer to steppe nomads and Byzantium – not to mention Islam.
Kievan Rus was a fascinating crossover. Nomadic tribal traditions – on administration, taxes, the justice system – were prevalent. But on religion, they imitated Byzantium. It’s also relevant that until the end of the 12th century, assorted steppe nomads were a constant “threat” to southeast Kievan Rus.
So as much as Byzantium – and, later on, even the Ottoman Empire – supplied models for Russian institutions, the fact is the nomads, starting with the Scythians, influenced the economy, the social system and most of all, the military approach.
Watch the Khan
Sima Qian, the master Chinese historian, has shown how the Khan had two “kings,” who each had two generals, and thus in succession, all the way to commanders of a hundred, a thousand and ten thousand men. This is essentially the same system used for a millennia and a half by nomads, from the Scythians to the Mongols, all the way to Tamerlane’s army at the end of the 14th century.
The Mongol invasions – 1221 and then 1239-1243 – were indeed the major game-changer. As master analyst Sergei Karaganov told me in his office in late 2018, they influenced Russian society for centuries afterwards.
For over 200 years Russian princes had to visit the Mongol headquarters in the Volga to pay tribute. One scholarly strand has qualified it as “barbarization”; that seems to be Putin’s view. According to that strand, the incorporation of Mongol values may have “reversed” Russian society to what it was before the first drive to adopt Christianity.
The inescapable conclusion is that when Muscovy emerged in the late 15th century as the dominant power in Russia, it was essentially the successor of the Mongols.
And because of that the peasantry – the sedentary population – were not touched by “civilization” (time to re-read Tolstoy?). Nomad Power and values, as strong as they were, survived Mongol rule for centuries.
Well, if a moral can be derived from our short parable, it’s not exactly a good idea for “civilized” NATO to pick a fight with the – lateral – heirs of the Great Khan.
“…the Communist Party’s Vladimir Zhirinovsky…”
Huh what? Zhirinovskii is from the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR).
I think this in the article is incorrect: “when Putin met with Duma political leaders, from the Communist Party’s Vladimir Zhirinovsky – enjoying a new popularity surge …”
Isn’t the leader of the communist party Gennady Zyuganov?
Yes, Zyuganov is the leader of the Communist Party of Russia.
tranquilos mis amores 😃
I’ve asked Pepe for a correction.
Yes he is. And he is probably the only legitimate opposition to Putin and the United Russia centre-right party.
By Novgorod, does Pepe mean Velikii Novgorod or Nizhnii Novgorod? Just wondering.
There is nothing shameful about being influenced by the Mongol Khanates. Revisionist historians now consider Chinggis Khaan to be one of the greatest modernisers in history. The Mongols may have been nomadic warriors, but they were hardly “barbarians”. For instance, their conquests relied on Chinese engineers, they opened up trade routes and communications, and they were religiously completely tolerant.
Velikiy Novgorod
A Rússia é como o rio Negro e Solimões. A junção do Ocidente com o Oriente.
Machine translation: Russia is like the Black River and Solimons. The junction of the West with the East.
https://youtu.be/FRO4rPbm4L0
If you wonder about what the Brazilian is talking about….
A great little essay from Pepe Escobar – I love where he’s going with these refresher courses in history, and this one is the best so far, in my view.
I also love what Putin said, that modern Russia is a place without ideology – and this is the real new thing in the world, that all the people of greater Russia can live together simply in a civilization that includes them all without bias.
The future belongs to those who wish to invest in it. Living in the US, while I despair of the future here, I am overjoyed that the world itself has a future now, and that the thieves won’t win, not in the end, not in the great world.
Your’s is an excellent, hopeful comment, thanks, we needed that.
Apart from the obvious error regarding Vladimir Zhirinosvky’s party affiliation, there is another line that is bound to raise many eyebrows: “he is enjoying a new popularity surge”. This is absolutely untrue. I’m wondering where the author has gotten this information. If the source is the notorious “Levada Center”, I wouldn’t recommend relying on their data. For one, “The Levada Center is a Russian independent, nongovernmental polling and sociological research organization recognized as a foreign agent under the 2012 Russian foreign agent law” (Wikipedia) and their finding should be taken with a grain of salt.
Marina Braun
The Levada Center, financed by the West, would hardly back Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who fought all his political life against Russian liberals. Some commentators have called Zhirinovsky a “clown”. He is nothing of the sort. Yes, he can be eccentric, but listen to his speeches. You have a very intelligent and highly educated man. I don’t know if his popularity is on the rise. However, it is highly unlikely that it can ever drastically drop.
“From the 4th century onward, nomad Eurasia was a vortex of marauding tribes, featuring, among others, the Huns in the 4th and 5th centuries, the Khazars in the 7th century, the Kumans in the 11th century, all the way to the Mongol avalanche in the 13th century.”
Of all these groups, the Khazars are the only ones who are still around, as they were the ancestors of the modern-day Ashkenazim. People forget that the Zionists who staged the 2014 coup in the Ukraine, Victoria Nuland, her husband Robert Kagan and company, had an axe to grind with Russia that goes way back to when Sviatoslav I destroyed the Jewish Khazar city of Sarkel in 965. The Ashkenazim have been anti-Russian ever since, and they don’t call us the Anglo-Zionist Empire for nothing. Once again they are solidly in control of the Biden administration just as Likud and the Kosher Nostra controlled Trump. The ReTrumplicans on this site always seem to forget that little detail.
The Khazars are not the truly Jewish. They are the Turks who adopted the Jewish religion. Their relatives are The Azers, from Azerbaijan, Iran, Afghanistan etc..
Yes, the Khazars were converts to Judaism and are not related to the original Israelites. But that didn’t stop them from thinking of themselves as the “chosen ones” who were destined by God to dominate the nations of the world, in particular the USA. That’s why Uncle Shmuel, as the Saker likes to call him, has always been a dual-citizen.
Remember what Benjamin Netanyahu said back in 1990, over a decade before Israel attacked us on 9/11: “… America is a golden calf and we will suck it dry, chop it up, and sell it off piece by piece until there is nothing left but the world’s biggest welfare state that we will create and control. Why? Because it is the will of God and America is big enough to take the hit so we can do it again and again and again. This is what we do to countries that we hate. We destroy them very slowly and make them suffer for refusing to be our slaves.”
Quoting your line ”the Khazars are the only ones who are still around, as they were the ancestors of the modern-day Ashkenazim. ” – May I ask you who are the descendants then of the sephardic and mizrahi!? Thank you!! =)
very nice points Tommy.
Also, could you explain please the difference between Likuds, Ashkenazi and Zionists ? As far as I know Likuds are the ones that are based in Israel itself but Israel was formed only in 1947 so they must have come from somewhere and probably are the same Ashkenazi(?). Who are zionists then? thank you!
“Moscow is painfully aware that the US/NATO “strategy” of containment of Russia is already reaching fever pitch”. That is correct. The globalists are losing their nerve. Their plans for separating Russia and China from each other have failed, as well as their plans of breaking up both countries, which are on the rise, politically and economically.
In 1904 he English geographer Halford Mackinder presented his ‘Heartland Theory”, where he pointed to the importance of Euro-Asia, ie. the land mass occupied by Russia and China. He warned that those who controlled this land mass will become the prime political and economic force in the world. The neocons in the West cannot forget this, and the reason NATO’s containment of Russia has reached fever peach is because the neocons are painfully aware that the current Western financial system, based on fiat currencies, cannot last for ever, with the dollar and euro printed backed by nothing. As the late political economist Lyndon LaRouche stated, the only thing which can save the US dollar is the breakup and plunder of Siberia and the Caspian region of Russia.
The appointment of of neocon puppet Joe Biden to the White House was meant to solidify neocon plans vis a vis Russia and China, although it is a mystery to me what the neocons hope to achieve with their aggressive policies, as both countries are too strong to be defeated militarily, nor can they be broken economically and financially. Biden’s tenure as ‘President’ is going to be very interesting, not because of what he intends to do – a sick old man like him cannot do much – but by what the neocons tell him to do.
Leo; Would it be a matter of the Neo-cons and their kind being both psychopathic and sociopathic? Which means they don’t have the capacity to reconsider their fundamental position, make changes and alter their approach. I am informed that psychopaths have only one possible response to resistance. That being to “double down.” Well if conflict can serve to raise consciousness it would seem we are in for some very interesting consciousness raising this year.
Snow Leopard
Yes, one can say that neocons are both psychopathic and sociopathic. When it comes to their foreign policy, you can compare them to a drunk who constantly wants his favorite booze. They are incapable of anything novel, still living in the past and unable to realize that times are changing. This is what makes the situation dangerous, the neocons thinking they are more powerful than they are. They might do something very foolish, like launching a sneak attack against Russia and thinking they can win with minimal loses.
“it is a mystery to me what the neocons hope to achieve with their aggressive policies, as both countries are too strong to be defeated militarily” The US/NATO is well aware of that. The US would never face by itself China or Russia and no way bot of them. But then there comes the “useful idiots” which role is to weaken Russia and China. It was supposed that Turkey should axe this role (against Russia) when the downing of the Russian jet in Syria bat then Erdogan backed down. There are still many more (idiots) ie. the Poles, Rumenians, Scandinavians? Georgians, and the Ukies, it remains to be seen how far these countries would go in order to please their master. Regarding China, India is the first that comes to my mind, then maybe Vietnam. I dont think Japan would dare but then who knows?
Oscar
Using proxy fighters is an old trick. However, times change and in this new high tech era “useful idiots” cannot do much. Look at Ukraine, which is facing a catastrophe, the price it is paying for that coup d’etat in 2014. As for Erdogan, he had nothing to do with that Russian light bomber being shot down in Syria. This was done behind his back. The Turkish pilot was of Albanian origin, and he was imprisoned. I don’t see Turkey, the former imperial power, fighting to save the US Empire.
Romania ? It cannot forget what happened to it’s troops at Stalingrad in 1943.
Scandinavians ? What can little Denmark do, especially now that it has said ‘no’ to Washington and consented to the building of the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline.
Multicultural Sweden ? Commentators are speculating if it will exist two generations from now.
Norway ? The Norwegians are not so obsessed with American culture as are Swedes, and I don’t see them squandering their huge Oil Fund to save the US Empire. Yes, they are showing some anti-Russian rhetoric, but only because they are members of NATO and have a border with Russia, which the US hopes to use when the time arrives.
Poland ? Unfortunately you can expect something very foolish from the Poles, who were always Catholics first and Poles second, which is the reason for their hatred of Russia, even though both Russians and Poles are Slavs. A few years ago the Poles offered to build, at their own expense, a military base to be used by the US. They even proposed that it be called “Fort Trump”. They have a talent of making enemies of both Russians and Germans. However, they and the Balts are probably the exception.
Leo: “What can little Denmark do, especially now that it has said ‘no’ to Washington and consented to the building of the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline”
Iceland & Greenland are still Danish possessions, see the GIUK Gap: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f7/GIUK_gap.png/800px-GIUK_gap.png
… and
“Norway ? The Norwegians are not so obsessed with American culture as are Swedes, and I don’t see them squandering their huge Oil Fund …”
The Norwegians will do what theyre instructed to do if they want their gold back from the vaults of the Bank of England
You’re correct re: RC Poland will do what The Vatican instructs it to do – the Vatican is as much a s geopolitical player as Chatham House or the City of London, aka The City – the 1 sq. mile of bankster HQs
Tyson B: Allow me one correction first:
The present chief of the Norwegian Central Bank several years ago sold off the entire gold storage of that “national bank”.
The former Labour party chief old Thorvald Stoltenberg was a snitch and a traitor who reported on his fellow Labour Youth members to the local US embassy if he suspected them of harbouring leftist or Soviet sympathies, thus ensuring stop-up of careers and no admition to North America, He became Minister of Foreign Affairs. His son sported an anti-NATO stance when chsirmsn of the Labour Youth moement — but became prime minister end is now the main eunuqe leading the NATO harem of secretaries in Brussels.
So much for Norway being “independent-mindes”. Wanting to strengthen US economy, they have baught their fair share of F-35 and now are hosts to B1 bombers and a combany of 978 US Marines.
Iceland gained its independence in 1918. Greenland has considerable autonomy from Denmark.
I’m not well-informed on this Russia-Poland enmity but I do remember back in 2004 my penpal from “gownopolska” and I were watching Anastasia Myskina and Elena Dementieva play the Roland Garros final in Paris and we both fell in love with Myskina. She looked real gorgeous and my friend, not even 20 then, ended up confiding “Russians are the best.”
Further, from reading Douglas Reed’s “Controversy of Zion” we learn that jewish elites moved to Poland after having been booted out of Spain in 1492. We all know “funny” business ensues when countries come to fall under the Zionist spell.
Could it be with a few generations this conflict burns out of fuel? Would love to see players involved play their cards right, be patient when needed, and let the nasty stuff wash away with the time.
Catholics are Romance Latin peoples in Southern Europe and there is not almost any antirussian sentiment there. I am not talking about vassal governments, i am talking about people.
Catholics are Latin America, half of Africa and they are much more friendly to Russia then all so-called Ortodhox brothers who regularly back-stabing Russia.
Catholics live in Asia, not many of them but there is not any antirussian feeling among them
In ex-Yugoslavia, Slovenes and Croats are Catholics, and anti-russian sentiment there is very insignificant…except maybe among some radical extremely right wing groups like those thirty five stupid idiots fighting for Azov in East Ukraine. By the way I am not sure if those imbeciles are still there …
In Eastern Europe, for example, Czech and Slovaks have probably some anti-russian sentiment, but it cannot be compared to Poles and their hatred.
I think that Polish hatred toward Russia has little to do with religion
Poles lost historical chance to become leading Slavic empire and power, Russia become great empire and Poles spent couple of centuries under russian domination
And that hurts …hurts…hurts…the is no cure for that hurt polish ego
That is the problem, not religion
Bosnian Croat
Well, there is no reason for Catholics of South America to hate Orthodox Russians, as they are on the other side of the Atlantic. This does not apply to Poles, who were used by the Vatican for anti-Russian policies. When Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812, how many Polish regiments did he have ? I believe his personal bodyguard was made up of Poles.
”There are still many more (idiots) ie. the Poles, Romanians, Scandinavians? Georgians, and the Ukies, it remains to be seen how far these countries would go in order to please their master.”
No need for the question mark regarding the Scandinavians — at least not for the journalists, the armed forces, and the politicos (of all party affiliations; there is not one single exception). Case in point: Swedish society is crumbling, both with regard to its infrastructure and to its social cohesion. I have a strong hunch that Sweden’s 1% is firmly in support of the notion that the only way to forestall a societal meltdown at home is by breaking up and plundering Russia and China. Sweden herself, however, is of course too weak and insignificant to go it alone, even if she has had a clear, distinctive tradition of Russophobia for a very long time. And, needless to say, there won’t be any spoils for Sweden from the envisaged loot unless there is solid, genuine commitment to be rewarded accordingly. After all, the more cynical and intelligent reactionaries do understand that ”Western democracy” primarily means deception accompanied by coercion (with fascism primarily being coercion accompanied by deception). Silly reactionaries, for their part, are just parroting MSM nonsense as their Holy Gospel.
As for the question how far the Swedish ’Elites’ are ready to go down this path, I believe they are, by and large, cowards. They would be very happy and grateful to see Russia and China vanquished, but would be even more happy and grateful to see other idiots sacrificing themselves in the process. Ukrainians, Poles, Balts, and what-have-you could be bribed quite effortlessly by Swedish authorities and corporations for this purpose. That would have the additional benefit of not looking too imperialist and chauvinist at home, especially in the all but certain case of a crushing defeat.
”Putin seeks to weaken the European project and the NATO alliance because it is much easier for the Kremlin to intimidate individual countries than to negotiate with the united transatlantic community … The Russian authorities want others to think that our system is just as corrupt or even more corrupt.”
In fact, the part put in bold seems to be exactly what the Pindos and the Euro-trash themselves seek to accomplish, and their attempts look pretty convincing too. As regards the question about the motives of Russia/Moscow/The Kremlin/Putin, I guess one ingredient is the refined amusement in watching your foes beset by internal squabbling, total incompetence, and ideological insanity. The ”united transatlantic community” amounts to little more than a screamfest/cacophony of reactionary soundbites with no quality whatsoever except for the impressive certified madness.
”Well, if a moral can be derived from our short parable, it’s not exactly a good idea for ’civilized’ NATO to pick a fight with the – lateral – heirs of the Great Khan.”
Quite right. Civilized NATO had better take on weak, defenceless countries and peoples before they get to be duly protected by the Sino-Russian structures in the making.
Containment of Russia is likely to result in the kinetic end to NATO and the Empire.
It is one thing to issues sanctions in hopes of harming Russian products and services, trade and finance.
So too, running Mr. Nobodies as a front man for color revolutions and spending billions to buy crowds in the streets have their use, failures as they are.
But, flying nuclear bombers, B-52s in Ukraine’s airspace and maybe trying to fly over or near the Crimean Peninsular and right up to the borders of Russia will soon lead to an event that will be catastrophic for pilots, crews, and machines.
Arrogance of Brussels and the Pentagon is clearly displayed with these operations, testing limits, scouting for weaknesses in the defenses, almost baiting the Russian military to act.
At some point, the daily missions to collect EW data, logistical info, and Russian readiness may elicit a very logical response. The intruders, interlopers, baiters just may catch a missile as a kinetic warning that enough is enough.
As for Europe, Russia is needed by Europe much more than the Europeans are needed by Russia.
In fact, Russia, China and Iran will be within a walled garden of Eurasia. There will be be doors (rail, air and ports) for products to pass through the walls, but 4.5-5 billion people will be inside the walls in no need of Europe. All their food, water, products, services and security will be Eurasian.
The project to contain Russia is as hopeless as trying to capture the wind.
Larchmonter
Yes, the project to contain (ie. breakup) Russia is as hopeless as trying to capture the wind. However, you try convincing the neocon bankers, who have been dreaming of braking up and plundering Russia since, at least, 1812, when they financed Napoleons invasion of the country. Worse for them, it’s only a matter of time before both Russia and China introduce gold backed currencies. What are the neocons going to do then, when in the US and in the EU they are using fiat currencies, not to mention all that gigantic debt they are facing.
The idea of backing currencies with gold ingots stored in bank vaults is an anachronism five hundred years out of date, when gold merchants came up with the subterfuge of issuing more gold certificates than there was gold in their vaults. That was the birth of fractional reserve lending. In other words creating money out of thin air and charging borrowers compound interest on the fake money so created. It is still going on today with the Euro and Federal Reserve Notes, that consist only of data entries on private bank computers with only 2% of money printed on paper. It is the weighted interest on all money so created that is the cause of inflation. The US dollar has lost 99% of its purchasing power since the creation of the privately owned Federal Reserve bank in 1913.
Thus the European Union and US do not have strictly fiat currencies created by edict or fiat of their governments, but are debt based such that no debts = no money. In other words if all debts were paid down by individuals, corporations and the US Treasury, there would be no money in existence. For anyone to be a $billionaire many other people must be in debt slavery to him, directly or indirectly. Doesn’t anyone wonder why the US Treasury is $26 trillion in debt to the private sector ?
By contrast China’s central bank is owned by the Chinese government and can create all the yuan needed to fund their government expenditure free of debt and interest to private banks. This is a tremendous financial advantage that has enabled their economy to expand at over 6% per year and build infrastructure at such a rapid pace.
re China. which is why a gold-backed currency can work.
Iran prints its own money too. But international sanctions for the last forty years have hindered its economic growth.
I think people here really need to be questioning why China hasn’t been under sanctions, and why its economy was “allowed” to flourish by the same outside forces that have been crushing the Iranian economy.
Anonymous
If you have been following developments, certain sanctions have been instigated against China. However, China is not Iran. Even the US economy cannot function without Chinese exports, and this includes – believe it or not – the US Military Industrial Complex, which uses Chinese components for it’s weapons systems. China solved it’s energy problems with Russian exports of oil and gas. The current Russian-Chinese partnership is a huge headache for he globalists.
US dependence on China was not an inevitable thing. It was allowed to happen. The US could have sanctioned China 40 years ago and kept all its industries domestic.
It is in fact the globalists that moved all US industries to China. It is the globalists that want a multi-polar world.
Globalists don’t want a multipolar world, it is the sovereignists that want a multipolar world.
A unipolar world is dangerous for globalists, because if the US manages to wrest itself free from their control, they are absolutely screwed, with no recourse.
But a multi-polar world where a communist east takes on the role of production, and a capitalist west that of consumption, and where the two sides are pitted against each other in a perpetual trade war entailing tariffs and sanctions, is just about as close to an ideal world domination scenario as there can be.
If either side begins to speak of freedom and independence from a “deep state”, “globalist elite”, or “banksters”, the other side will simply crush them by withholding production or consumption.
In such a scenario, the globalist elite can simply sit back and facilitate international banking transactions, and rake in cash without having to so much as work a single honest day in their whole lives and the lives of their children who are set to inherit this new world order.
The US, and every other Western country, would not have moved practically all their production to China, making themselves absolutely dependent on China, while elevating the Communist state to a world power, if they had a say in the matter.
The globalists did not appear out of nowhere yesterday. Their plans have been in motion longer than anyone here has been alive. And if they didn’t want China to become a great power, they would have cut it off from SWIFT and other means of international money transfer, long before any Western company moved its factories there, like they have done to Iran.
this is by far the smartest comment ever
Anonymous
The last thing the globalists want is a multi-polar world, as that would be against their globalist principles based on creating a world wide empire run by private banks and corporations. It’s the Russians and Chinese that want a multi-polar world, which is one of the reasons for the antagonism of the US towards them.
As for the US allowing all those industries to depart to China and India, that is a mystery which needs to be resolved. The official explanation was the profit factor. I think there is more to it than that.
The globalists underestimated China and her ability to transform herself with an assumed notion that it is to be used as a workshop only to squeeze out maximum profits and control.
I believe China was allowed to develop because, at a time, the empire believed they fully controlled Russia and by controlling Russia, combined with navy controlling all maritime choke points, they believed they also controlled China and its development. Even with Putin in power for a number of years, I believe the new reality only fully crystallized after Putin’s speech at Munich security conference and by then it was too late to change the course.
Kapricorn4
Yes, analysts are familiar with that little trick of issuing more gold certificates then there is gold. This factor will contribute to a Western financial crash. As for the 26 trillion dollar debt, the bulk of that pertains to the foreign debt. Bankers have been playing with numbers, refusing to divulge what the internal debt is. Even university professors cannot agree on it’s actual size, but it’s huge, larger than the foreign debt. As for storing gold in vaults, that practice can never go out of fashion,. As I wrote, it’s only a matter of time before Russia and China introduce gold backed currencies, and then we shall have an interesting “show” on the international scene.
The price of gold has been in a downtrend since August 2020, when it reached a high of $2,089 per troy ounce. It is now at $1,1714 per troy ounce. Gold is now just another commodity to be traded by corporations and governments that acts to a large extent as a hedge against inflation of currencies. It is not legal tender in any country. Why should the production of any particular commodity control the amount of money in circulation ? It is in fact rather similar psychologically as to when bangles, baubles and beads were use to persuade African Chiefs to sell their subjects as slaves.
Of course the private bankers have gone one step further by creating debts ex nihilo that have turned 90% of Americans into debt slaves.
Would this (hopefully figurative) “walled garden” still be considered ‘Eurasian’ if Europe is excluded from it?
Joey,
Russia is transcontinental – part in Europe and part in Asia – as is Turkey
There’s no geographic reason to call Eurasia’s western peninsula (i.e. Europe) a separate continent any more than there is to call India (also a peninsula) a continent
Russian schoolchildren are taught that there is the Eurasian continent, with three subcontinents of Europe, Arabia and India.
Both Soviets and Chinese have shot down US spy planes long ago. I wonder what has transpired after half a century that this kind of tactics are avoided at all cost by both
what makes the situation between us/nato and russia especially but also china and iran so dangerous is that the central social organizing idea that has dominated the west for the last 100 plus years is collapsing, it is bankrupt now which can be seen in the utter hollowing out of both the us and european economies to the point their respective central banks have had to resort to near zero or even below zero real interest rates because the debt load is so gigantic positive rates will cause wholesale bankruptcy and implosion within the nation states. the western ideology of socializing elites losses while forcing non elites to bear the brunt of purchasing power debasement, lost opportunities and paying for the losses incurred by the ruling elites has finished off the west leaving only a trail of human and business wreckage and bitter taste of a rigged and dirty scam masquerading as capitalism when hitlerian and mussoilini style fascism is closer to the real truth
putin surely understands he is dealing with a western elite profoundly disconnected from and contemptuous of the people they obstensibly rule yet still in thrall to their ideology clearly in terminal failure to point harsh and absurd censorship is essential or so elites believe
he must surely appreciate war is coming soon (within 5-7 years) because those running the west are now presiding over a collapsing house of cards while still in thrall to their own exceptionalism and virtue. he can see private capital is fleeing public debt and running into private assets, stock markets (look at the averages), collectibles, rural land, et al. trust and confidence in western governments by their own citizens and private capital is collapsing at an accelerating pace
putins dilemma is how to prevent a war when the opponents are delusional bordering insane! and IF it can not be prevented does he hit first to minimize the overall tragedy…. if that is even possible any longer. a real hobsons choice for a man who appears to genuinely exude patience, favors the rule of law, fair play and good manners!
Apologies if this seems off topic, but it is intended to address and expand upon the previous few very reasoned comments by taking a much wider view.
If we take the entirety of the Anglozionist scam to its logical conclusion it winds up with one private banker owning everything in “the west” and the population being reduced to two classes, either serfs or enforcers. At that point “the west” is ripe for the picking by agents of “Eurasia”. The mass of the serfs is no match for the agents of the private banker and a period of reorganisation could reasonably be anticipated. It would be logical and inevitable for Eurasia to employ it’s ability and resources to undermine “the west” and its banker king by formenting endless revolts among the serfs. History tells us that power is never absolute forever and that eventually all empires fall. (Anglozionism is arguably an imperial structure, and a common mistake inho is referring to the USA empire. More correctly the empire is one of a neoliberal/globilisation/finacialisation character) I suspect that Eurasia is well aware of this potential trajectory. The mote that blinds the western observer to it is our predeliction for thinking in terms of electoral cycles instead of epochs.
Please note that what I am presenting is a very broad outine and that it is one that is subject to an infinte number of vectors of variability that would impact timelines, changes of direction and ultimate endpoints, but I do think the general trend will be towards this outcome.
Ulltimately Eurasia will win out, because it has a system of selecting leaderships that is not dominated by greed, but by competence demonstrated by past performance.
The above posits a trajectory
”ulltimately Eurasia will win out, because it has a system of selecting leaderships that is not dominated by greed, but by competence demonstrated by past performance. ”
that is now… but there is no guarantee that another Yeltsin wont appear sponsored by the west’ bankers, of course and the same non guarantee for china. how do voters with no power up against Bernays’ well funded machinations called ”public relations” get out from under this crushing ideology?
just as an example… Bill Gates is obviously a eugenicist, openly talking about reduction of the population but he still commands apparent respect from like minded people in the media. so where are the lawsuits to stop him?
oldnik, you seem to be confusing what goes on in “the west” with what IS happening in Eurasia. I agree there are no guarantees, but on the balance of probabilities it is less likely that the current Eurasian regimes will succumb to the predations of “the West” and its media whores. As evidence I submit the fate of the convicted fraudster Navalny.
“Ulltimately Eurasia will win out, because it has a system of selecting leaderships that is not dominated by greed, but by competence demonstrated by past performance.”
Where is and who are this “Eurasia” of which you speak. You see, this is what happens when you use a vague, non-objective word dreamed up by an English dystopian novelist, and never confirmed formally anywhere.
Since Eur = Europe, and Asia = the Far East, then clearly France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Austria, the Netherlands, and Spain are also “Eurasia”.
I see no evidence of them selecting leaderships as you claim. I see them as being nothing but shadows of their sister civilisation, the Oceania AngloSaxon Empire of England then USA. The entire of USA culture was borrows from Eurasian nations of the Atlantic Peninsula; they had nothing of their own after all. They took some of the Anglo culture of the English, but interacted closely with the Peninsula nations. In fact the concept of mandatory schooling away from home was a direct copy of that introduced by Germany after their shock defeat by France.
Only Russia has shown the kind of thing you are speaking – but she is the worlds only Northern Nation, and differs widely in her culture both historically and genetically.,
‘Eurasia’ might be a ‘vague non-objective word’ but it was not dreamed-up by Orwell, but by a group of Russian émigrés, in 1920. Its principal representatives were Prince Nikolai Sergeevich Trubetskoi, a scion of one of Russia’s most aristocratic families and later a renowned linguist; Petr Petrovich Suvchinskii, a cultural entrepreneur, connoisseur of music, and publisher; Petr Nikolaevich Savitskii, a young and energetic stu-dent of Russia’s leading liberal politician and scholar Petr Struve; Georgii Vasil’evich Florovskii, a Church historian and theologian; and Prince Andrei Aleksandrovich Lieven, a poet and eventually an Orthodox priest who descended from the Moscow-based Orthodox branch of the renowned Baltic German noble family. They finally were able to establish a newspaper called ”Eurasia”, in 1928 in the Parisian suburb of Clamart, with the support of an English wealthy philanthropist and theologian, Henry Norman Spalding.
Its roots are in the Late Imperial Period, in the policies of Russian eastern expansion in Siberia and Far-East.
eagle eye,
Think about what youre suggesting
Populations
US – 330 millions
Mexico – 126 millions
Canada- 36 millions
Europe – 425 millions
Australia – 25 millions
NZ- 5 millions
ie ~947 millions
Out of 7.8 billion people on the planet, the ‘collective West’ is a tiny minority of 12%
Why on earth would “a walled-off Eurasia” even bother its got a vast hinterland of resources and a huge population as a market for manufactured products?
See There are more people living inside this circle than outside of it :
HaUgmLdTz6GoYFnzjthwx0H1Iyoc3No6nbHLvB7OyEI.jpg
Oops!
try this link: There are more people living inside this circle than outside of it
https://www.reddit.com/r/blowit/comments/1t7rii/there_are_more_people_living_in_this_circle_than
My point is, each person living inside the circle – need 3 meals per day, shirts on their backs and rooves over their heads – an instant market of 3,900,000,000+ people
Tyson B, not arguing with that analysis. It only reinforces my point which is that “the wests” leadership model is not fit for purpose and will ultimately be replaced with one more focused on competence and performance.
tedrichard, I pretty much agree with your brief analysis of the present situation. However, I would estimate war coming in 5 to 7 months, rather than 5 to 7 years, but I truly hope I’m wrong.
Zoroastrians aren’t ‘sun worshippers’ (an offensive Victorian era trope). Russia is currently suppressing Mongol religion a little in order to please China, but in general it is a staunch defender of traditional culture and faith. Some eccentrics (Dorzhiev, Ungern-Sternberg, Roerich etc.) hold Russia to be a kind of holy land for Mongolian Buddhism.
Tibet is the origin and holy land of Mongolian Buddhism.
India is really the origin and holy land of Mongolian Buddhism.
Russia is also considered a sacred kingdom, not least because Buddhism is one of its traditionally protected religions. Russia’s absorption of Mongolian Buddhism is amazing; it even resulted in the Russian Tsars traditionally employing Tibetan physicians, as well as legendary scholars like Fyodor Shcherbatskoy.
https://www.buddhistdoor.net/features/the-kalmyk-temple-of-victory-survival-of-buddhism-on-the-volga
It is a bit of exaggeration that the Tsars ‘traditionally’ employed ‘Tibetan physicians’. There were actually only two known and they were Buriats trained in Tibetan medicine, the brothers Alexander and Pyotr Badmayev (Zhamsaran). The first was allowed by Tsar Alexander III to practice in St. Petersburg. Both converted to Orthodoxy. Pyotr, baptized by Alexander served as an adviser on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Asian desk and was an active promoter of Russia’s civilizing mission in Asia (including Orthodox proselytism). He was one of the first to put forward historical arguments justifying Russia’s presence in Asia. He manifested as a staunch ‘Slavophile’.
Mongolian medicine uses an expanded pharmacopoeia compared with Tibetan Medicine, but it is essentially the same. Tibetan medicine is largely derived from Indian medicine, hence ‘Mongolian Ayurveda’. The fact that even one Russian Tsar used the same kind of yogic physician as an Indian Rajah of the period is extraordinary enough, and a further example of the deeply Asiastic nature of Russian culture.
Even today Tibetologists undertaking a serious study of Tibetan medicine are obliged to learn Russian, because Russian scholars have dominated in this academic field for generations. So it is not just a matter of a couple of isolated Buryats, and also their personal religion isn’t that important.
Judaism, Islam and Buddhism are state religions alongside Orthodoxy, So one doesn’t become less Russian by converting to one of these historic Russian traditions, as numerous present day ‘Slavic’ converts to Tibetan Buddhism can attest.
Different religions simply suit different types of people, so there is no single religion for everyone any more than there is a single medicine for all ailments.
Russia is a secular state. There are not ‘state religions’. Their existence in Russia is predicated on the ‘freedom of conscience’ and ‘freedom of creed’. The Law of 1997 is specific:
‘Confirming the right of each [citizen of Russian Federation] to freedom of conscience and freedom of creed and also to equality before the law regardless of his attitudes and his convictions; basing itself on the fact that the Russian Federation is a secular state; recognizing the special contribution of Orthodoxy to the history of Russia and to the establishment and development of Russia’s spirituality and culture, respecting Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and other religions and creeds which constitute an inseparable part of the historical heritage of Russia’s people; considering it important to promote the achievement of mutual understanding, tolerance and respect in questions of freedom of conscience and freedom of creed…”
The emphasis on the ‘special contribution of Orthodoxy to the history of Russia’s spirituality and culture’ starkly contradicts the trope of ‘the deeply Asiatic nature of Russian culture’ (the tired ‘Western’ argument that ‘Muscovy’ is not the legitimate Russian state – which would be ‘Ukraine’).
Cimmerians might in fact be related to the Cimbri, Kymri, therefore coming from the West (Celto-Germanic, for a better term).
The Vikings have been invited by the Slavs to be their rulers and have been relatively quickly assimilated (after the completion of their Christianization by St. Vladimir). Russia did not ‘imitate’ Byzance on religion, but assimilated it. Prevalent institutions have been the ‘Byzantine’ ones, as the whole culture. Russia is not the ‘successor of the Mongols’, but of Byzantium. The ‘succession of the Mongols’ was actually a ‘Reconquista’.
The Vikings have been invited by the Slavs to be their rulers ………And where did you learn this … in the school of Western Atlantists or in german Miller books that have been introduced to russian kids by Tzar families?
The Vikings were defeated by the Russians through the leadership of Varjags (Ljutici, Bodrici-check the Limes Sorabicus), a tribes of Pomerian-Lab Serbs refugees that were expelled by Germanic tribes, who introduced the Russians to the Norman way of fighting. About 10,000 of them paid with their heads in Novgorod, and since then the Scandinavians have turned the direction of the ships to the west. Disappeared from Russian rivers and lands.
If you believe that Nestor the Chronicler went to the school of the ‘Atlantists’ or of the Tzar families’, so be it.
”6367 (859). The Varangians from beyond the sea imposed tribute upon the Chuds, the Slavs, the Merians, the Ves’, and the Krivichians. But the Khazars imposed it upon the Polyanians, the Severians, and the Vyatichians, and collected a white squirrel-skin from each hearth. 6368–6370 (860–862). The tributaries of the Varangians drove them back beyond the sea and, refusing them further tribute, set out to govern themselves. There was no law among them, but tribe rose against tribe. Discord thus ensued among them, and they began to war one against another. They said to themselves, “Let us seek a prince who may rule over us and judge us according to the Law.” They accordingly went overseas to the Varangian Rus’: these particular Varangians were known as Rus’, just as some are called Swedes, and others Normans, English, and Gotlanders, for they were thus named. The Chuds, the Slavs, the Krivichians, and the Ves’ then said to the people of Rus’, “Our land is great and rich, but there is no order in it. Come to rule and reign over us.” They thus selected three brothers, with their kinsfolk, who took with them all the Rus’ and migrated. The oldest, Rurik, located himself in Novgorod; the second, Sineus, at Beloozero; and the third, Truvor, in Izborsk. On account of these Varangians, the district of Novgorod became known as the land of Rus’. The present inhabitants of Novgorod are descended from the Varangian race, but aforetime they were Slavs.
After two years, Sineus and his brother Truvor died, and Rurik assumed the sole authority. He assigned cities to his followers, Polotsk to one, Rostov to another, and to another Beloozero. In these cities there are thus Varangian colonists, but the first settlers were, in Novgorod, Slavs; in Polotsk, Krivichians; at Beloozero, Ves’, in Rostov, Merians; and in Murom, Muromians. Rurik had dominion over all these districts. With Rurik there were two men who did not belong to his kin, but were boyars. They obtained permission to go to Tsargrad with their families. They thus sailed down the Dnipro, and in the course of their journey they saw a small city on a hill. Upon their inquiry as to whose town it was, they were informed that three brothers, Kyi, Shchek, and Khoriv, had once built the city, but that since their deaths, their descendants were living there as tributaries of the Khazars. Askold and Dir remained in the city, and after gathering together many Varangians, they established their dominion over the country of the Polyanians at the same time that Rurik was ruling at Novgorod”.
And Nestor’s chronicle is probably the law, there are no other sources or we catch the one that suits us best, ha? How many Miller, Schwarz translations and transcripts of the original are on the market today :))?
Please see how Nestor says about the squirrel, so compare it with the Russian language :)). Is science multidisciplinary or am I lying?
I hope you are not drowning into the mentally deranged swamp of the ‘New Chronology’ of the pseudo-historians Anatoly Fomenko, Nikolai Morozov, the ‘fantasy world’ of what an Australian researcher (of Russian extraction) called ‘Lomonosov bastards’. In this fantasy world all Russian history as we know it is based on forged documents by the Church, the Germans and the ‘German’ Romanovs, hell bent to ‘falsify the true history’ of the ”Russian Horde”, the supposed Russo-Turk ‘Empire’. Their virulent anti-Orthodoxy shows where their inspiration (along with the funding of their publication) comes from (Gary Kasparov is a strong supporter of this anti-Russian, anti-Christian psyop). It is actually a reflection ‘with Russian characteristics’ of a vast psyop aimed at erasing the history of Christianity (in the West the role of Fomenko is played by a ‘professor emeritus’ (in sociology and economics) at the University of Bremen, Gunnar Heinsohn (of course the falsifiers are there the Vatican, the Jesuits, etc).
No they are there to make “indigenous” real scientists fools. We have them in Serbia also, inserted by the Yugoslav DB service to destroy any attempt to challenge official history written by the black west. That Red International forced the people “after the victory over fascism” to learn.
I think it’s enough to check when you already mentioned the squirrel. What Nestor writes for squirrel, and how it is speel in “German-processed” Russian :)).
Now, if you want to bring in the argument of ‘speeling’, you should be careful of how you ‘speel’.
The German historians you call Miller and Schwarz were:
Mueller, Gerard Fredrick(1705-1783), spelt also Müller. (In Russia he became Фёдор Ива́нович Ми́ллер, Fyodor Ivanovich Miller),
Schlözer, August-Ludwig von (1735-1809), spelt also Schlozer.
The ‘Book of Veles/Isenbeck’s Planks (Велесова книга/Дощечки Изенбека)’ along with the ‘Hymn of Boyan’ should be put in a ‘Museum of the industry of literary and historical hoaxes – which surely would be very large), no matter that they had been included in the high school program in Ukraine (or perhaps because of that!).
For your information, it had been established with a high degree of probability by the eminent historian A.A.Vasiliev, considered the foremost authority on Byzantine history and culture and its relations to ‘Russia’ in the mid-20th century, that the Rurik of the Russian Annals was Rorik of Jutland or Friesenland (identification already proposed by German historians so you would dismiss it) a notorious ‘Norse’ personage in the last half of the 9th century, “the most powerful and influential of all the Danes drawn into the Carolingian milieu” deemed as ”Roricus barbarorum rex” in western sources.
I see you get lost, talk about everything and move topics there that I didn’t write :)). Why are you writing about Veles book Anonymous if this is not topic here? If you don’t know the real historical sources, then write down and you will get them.
…….authority on Byzantine history…there is no Byzantine, only Romeic culture:))
Because it is purported to ‘correct’ the ‘false’ history of Russia that crept into Nestor’s Chronicle. That it twisted the minds of the Pan-Slavists (including Serbians) into the ‘Rodnoverya’ which would have remained a buffoonish manifestation had not aggressively been anti-Russian and anti-Orthodox.
”In contrast, there’s not much left for the deep state except endlessly demonizing both Russia and China to justify a Western military build-up, the ’logic’ inbuilt in a new strategic concept named NATO 2030: United for a New Era.
The experts behind the concept hailed it as an ’implicit’ response to French President Emmanuel Macron’s declaring NATO ’brain dead’.
Well, at least the concept proves Macron was right.”
In case the AngloZioNazis really launched their awesome ’new strategic concept’ in response to an insult from a non-entity such as Macron, the latter revealed a ’dirty little secret’ indeed. Without having looked into the matter, my gut feeling is that NATO rather decided to waste some money on, yes, quite inferior PR rubbish to fool people who would never question NATO’s existence anyway and, maybe, in order to raise funds. Looks like the braindead are more on the receiving end of NATO propaganda, as could be expected.
What about the name then: NATO 2030: United for a New Era ? At the rate things are going, unless Russia and China are defeated pretty damn quickly, there will be no NATO in 2030. Thanks to the neoliberal plague, Western imperialism has irretrievably destroyed its own productive and fiscal base, relying exclusively on looting and marauding abroad and unsustainable indebtedness at home (’post-industrial society’). The neocons are not even trying to hide their hatred and disgust of human civilization all along the line. They are intoxicated by their own mindrot.
If, like a bolt out of the blue, Russia and China were to fall with their current top-class leaderships then human civilization is finished. Hence, there will be no NATO around by 2030 even in the ’happiest’ of circumstances. United for a new era in afterlife would seem more apt.
“If, like a bolt out of the blue, Russia and China were to fall with their current top-class leaderships then human civilization is finished”
Totally agree with your assessment – if that happens, there will be no civilizational choice left open for humanity
Indeed, indeed. “… if a moral can be derived from our short parable, it’s not exactly a good idea for “civilized” NATO to pick a fight with the – lateral – heirs of the Great Khan.”
But they are dum enough to try, well then the transatlantic exceptionalistans are in for a good-ass-whipping. Nato 2030 was dead on arrival. All things considered, Nato will not make it beyond 2025 – no new era, just thee graveyards. Anyone who cares can read the signs at the center and the seams. And finally when Germany elopes to Eurasia, well it is all over … Welcome to the Eurasian millenium
Why did the Slavs accept the Christianity so easily?
Before the Christianity they have had a religion, common to all East European and Baltic nations, and the language vas common – Arian. With this religion and language they influenced a wide areas of South-West Asia, incl. Iran, North Syria and Iraq, Armenia and North-West India *the state of Haryana).
In Iran this produced zoroastric religion, which has a great influence to a nowadays shia-islam. But it fundamentally influenced Jewish tribes, during their Persian slavery. And they broke it back to Mediterranean, which is the beginning of the Christianity.
So when it came to Slavs – it was theirs religion and belief, only re-packed.
So, why didn’t they accept the religion of the Jewish Khazars or the Mahomedan Bulgars so much influenced by the ‘zoroastrians?
”6495 (987). Vladimir summoned together his boyars and the city-elders, and said to them, “Behold, the Bulgars came before me urging me to accept their religion. Then came the Germans and praised their own faith; and after them came the Khazar Jews. Finally the Greeks appeared, criticizing all other faiths but commending their own, and they spoke at length, telling the history of the whole world from its beginning. Their words were artful, and it was wondrous to listen and pleasant to hear them…
The boyars and the elders replied, “You know, oh Prince, that no man condemns his own possessions, but praises them instead. If you desire to make certain, you have servants at your disposal. Send them to inquire about the ritual of each and how he worships God.” Their counsel pleased the prince and all the people, so that they chose good and wise men to the number of ten, and directed them to go first among the Bulgars and inspect their faith. The emissaries went their way, and when they arrived at their destination they beheld the disgraceful actions of the Bulgars and their worship in the mosque; then they returned to their country. Vladimir then instructed them to go likewise among the Germans, and examine their faith, and finally to visit the Greeks. They thus went into Germany, and after viewing the German ceremonial, they proceeded to Tsargrad, where they appeared before the Emperor…
Thus they returned to their own country, and the Prince called together his boyars and the elders. Vladimir then announced the return of the envoys who had been sent out, and suggested that their report be heard. He thus commanded them to speak out before his retinue. The envoys reported, “When we journeyed among the Bulgars, we beheld how they worship in their temple, called a mosque, while they stand ungirt. The Bulgar bows, sits down, looks hither and thither like one possessed, and there is no happiness among them, but instead only sorrow and a dreadful stench. Their religion is not good. Then we went among the Germans, and saw them performing many ceremonies in their temples; but we beheld no glory there. Then we went to Greece, and the Greeks led us to the edifices where they worship their God, and we knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth. For on earth there is no such splendor or such beauty, and we are at a loss how to describe it. We only know that God dwells there among men, and their service is fairer than the ceremonies of other nations. For we cannot forget that beauty Every man, after tasting something sweet, is afterward unwilling to accept that which is bitter, and therefore we cannot dwell longer here.”Then the boyars spoke and said, “If the Greek faith were evil, it would not have been adopted by your grandmother Olga who was wiser than all other men.”Vladimir then inquired where they should all accept baptism, and they replied that the decision rested with him”.
And we know that he did and why he did it. We know also that the Tsars’ policy was diffident of what a Russian politician called in the 19th century ‘Slavophile onanism’, when pondering the risks and advantages to intervene in the Balkan crisis of 1876-77.
NATO is basically a parasite. It has no other function other than to draw sustenance from its social matrix. It is incapable of effective military action but provides investment opportunities for the likes of Raytheon, BAE, Northrop-Grumman, General Dynamics, Lockheed-Martin et al. It is the same in the financial sector. Matt Taibbi once famously described Goldman, Sachs as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessy jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” That’s about right. The great theorist, Joseph Alois Schumpeter, sums up militaristic blood-suckers in the following way.
Schumpeter ”… contented that in Egypt a class of professional soldiers formed during the war against the Hyskos, persisted even when those wars were over – along with its warlike instincts and interests …But created by the wars that required it, the military machine now created the wars it required.” That pretty much sums up NATO.
It is also worth noting the number of the parasitic spook agencies are also feasting on governmental largesse all in the name of ‘Security’.
@Francis Lee
” >> But created by the wars that required it, the military machine now created the wars it required. >> That pretty much sums up NATO.”
While this is indeed a beautifully written and witty observation of Schumpeter’s, I think it’s only the latter part of it which could be applied to NATO. Even though NATO, employing much of Nazi Germany’s erstwhile Officer Corps in ”de-Nazified” FRG’s Bundeswehr, was devised as a tool of reaction and coercion, it didn’t stage any bombing campaigns throughout its first 50 years of existence. It was ”only” its constituent members that carried out their own genocidal campaigns in the Third World: the UK in Kenya and Malaysia; France in Indochina and Algeria; the US in Korea and Vietnam. The watershed moment came with Western imperialism’s victorious conclusion of the Cold War (1989-1991). Shortly thereafter, NATO began its own killing sprees starting in Yugoslavia in 1999 and continuing ever since. All these wars were waged in strict accordance to the needs of the murderous parasite which is NATO. What stands out as the most profound lesson here is that the demise and dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and the USSR didn’t dampen Western imperialism’s insatiable war drive and genocidal instincts; it encouraged them.
Pepe Escobar is the greatest comments writer with rich knowledge and easy to understand even for peasant as i am.
Every day i am waiting for new comments from Pepe to read as his comments helping me to understand the real situation in world politics.
I just hope that all thouse mutant people in power read too and then sometimes look in the mirror……..
Thank you Pepe Escobar!
Dear Pepe, among the nomads assaulting Europe you’ve omitted very important Avars (they would fit in between Huns and Khazars, – VI-VII centuries)…
They’re most famous for their siege of Constantinople in 626, where the City was protected by the Theotokos (Virgin Mary), which is remembered in a well-known Orthodox hymn “Τῇ ὑπερμάχῳ στρατηγῷ” (Взбранной воеводе; this means smth.like To the Protector Commander…)
One may notice that the subject of the ‘protection of the City by the Theotokos’ is carefully avoided in all circumstances. The ‘protection’ was visible in 863, when it repelled the attack of the Variag-Rus fleet, with far reaching and endurable consequences. Shattered by the miracle Askold accepted the baptism and asked for a bishop. Although the ‘critical’ historians reject furiously the conversion of Askold, this is the first moment in the conversion of ‘Rus’. The protection extended over Russia.
The US has had a “hands-off policy” to China as you describe it, primarily because China is integral to supporting the US Dollar, from the US point of view.
Consider that US fiat Dollars purchase Chinese exports and these Dollars are recycled into oil and US treasuries, which funds the US empire. The US, whose power is reliant on maintaining the US Dollar as the global reserve currency and the rent it extracts from this status, including profligate money-printing and military spending, is in no position to cut China off, despite the threats. Not yet anyway, but it is searching for a substitute to the PetroDollar that will maintain US dollar as global reserve.
Attitudes policies hanhed and hardened and to some extent, aggtessive actions started as warning shots when Russia and China agreed to the large oil/gas supply agreements and to trade in Yuan/Rubles, by-passing the Dollar.
Thus began the demonization of Putin and Russia and of course, attempts to isolate China and Russia from each other.
In short, the US needs China to support the Dollar, and China once needed the US as a market. But China has a plan to ween itself off the US, and has been doing so with Russia and now the BRI, but the US does not have a substitute for China.
Pepe, my plate!
Please: ask Vladimir Vladimirovich whether or not it is true that he called President Dilma, as he did with Erdogan ( and he thanked him ) warning about the coup that the Koch brothers and Exxon Mobile companies were preparing to overthrow her in 2013.
Who said This was Fernando Haddad, PT, former mayor of São Paulo, who with his attitude to allow new increase in bus tickets in the city, gave huge reason for the demonstrations against the Federal Government of Dilma herself, PT.
She got a show on the TV Diario Centro do Mundo to disprove this the next day…
He said Putin called but to talk about something else (maybe to ask for the omelet recipe that she was frying in the program of Ana Maria Braga, TV Globo…).
He also said that coup is not avoided with phone calls and that in Brazil our institutions can not call with coups. Nothing said of the people being aware and mobilized to avoid blows, of course, because she and Lula were experts in this: leave the workers who voted for the PT without any work of awareness, organization and mobilization, as befits the Peoples dominated by the Anglo-Zionist Empire.
Take advantage and ask Vladimir for more data on the course that Dilma did at the International Leadership Exchange of the State Department in 1992, because we are all curious to know what our imprisoned and tortured guerrilla would have done “inside the bowels of the monster” and how she would have been admitted inside with this curriculum ((perhaps as José Serra, former president of UNE, recruited by the US as “leadership” to be promoted to President, as Carlos Meza, as that Georgian tramp who forgot the name, doormat of George Bush and currently “dismissed Ukrainian minister” ” what do you call that little dog?)
Pepe, your reference is very important here. All our left-wing media is ex-querda! They are outsourced officials of George Soros, Obama, Clinton and BIden. Friends of MOssad.
Yandex translation by mod.
Pepe, meu chapa!
Faz favor: pergunte a Vladimir Vladimirovich se é ou não verdade que ele ligou para a Presidente Dilma, como fez com Erdogan ( e este agradeceu ) avisando sobre o Golpe que as empresas Irmãos Koch e Exxon Mobile estavam preparando para derrubá-la em 2013.
Quem disse isso foi Fernando Haddad, do PT, ex-prefeito de São Paulo, que com sua atitude de permitir novo aumento nas passagens de ônibus da cidade, deu enorme motivo para as manifestações contra o Governo Federal da própria Dilma, do PT.
Ela conseguiu um programa na TV Diario Centro do Mundo para desmentir isso no dia seguinte…
Disse que Putin ligou mas para falar de outra coisa ( talvez para pedir a receita de omelete que ela foi fritar no programa da Ana Maria Braga, da TV Globo…).
Disse ainda que golpe não se evita com telefonema e que no Brasil nossas instituições não conseguem ligar com golpes. Nada disse do POVO ESTAR CONSCIENTE E MOBILIZADO PARA EVITAR GOLPES, claro, porque ela e Lula foram especialistas nisso: deixar os trabalhadores que votavam no PT sem qualquer trabalho de conscientização, organização e mobilização, como convém aos povos dominados pelo Imperio Anglo-Sionista.
Aproveite e peça mais dados a Vladimir sobre o curso que Dilma fez na International Leadership Exchange do Departamento de Estado em 1992, pois todos aqui estamos curiosos para saber o que nossa guerrilheira presa e torturada teria ido fazer “dentro das entranhas do monstro” e como teria sido admitida lá dentro com esse currículo…( Talvez como José Serra, ex-presidente da UNE, recrutado pelos EUA como “liderança” a ser promovida a presidente, como Carlos Meza, como aquele georgiano vagabundo que esqueci o nome, capacho de George Bush e atualmente “ministro ucraniano demitido” ( como chama aquele cãozinho?)
Pepe, sua referencia é muito importante aqui. Toda a nossa mídia de esquerda é de ex-querda! São funcionarios terceirizados de George Soros, Obama, Clinton e BIden. Amigos do MOssad.
Carioca:
Are you saying Dilma helped the blow she suffered?
That his party Comrade Haddad, claims that Putin warned her ( as he did with Erdogan) but she did nothing to defend Brazil from the coup coming from the US?
Do you also say that this has to do with the International Leadership course she would have taken at the US State Department?
If this is true it is very serious, for sure and Pepe would know. So ask the right person!
Yandex translation by mod.
Carioca:
Estás a dizer que Dilma ajudou o Golpe que sofreu?
Que seu camarada de partido Haddad, afirma que Putin a avisou ( como fez com Erdogan) mas ela nada fez para defender o Brasil do Golpe vindo dos EUA?
Dizes ainda que isso tem relação com o curso de Líderanca internacional que ela teria cursado no Departamento de Estado dos USA?
Se isso for verdade é gravíssimo, com certeza e Pepe saberia. Portanto perguntasse à Pessoa certa!
“Not without a touch of wickedness, Putin added this was no exaggeration”
The Russian word was probably лукавство (lukavstvo), which does not mean wickedness, but mischievousness.
“New leaked documents show Reuters’ and the BBC’s involvement in covert UK FCO programs to effect “attitudinal change” and “weaken the Russian state’s influence,” alongside intel contractors and Bellingcat….
Reuters and the BBC solicited multimillion-dollar contracts to advance the British state’s interventionist aims, promising to cultivate Russian journalists through FCO-funded tours and training sessions, establish influence networks in and around Russia, and promote pro-NATO narratives in Russian-speaking regions.
In several proposals to the British Foreign Office, Reuters boasted of a global influence network of 15,000 journalists and staff, including 400 inside Russia.
The UK FCO projects were carried out covertly, and in partnership with purportedly independent, high-profile online media outfits including Bellingcat, Meduza, and the Pussy Riot-founded Mediazona. Bellingcat’s participation apparently included a UK FCO intervention in North Macedonia’s 2019 elections on behalf of the pro-NATO candidate.
The intelligence contractors that oversaw that operation, the Zinc Network, boasted of establishing “a network of YouTubers in Russia and Central Asia” while “supporting participants [to] make and receive international payments without being registered as external sources of funding.” The firm also touted its ability to “activate a range of content” to support anti-government protests inside Russia.
The new documents provide critical background on the role of NATO member states like the UK in influencing the color revolution-style protests waged in Belarus in 2020, and raise unsettling questions about the intrigue and unrest surrounding jailed Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny.”
https://thegrayzone.com/2021/02/20/reuters-bbc-uk-foreign-office-russian-media/
The collective West–both the Anglo American and Europeans–is a Crusader civilization.
Their entire identity is based on the delusion that they have a God-given right to colonize the entire world–under the pretext of championing “Christianity and Jesus” in the past or “Democracy and Freedom” today.
This is true not only of Western regimes and ruling elite but *Western people* themselves from the grassroots on up.
The will to conquer and exploit are part of the civilizational and cultural DNA of the Anglo Americans and Euros as a people.
Why?
Because the Western way of life, wealth, and prosperity are based on exploiting and subjugating the rest of the world for the past 500 years since the Age of “Discovery” (i.e. Age of Colonialism) when Columbus and his ilk were raping the non-Western world.
The collective West thus is a criminal enterprise from top to bottom.
All the economic whining that you hear from the Western middle and lower classes (including people here) is ultimately about one thing: Whining for a greater economic cut of the spoils of their empire.
They are nothing more than a self-serving economic Pity Party.
This is the 1000 pound gorilla-in-the-living-room issue that the Americans, Anglos, and Euros all do not want to admit and will try to divert and deflect guilt away from.
Western war criminal regimes like those of Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, Justin Trudeau, Scott Morrison, Emmanuel Macron, or Angela Merkel are only a reflection of their own nations and people.
Western imperialists want military, economic supremacy worldwide: Chandan
https://www.shiatv.net/video/ca74e880d28145ff9b77
So many words and …to say “Russia essentially is on the margins of three civilizations”… Russia is a Civilization itself! Not the East not the West, but its own and the real Eurasian center.
Harvey Weinstein. The embodiment of 21st century Western ideas. When I see him, I see the governing body of the United States.
It’s my first time that I post a comment here. I have been reading, on and off, what has been published, since around 2014. Found the articles very informative and interesting.
In relation to what I call sarcastically “enlightened barbarians/crusaders” of the so called “free world” aka Western civilization” , having lived in NYC for over half of my adult life, since the age of 22 years old until the age of 50, it has been an eye opener to discover the godlike entitlement that passes for Amaricón culture in that society, alone. NYC is just a microcosm of what all humanity is suppose to look like.
Looking forward to read more from the Saker blog.
Cybor_ikua
Vladimir Putin: Working on draft laws is always our collective endeavour. The President, the Government and the Presidential Executive Office make their contribution to the work on nearly every draft law. Overall, as I have said in my opening remarks, work proceeds in a positive and intensive manner, as we can see from the number of laws adopted and their increasingly high quality, which is very important.