Introduction
I have been putting off writing about this topic for a very long while. In fact, I wrote several articles trying to explain the self-evident truism that the US/NATO/EU does not have a military option in the Ukrainian war. First, in an article entitled Remembering the Important Lessons of the Cold War I tried to explain that the reason the Cold War did not turn into a hot, shooting, war is that both sides understood that they simply could never win and that any escalation in strikes and counter-strikes could very rapidly lead to a intercontinental nuclear war, something which neither side was willing to risk. In a piece entitled Making Sense of Obama’s Billion Dollar Hammer I tried to show that all the money the US will by pouring into “European security” is just a grandiose bribe for some European elites and that it had no real effect on the ground. A few days later I posted an article entitled Why the US-Russian Nuclear Balance is as Solid as Ever in which I tried to dispel the myth prevalent in the West about the putative state of disrepair of the Russian military in general, and of the Russian nuclear forces in particular. Lastly, in a piece entitled Short Reminder about US and Russian Nuclear Weapons I tried to show that in reality it was the US nuclear forces who were in a state of disrepair. And over and over again, in many comments, I tried to lay out the reasons for which I simply did not believe that the US/NATO/EU would dare to attack Russia. In summary, I will say this: the US is not nearly as powerful as the US propaganda claims. Without going into long debates about what “victory” and “defeat” mean, I will just say that in my personal opinion the last time the US military fought well was in Korea, and even there it had to accept a draw. After that, it was all downhill. This is not the fault of the US solider, by the way, but by the fact that big money and politics got so heavily involved in the US military that they corrupted everything. This is most evident in the USAF which still has superb pilots, but who are given a terrible choice: either fly on good but old aircraft or fly on new but terrible ones (I believe that given the choice, most would chose the former). As for the European NATO allies, they are such a joke that they hardly deserve mention. They even look bad on a parade.
As for a military option in the Ukraine, it appears unthinkable to me not only because, frankly, I don’t see a single military in the West capable of taking on the Russian military in full-scale battle, but also because geography powerfully argues against such a crazy idea (the very same geography which would make it impossible for Russia to try to invade western or even central Europe).
And yet, something in all this very logical reasoning felt wrong to me. A few days ago it finally hit me. What bothered me was
The American Duck
Among the many beautiful and witty expressions and neologisms Americans use, I always loved this one: If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. This so-called “Duck test” is funny, but it is also a powerful logical method which ended up chewing at me day after day after day. Here I was, all sure and certain that the US/NATO/EU would never consider such a ludicrous notion as the one of an military attack on Russia or on Russian forces. But kept hearing the voice of the American Duck telling me: look at what they are doing, what does that look like to you? Suspend your conclusions and just tell me what are you observing? Tell me, if they had decided to escalate to the point of a military confrontation with Russia, would they be doing things differently? And a few days ago, I threw in the towel (at the duck, of course) and had to accept that while I did not know what they were thinking or what their intentions really were, it sure looked to me like the western plutocrats had decided to escalate the crisis has high as possible.
In truth, I have to admit that when I studied the theory of deterrence in the 1980 my teachers always insisted that this theory of deterrence was predicated on what they called a “rational player”. To put it simply – how do you deter a lunatic? Or a desperate man with nothing to lose? Or a person hell-bent on mutual destruction? The truth is, you cannot. Deterrence assumes a rational actor making a logical decision about unacceptable costs. As far as I know, nobody has ever developed a theory of deterrence applicable to a madman. When I initially wrote my pieces explaining why I believed that a US/NATO/EU attack was impossible a lot readers posted comments saying that while maybe the top US military command was still mainly composed of rational men, the US imperial elites had clearly gone crazy a long time ago and that they were so stuck in their arrogance, their imperial hubris, there delusion of invincibility and their knee-jerk and systematic use of violence that they could no more be considered as rational. At the time I replied that, yeah, sure, maybe, but what is the point of analyzing something crazy. How do you try to make sense of the suicidally insane?
And yet, this is what I propose to do today. I will try as best I can to try to place myself in the mind of these lunatics and see what they could try doing, and what the consequences of that would be. I will go through several possible plans that these crazies might have starting from the most limited one and then going up the insanity slope.
Plan one: a symbolic and limited intervention
This plan is already underway. We know that there are US military advisers in the Ukraine, including at least one general, we know that the Dutch and Australians will be sending in a lightly armed force to “protect” the investigators at the crash site of MH17 (although how a few men armed with assault rifles can protect anybody from Ukie artillery, tank or mortar fire is anybody’s guess). Then there are all the reports of foreign mercenaries, mostly US and Polish, fighting with the Ukie death squads. There is also some good evidence that Poland is sending military equipment, including aircraft and, possibly, crews. Well, all of that is dumb and serves very little useful purpose, but that is what the West is so good at: pretending. If this plans stays at this level I would say that it is not very important. But, alas, there is a nastier possibility here:
Plan two: a tripwire force
This is just an extension of plan one: bring in a few men, and then have them killed. This would trigger the needed “popular outrage” (carefully fanned and reported by the corporate media) to force the Europeans to accept more US sanctions in Europe or even some kind of “EU-mandated” “peacekeeping force”. Of course, if the Russians or the Novorussians do not take the bait and fail to kill the “observers”, US/NATO false flag teams could easily do that. Just imagine what a heavy-mortar strike on a building with these OSCE observers would look like. The junta in Kiev would be more than happy to “invite” such a “peacekeeping” force into Novorussia and since this would be an “invited” force, no UNSC Resolution would be needed. Finally, such a “peacekeeping” force would be regularly reinforced and augmented until it could basically cover the flanks of the Ukies in their attacks against Novorussia. This force would also assume the command and control of Ukie forces, something which the Ukies could greatly benefit from (their current command and control is a mess).
Plan One and Plan Two assume that Russian forces stay on the other side of the border and that the only opposition to such a deployment could come from the Novorussians. But what if the Russians decided to move into Novorussia either to protect the locals or stop his limited US/NATO/EU “peacekeeping force”? Then the US/NATO/EU would have to take a dramatic escalatory step send in a much bigger force, more capable of defending itself.
Plan three: UPROFOR on the Dniepr?
This is the Yugoslav scenario. The West would send in something on the order of 10 battalions which would each be given an area of responsibility for “peacekeeping”. Then police forces would be also sent to “maintain law and order” and EU commissars would be sent in to “help” the local population “express their will” and “organize” a local government. Soon there would be some kind of EU-run election and all the Novorussian forces would be declared “bandits” from which the local population need to be “protected”. Since Strelkov himself fought in Yugoslavia, as did many other Russians, I don’t believe that the Russians or Novorussians would fall for this one. I think that Russia would express its opposition to such a plan and that if she was ignored, she would move in her own forces along the line of contact.
This might be the US/NATO/EU endgoal: to create a Korea like “line of demarcation” which would isolate the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s republics from the rest of Novorussia and the rest of the Ukraine, this would mean getting plenty of Kosovo-like “Camp Bonsteels” all along the Russian border and it would make it looks like the “Wartime President of the One Indispensable Nation” “stopped the Russian Bear”. Finally, it would create a perfect Cold War like environment in which the western 1%ers could continue to exploit the 99% while constantly scaring them with the “Russian threat”.
Plan four: Operation Storm in Novorussia and Crimea?
I would not put it past the folks in the Pentagon and Mons to try to pull off an “Operation Storm” in Novorussia and even possibly Crimea. That is the scenario Glazev fears: the US/NATO/EU would put enough forces inside the Ukraine to allow it to survive long enough to mobilize a sufficient number of men and equipment for a lightening fast attack in Novorossia and even possibly Crimea. And, in theory, if we assume the Banderstan does not collapse under its own weight and the economic disaster, the Ukraine has the resources to mobilize far more men and equipment that the tiny People’s Republics of Donestk and Lugansk or even Crimea. But that, again, assumes that Russia will let that happen, which she won’t, so now we have to look at the really crazy plans:
Plan five: First “Desert Steppe Shield” then “Desert Steppe Storm”
That is a crazy notion: to do with Russia what the US did with Iraq. First, to place down a “protection force” in the Ukraine, isolate Russia, and then attack in a full-depth and full-scale determined attack. We are definitely talking about a continental war with a fantastic potential to turn into a world war. This plan would have be based on two crucial assumptions:
1) The US/NATO/EU conventional forces would be capable of defeating the Russian military.
2) If facing conventional defeat, Russia would not use nuclear weapons.
I think that both of these assumptions are deeply mistaken. The first one is based on a mix of propaganda, bean counting and ignorance. The propaganda is something which western military are very good. They are not. Most western armies are a pathetic joke, and those who can fight well (the Brits, the Turks) are too little to matter. That leaves the US military which have capabilities far in excess of what its NATO allies can muster. Just as in WWII all the serious fighting had to be done by German units, in case of a WWIII (or IV?) all the serious fighting would have to be done by Americans. The problem is that the Americans would have an extremely hard time bringing in enough forces to really make the difference. In any case, I have the biggest doubt about the current fighting capabilities of the US Army and Marine Corps. Faced with a Russian battalion defending its own soil I think that an equivalent USA/Marine force would get slaughtered.
The “bean counting” is when you compare all the NATO APCs or tanks to the number available to the Russian military. The corporate media loves this kind of charts in which soldiers, APCs, tanks, aircraft and other gear are compared. Professional analysts never use them simply because they are meaningless. What matters is how much of that gear is actually available for battle, the kind of tactics used, the training and morale of the soldiers, the skills of their commanding officers, and stuff which is *never* mentioned: supplies, logistics, petroluem, lubricants, ammunition, lines of supply, medical standards, even food and weather. Bean counters simply never see that. But one could argue that the number of trucks is more important to a military than the number of tanks. Yet trucks are never counted. But yes, on paper NATO looks huge. Even though most NATO gear could not even survive your average Ukrainian road, nevermind the winter.
But let us assume that the Hollywood image of the US military is true: invincible, best trained, best armed, with a fantastic morale, led by the very best of the best officers, it would easily defeat the primitive Russian military, armed with antiquated weapons and commanded by fat drunken generals. Okay, and then what? If is the official Russian nuclear deterrence doctrine that in this case Russia would use nuclear weapons. Since even in Hollywood movies nobody makes the claim that the US anti-missile systems could stop Iskanders, cruise missiles or even gravity bombs, we would have to accept that the invincible US force would be turned into radioactive particulates and, that, in turn, would leave the US President two terrible choices: a) take the loss and stop b) retaliate and the second option would have to include the location from where the strike came from: Russia proper. That, of course, would place the following choices for the Russian President: a) take the loss or b) strike at the continental United States. At this points nuclear mushrooms would start appearing all over the map.
Now please make no mistake: Russia can not only destroy Mons, the Pentagon and Cheyenne Mountain (just a matter of placing enough warheads on the right spot), but also every single major city in the United States. Sure, the USA can retaliate in kind, but what kind of consolation would that be for anybody left?
I cannot believe that the US deep state would truly, deliberately, want to start a planetary nuclear war. For one thing, US leaders are cowards and they will not want to take such a monumental decision. A far more likely version is that being stupid, arrogant and cowards they will stumble upon just that outcome. Here is how:
Plan six: American football’s “Hail Mary”
In American football there is a specific pass which is used only when seconds are left on the clock and your teams is badly losing anyway. Basically it works like this: every single person who is not defending the quarterback rushes to the endzone, as do all the defenders, and the quarterback then just throws the ball straight into that zone with the very slim hope that one of his own players will catch it and score a touchdown. This is called a “Hail Mary” for very good reason as only a miracle makes such a desperate plan work. Most of the time the ball is either fumbled or caught by the other team. But, very rarely, it works (see here).
I can very much imagine a desperate Obama trying to show the American people that he “has hair on his chest” and that he is not going to let “regional power” challenge the “indispensable nation”. So what he and, really, his administration risks doing is the following: to play a game of chicken hoping against all odds that the Russian will yield. This is my worst nightmare and the worst possible assumption to make because Russia cannot yield.
In March of this year I issued a warning which I entitled “Obama just made things much, much worse in the Ukraine – now Russia is ready for war“. What prompted me to issue that warning was the fact that the Council of the Russian Federation has just unanimously passed a resolution allowing Putin to use Russian armed forces in the Ukraine. Since, this resolution has been repealed at Putin’s request and for obvious political motives, but the mood, the determination is still there. In fact, I think that it has grown much stronger.
There has been much useless speculation about Putin, his motives and his strategy. This is way bigger than just Putin. If the US/NATO/EU really push too far, and that includes a genocide in Novorussia, an attack on Crimea or an attack on Russian forces, Russia will go to war, Putin or no Putin. And Putin knows that. His real base of support is not in the Russian elites (who mostly fear him), but in the Russian people (with whom his current rating are higher than ever before). And Putin himself openly spoke about the “threats to Russian sovereignty” though he did add that because of the Russian nuclear forces there was, in his opinion, no immediate threat to the Russian territory.
If the US decides to play a game of chicken with Russia, then it will do the same thing as a car driver playing a game of chicken against an incoming train: regardless of the train’s driver, the train is on tracks and its momentum is too big: it cannot stop or veer away.
The problem is that the USA has a long record of making absolutely irresponsible statements which end up putting them into a corner from which they cannot bulge without losing face. Just look at the MH17 disaster: the Obama administration immediately rushed to blame the Russians for it, but what will it do when the evidence to the contrary comes out? What if Obama also draws a red line somewhere (it does not really matter where) and then forces Russia to cross it?
Sadly, I can imagine the USA declaring that the US/NATO will defend the Ukie airspace. I think that they are dumb enough to try to seize a Russian ship entering or leaving the Black Sea. Remember – these are the folks who hijacked the aircraft of Bolivian President Evo Morales to try to find Snowden on board. These are the folks who regularly kidnap Russian citizens worldwide (the last time the son of a well-know Russian member of Parliament who was kidnapped in the Maldive Islands). And, of course, these are the folks who did 9/11. Their arrogance knows no limits because they are profoundly evil sociopaths. For them the organization of false flag operations is a normal, standard, procedure. They almost triggered a war between the DPRK and South Korea by sinking a South Korean military vessel. They used chemical weapons in Syria not once, but several times. And the last time we had a Democrat in the White House, he was crazy enough to send two US Aircraft Carrier Groups into the Strait of Taiwan to threaten China.
My biggest fears
This is my biggest fear: some kind of desperate “Hail Mary” maneuver in which the US will try to convince Russia that “look, we are crazy enough to start this thing, so you better back off” not realizing that Russia cannot back off. The other thing which really scares me is that during the Cuban Missile Crisis everybody was aware of the stakes and most people were truly terrified. Now, thanks to the propaganda of the corporate media, almost nobody is afraid and hardly anybody is paying attention. Russia and the USA are on a clear collision course and nobody cares! How come?
Because if 9/11 proved anything is that there are things which most people are simply unwilling to contemplate, no matter how close and real they are. It would only make sense that the Empire of Illusion would be populated by a people in total denial. After all, illusion and denial usually go hand in hand.
Most of you, dear readers and friends, seem to be sharing with me a sense of total distrust in the sanity of our leaders. When I asked you whether you believed that the US/NATO were crazy enough to use military forces against Russia, an overwhelming number of you answered that “yes” and a good part of you was even emphatically sure of that. Why? Because we all know how crazy and deluded are Imperial Overlords are. Crazy and deluded enough not to quality as “rational actor”? Crazy and deluded enough to play a game a chicken with a train? Crazy and deluded enough to risk the planet on “Hail Mary? Alas, I think that this is a very real possibility.
But what does Uncle Sam really want?
There is a gradual realization in Russia that for Uncle Sam this is not about the Ukraine. It is about Russia and, specifically, about regime change in Russia. A vast majority of Russian experts seem to believe that the US wants to overthrow Putin and that this entire war in the Ukraine is a means to achieve that. As a very cynical joke going around now says “Obama is willing to fight Putin down to the very last Ukrainian”. I think that this is correct. The US hopes that one of the following will happen:
1) A Russian military intervention in Novorussia which will allow the US to restart a Cold War v2 on steroid and which will also fully re-enslave Europe to the USA. Putin would then be blamed for falling in the US trap
2) The creation of a US-run “Banderastan” in the Ukraine. That would ‘contain’ and destabilize Russia. Again, Putin would be blamed for letting that happen.
3) A “nationalist Maidan” in Russia: this is what is behind the current Putin-bashing campaign in the blogosphere: to paint Putin as a weak and/or corrupt man, who traded Crimea for the Donbass (you know the tune – these folks even comment on this blog). These efforts are supported and, sometimes, even financed by Russian oligarchs who have a great deal of money involved in the EU and who really don’t need the current tensions. Here Putin would be blamed for not doing enough.
In all three cases, Putin would risk a (patriotically) color coded revolution which would, inevitably, bring either crazy rogue ruler or a clueless fossil to power (a la Zhirinovsky or Zuiganov) or, much better, a pro-American “liberal” (a la Medvedev). I think that all of these plans will fail.
Putin will not give Uncle Sam the intervention he wants. Instead, Russia continue to support the Resistance in Novorussia until Banderastan goes “belly up”, i.e. for another 30-60 days or so. As for the “nationalist Maidan”, the Russian people see straight through this “black PR campaign” and their support for Putin is higher than it ever was. It’s not Putin who does not want to intervene overtly in the Donbass, it is the Russian people. The attempts at stirring up anti-Putin by first stirring-up anti-Strelkov feelings have completely failed and, in fact, they have backfired. A lot of these “hurray-patriots” are now overly called “useful idiots” for the CIA or even provocateurs.
Finally, while they are at this point in time only rumors, there seems to be more and more specialists of the opinion that MH17 was a deliberate false flag by the US. If the news that the Ukies did it ever becomes public, then the entire destabilization plan will go down the tubes. At this point, I would not put anything, no matter how crazy, past the US deep-state.
And that is a very scary thought.
The Saker
The US as an entity is acting irrationally because the cost/benefit calculation for the US as a whole is negative however the US as an entity isn’t driving the process.
The people driving the process are factions within the US i.e. the neocons and the banking mafia and they have different cost/benefit calculations than the US as a whole.
The banking mafia stand to lose a great deal from de-dollarization and it is rational for them to play a game of chicken with the BRICS up to but not including war (barring accidents).
The neocons want to destroy every country they see as a potential threat to Israel and any allies of those countries. They are psychopaths and their view of the world is insane but their behavior is rational in the context of how they see the world.
So the factions driving US policy are rational once you understand how they view the world – at least in the sense that you can predict their behavior. The big difference between them and everyone else is simply that they rate their point of view as of 100% importance and everyone else’s point of view as 0% importance.
It just came over the news that Ukraine has agreed to letting 950 Dutch and Australian soldiers and police guard the crash site. An obvious trap but will the rebels be able to avert it?
PART I
Conditions are now almost ripe for a military coup – not against Putin in Russia, but in the US.
Corruption is so rife that it is not even hidden anymore. The political system has fundamentally broken down and is completely dysfunctional. The administration has no leadership or direction and is out of control.
The fabric of society is rapidly disintegrating – about 50 million people now rely on government food to survive. Half the entire population live at or below the poverty line. Despite the rigged monthly reports, jobs disappear by the hour. Inflation is rampant for all to see but officially concealed to appease the corrupt masters.
Military veterans are systematically denied government assistance. The armed forces are routinely used as pawns in CIA games contrary to international law, leaving the faceless men unaccountable but the military commanders liable to charges of war crimes and others.
The modern incarnation of Himmler’s SS – Homeland Security (a Nazi-cum-Orwellian term if there ever was one), TSA and the associated ‘Fusion Centres’ – have unfolded across the land as protection against the concept of ‘terrorists’. In reality they provide nothing of the sort as is demonstrated so clearly by the complete inability to stem the flow of human traffic across southern borders (either through sheer incompetence or by insidious design).
Internal strife is on the horizon.
The new Gestapo – NSA – monitors everything by everyone all the time. Curiously, military communications are not even exempt from this totalitarianism – why so?
The little publicised purge of commanding military ranks throughout 2013 should be kept in mind. Many, many officers were expunged from the services on what can only be described as spurious grounds. What was their real crime? It has been reported they did nothing more than affirm their allegiance to the constitution rather than to political masters.
On all levels and from any perspective (except perhaps for the completely duped dullards), the constitution is dead. Despite propaganda to the contrary, none of the protections it once afforded continue to exist in reality.
The country is now brazenly controlled by a not-so-hidden elite who exist behind a thin corporate veil that totally owns the government, congress and senate in what can only be described as blatantly.
PART II
The curtain was lifted for all to see during 2008 when the bankers interests were put above those of the people. There has been no doubt since that time where the citizens, the military and the veterans (of the failed hegemonic wars) stand – in last place, behind almost every other interest that has corrupted the once great country.
The dollar teeters on the brink – it has lasted far longer than expected but is now on life support. The hidden elite hope that a war with Russia, whether by proxy or front on, will revive the currency. That hope is futile.
Many senior military officers know what is happening – not those with comfortable offices with views to the White House, but those in the field, those with enlisted men who cannot meet their costs of living and those whose colleagues have inexplicably disappeared from all around in the purging of past years. They know the military is the greatest fear the administration holds. It is the reason the NSA monitors everything they do.
The world could not conceive during November 1991 of the planet without the USSR – just a month later it was gone. Corruption and central planning gone awry, as present in the US today.
The nation is nothing more that its revolutionary constitution and the principles it espoused. That document has now been consigned to the dustbin of history, the principles lost – the country will follow.
It is only a matter of time before the military steps in the stop the rot. They will likely face their own countrymen in the form of the completely militarised Homeland Security.
Monitor not the ludicrous claims of instability in the Russian government (the country that adheres to the law both domestic and international) but machinations in Washington.
SAKER said:
“…while maybe the top US military command was still mainly composed of rational men, the US imperial elites had clearly gone crazy a long time ago…”
And this is precisely the reason a military coup shall occur in the US if the bizarre plan to attack Russia continues.
Greetings Mr. Pragma!
The Americans (cowards and traitors) will never attack directly, but they will continue to attack and they will not stop. The next false flag series (in Ukraine, then Europe, then America) will make it easy to 1) declare Novorossia a terrorist organization and 2) declare Russia a state sponsor of terrorism. Hence the original name for the operation ‘ATO’. ‘Russian terrorists’ is obviously a pre-tested meme, Ukraine has been using it for months, it is now worldwide since MH17, and it will be used to steamroll public opinion and ‘justify’ any and all USEUNATO aggression. As well as to limit other states from formal assistance to the RF/NAF.
One of the tricks they play is to misuse the word ‘Russia’, they use it for everything, the government of the Russian Federation, the country, the Russian people, etc. all at the same time. It is similar to the legal (illegal) treatment of ‘terrorism’ as a problem with a military solution and a criminal solution, depending on whichever is convenient at the time. The Jose Padilla case and the Guantanamo tribunals are a good example of that total scam which is still going on. It’s a ‘war’ but it’s not a ‘war’, auxiliary funding from Congress, secret executive orders and black budgets, but it’s a ‘war’ whenever you want it to be, the laws of war apply, but they don’t . . .
I expect more problems to occur within America, i.e., Mexican border problem. The ‘Russian mafia’ has strong ties with the Mexican drug cartels, interesting coincidence.
The use of whatever ‘electronic’ and ‘secret’ weapons are laying around may start coming into play as time passes.
Judging by the character of Americans as a whole at the present time, I doubt there is anyone left in military/intelligence who can stop the war.
This time the peace loving people of the world should skip street protests and move to direct action, economic blockade of their own governments and corporations and ultimately guerilla warfare within each country.
“But what our analysis suggests is profound: Russia’s leaders can no longer count on a survivable nuclear deterrent. And unless they reverse course rapidly, Russia’s vulnerability will only increase over time.”
And this 8 year old article suggests the US could win a nuclear war with a first strike. Madness, of course unless you are a Psychopath.
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/61508/keir-a-lieber-and-daryl-g-press/the-rise-of-us-nuclear-primacy
Richard
Europe needs to shrug-off The American influence (Gaza may help people are disgusted). Made jokes about Russian nukes myself (only jokes now guys I live OOh “somewhere in Britain”), but this now this IS FUNNY; “America dropped an armed nuclear weapon on itself!” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Y1ya-yF35g&feature=youtu.be
The idea of war with Russia in the 21st Century is to many in The West TOTALLY ABSURD. We’ve been allies we’ve been foes, what better friends could we have? For someone whose family has a merchant marine history (I live in Southampton), the notion of NOW turning on “The Ruskis” is genuinely stomach churning.
We’ve reached the “lowest common denominator” though in; Libya, Iraq, Syria and The Ukraine (to name the obvious examples), when the dread word “partition” must be seriously uttered. If however a “two part Europe” were to become the guiding principle behind The E.U’s negotiations with The Russians we may find The Russian oligarchy more amenable to compromise. E.F.Schumacher was a great social scientist one may argue that it was this that made him a great economist.
Wikipedia article is 100% certain that self-defense forces shot down the jet.
Here is some of their evidence:
Witnesses in Torez reported sightings on the day of the incident of what appeared to be a Buk missile launcher.
Walker, Shaun. “Ukrainians report sightings of missile launcher on day of MH17 crash”. theguardian. Retrieved 23 July 2014.
Miller, James (25 July 2014). “Evidence Review: Who Shot Down MH17?”. The Interpreter. Retrieved 26 July 2014.
AP journalists reported sightings of a Buk system in separatist controlled Snizhne.
Karmanau, Yuras, “What happened? The day Flight 17 was downed”, MSN News, 25 July 2014
A Buk was spotted by residents of Torez on the day of the downing? I have never heard this before. Is it true or do we have an answer to this charge?
AP journalists saw a Buk in rebel held Snizhne? When did they see this Buk? Is the report true? What is our answer to this charge?
Did the self-defense forces ever have a Buk in Snizhne or Torez?
I understand that self-defense forces have only one Buk, and it doesn’t even work as it lacks a radar. The self-defense forces reported that they captured this nonworking Buk on the day they grabbed it. It is nothing more than a trophy.
The self-defense forces had never used a Buk before the jet incident to down any planes, and they have never used one afterwards either. What are the odds that they used this one even once.
However, the self-defense forces did apparently have a nonworking Buk trophy. Does anyone know where this nonworking Buk was on the day of the jet downing?
Please though, we must answer the charges…
Analysis by the Russian Defense Ministry of Kiews claims:
http://eng.mil.ru/en/analytics.htm
The US WILL NOT INVADE. There is zero appetite for American casualties in Ukraine. Ditto NATO: They talk a big talk, but NATO WILL NOT INVADE because there is even less appetite for European casualties in Ukraine.
Money will continue to get thrown at the junta. If the novorussians can continue to hold out, the coming cold winter will force the general Ukrainian population to make a decision one way or the other – as opposed to what most are doing now: watching and waiting.
Some of us knew from the very beginning that the real aim all along in the Ukraine has been the complete subjugation of Russia to the US-dominated New World Order System.
But you left one option off the table in your analysis: An attempt by the US at a nuclear first strike. Now that you take seriously what some of us knew from the very beginning were the real US aims, will you also take seriously the First Strike scenario, as something the US deep state is at least seriously contemplating?
I actually think the First Strike may not happen in the current Ukrainian context as such, since Ezekiel 38-39 seems to indicate Russian participation in the coming Gog-Magog invasion attempt against Israel.
But, if Russia is not eliminated as a world power beforehand by a US nuclear First Strike, it will definitely be eliminated in the wake of the Gog-Magog war, should it participate in that invasion as the partner coming from the “uttermost parts of the north.”
As a Russian Orthodox Christian, Saker, you must not neglect the apocalyptic aspects of your professed faith. Yet, I have seen none of these religious tenets whatsoever reflected in any of your analyses thus far.
Anonymous 31 July, 2014 21:51
“I remember when I was a kid attending a music school, I was always told that by playing with musicians that are better than me I can improve much faster and the other way round; by playing with those who were worst then me, I was likely to degrade my skills.”
Something seems to be wrong here. Why should better musicians degrade their skills by playing with you? Why should teachers risk degradation by teaching novices? Why bother playing an instrument at all, when the maestros have put everything on CD?
No wonder you despise your fellow countrymen.
“If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. This so-called “Duck test” is funny, but it is also a powerful logical method …”
A professional and experienced strategist’s response would likely be ,
” If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then test the hypotheses that it is either a robot emulating a duck, or that the interpretation of duck-like signals omitted are functions of mapping your own expectations/prejudices.”
Your duck is not a powerful logical method, as even some in the opponent’s intelligence services are aware; it is a pathway to self-delusion.
Using this “powerful logical method” you extrapolate.
You also posit factual innacuracies/generalisations such as – ” There is a gradual realization in Russia that for Uncle Sam this is not about the Ukraine. It is about Russia and, specifically, about regime change in Russia.”
This has been understood by some in Russia since the time of Andropov/Gorbachov and has informed strategy since circa 1990 – a recent Serbian contributor to the blog made the same point.
Deterrence was never predicated on rationality, although some residue of game theory did have some afterlife in the 1980’s in some “military” circles giving rise to one of the theories of deterrence, which apparently you studied.
Deterrence is predicated on interaction, hence one of the reasons why the opponents continue to be unsuccessful.
mh17 info at
http://eureferendum.com/
fairly detailed analysis of various technical and geographic aspects
Excellent post, well written and well argued. However, you misunderstand what is happening in Washington at this time. The Deep State is experiencing internal conflict and foreign events are being used as part of a power game. The Syrian false-flag events are a case and point–everything was set for a military intervention the media was howling for war, “left”, right and center. But nothing happened. Why? It wasn’t that the people didn’t want war–that has never stopped the National Security State–it was the military itself that balked and, I believe, segments of the intel community. What the deep state craves is stability and a Pax Americana which it has, mainly achieved. Having failed in Syria the neocon faction (they are deeply ideological) found a weak spot in Ukraine and exploited it–it had been simmering for some time and was brought to a boil fairly easily. The goal of the neocons was, in part, to demonize Putin, but mainly to garner power in Washington and force the U.S. into a belligerent state. Other factions complied because the whole GWOT meme has died out–there is clearly no terrorist threat (and there never was one) so that “enemy” was no longer credible so a new one was needed, i.e., Putin. I don’t think Putin did anything to trigger that–he was just there and convenient. They had assets on the ground in Ukraine as they do even in Russia and they just pulled a few strings.
I don’t think the U.S. will go to war over Ukraine–they just want an enemy to focus on and increase funding to Deep State, in part, to stay powerful vis a vis other factions within the government. The planners all know how bad the U.S. military is, as you say, not because the fighting units are bad but because massive corruption in the Pentagon has created an impractical military with loads of impractical weapons. I think Afghanistan and Iraq have demoralized much of the officer corps as they have watched political generals rise to the top. No one, I can assure you, would want to pit the U.S. military against Russian troops. I don’t know their capability so I’ll take your word for their effectiveness.
New Russian Military presentation on satellite photography.
http://eng.mil.ru/en/analytics.htm
Pretty heavy demolition of SBU/CIA “evidence”.
The SBU appears to have reacted particularly very negatively to the disclosure of Ukrainian BUK’s being active south of Shakhtersk on July 17. This strongly suggests this is the guilty battery of the shoot down.
Russian MOD notes that many mercenary field units of Ukraine are out of control of the ATO command, thus implicitly supporting the allegations that an out of control unit fired the BUK.
The location south of Shakhtersk is consistent with leaked disclosures on American evidence that the BUK was in “rebel” controlled area south of Torez/Snizhne but operated by men in Ukrainian uniform using the public/media misunderstanding of how the NAF hold territory based on internet maps and continuously reinforced misunderstanding by the public of “frontlines” (something which has not really existed since WWI) and obfuscation of what happens during an armored thrust. In reality, there is no “line” of control beyond an imaginary line across farmland joining roadway checkpoints and strongholds, and there is significant no-mans land between Ukrainian strongholds and NAF stronghlds which either side can “occupy”. As the Ukrainian assault on Shakhtersk and Torez this past week has shown, only light company sized forces are present in any given major intermediate town held by the NAF, with brigade and battalion level forces engaged or reserved in major strongholds like Donetsk, Gorlovka, Saur Mogila, etc. and available for redployment to points of attack. Therefore it is entirely plausible that Ukraine forward deployed BUK’s to 5 miles south of Shakhtersk near Zaroshchenske and relied on forward scouts for protection against any NAF recon units venturing too far out of Shakhtersk and discovering the emplacement as well as reserve armored units to the rear near Blahodatne. This location was far enough north to make it look like NAF territoy, and far enough west of Saur Mogila (14 miles) to be safe from spotters and artillery fire thanks to distance an an intermediate covering ridge at the same elevation as the BUk emplacement (around 660 to 705 ft.) running south of Torez. This then also appears consistent with the censored BBC report that apparently located the view south of Torez with the three trees on a ridge with a smoke trail rising to the sky.
Regarding the technical capabilities of these satellites to detect features down to arm patches on uniforms, imagine the Hubble Space telescope, but turn it downwards to look at earth and consider the resolution capability. It is very believable that American evidence shows these same BUK’s south of Shakhtersk manned by people in Ukrainian uniform.
great to hear from Mr. Pragma again, I hope he will continute to contribute
MoA has gone downhill since his departure
Good to see Mr. P. back. With his usual optimism – even though we seem to be fighting Mystery Babylon.
One possibility that may not have been presented was to try to get Russia to use nukes and then simply have the US back out and get the Cold War it wants. Set up a threat or situation that Russia feels requires a response. So a higher-level form of forcing Russia to intervene. Russia could convince reasonable leaders that it was the US’s fault, but the media and Operation Gladio pressure on Europe would be to fall in line with the Cold War.
“Putin will not give Uncle Sam the intervention he wants. Instead, Russia continue to support the Resistance in Novorussia until Banderastan goes “belly up”, i.e. for another 30-60 days or so.”
Can Russia resist the kind of provocations that can be ginned up? Tochkas inside Russia?
Saker, great article, despite the tragic and frightening issue, I spent a fun time last night reading you. It is indeed that special sense of humor you have to analyze the situations that brought me here for months now.
Thanks for the fun time.
Take care.
With respect to the analysis, in my view, any scenario is possible, given what specimens we face.
Therefore, we must continue our struggle, each to the extent that he can, and while we must try to enjoy life and good times with loved ones.
It will do what it can, with this kind of people there is not much room for maneuver, are impervious to change. Also they do not usually disappear from the face of the earth because a natural death since neither suffer nor have a conscience. Therefore, patience,serenity, sanity, health and strength to face them and that it will be what God wants.
Enjoy this summer as possible.
This sanction may hurt Russia in the short term but I hope the G7 blocks World Bank dealings with Russia for 1.5bn $ (including education and envronmental initiatives). The less Russia has to to do with these people the better. Trade OK with West, Great – even – but stay away from as many of these political institutions as you can.
Mr. Pragma, a big “Dankeschön” from Germany.
Thank you very much for your precise analysis, especially regarding the situation in Europe. I have come to the same conclusion but would have never been able to say it in such a simple and yet comprehensive way.
By the way, I found a link in the most stupid article today in the Asia Times Online by a full-fledged Neocon, forget the article, this information is really interesting:
http://thejubilee.wordpress.com/2014/05/15/so-who-is-vladimir-putin/.
Should be recommended especially to all those who think that Putin is a failure.
@Nora
You see, the democracy simulations in europe have been quite good for quite a long time. So, as soon as it gets to the matter of war, the politicians can’t wheel and deal as they please, they *need* the people. They need parliaments to say yes and they need soldiers to go along (Hint: My partner told me that they call their soldiers “citizens in uniform” in germany). If it were about some small country far away (e.g. Afghanistan, Mali, etc) the usual blabbering of “terrorism!!!” works, but not when it’s about Russia.
As for the how I agree. Obviously the usa planned to establish a solid mil. base in ukratine. But at least as first attack they will use their 5th colonne in a concerted way, i.e. their media bitching day and night about evil Putin and his terrorist dictator regime and then they will send their 1000s of traitor rats and, sure enough, there will be mil. trained fighters, too.
But they will fail.
For one Russia is not ukratine. In Russia there are reliable and strong state police units. Moreover there is a very strong people movement; some of them are well trained fighters, ex military, ex police, some of them are teachers, mothers, or taxi drivers; they won’t be used for direct fighting but they build a very strong, dense and wide spanning logistics, intelligence, and support.
Simply speaking, for every payed rat whore in usa service there is 1000 people movement Russian, for every trained rat fighter there is 1000 people movement warriors. Plus, of course, the official police and military.
Similarly, oh well, who would know what soldiers do in their spare time …
Btw I do not really expect war, mil. war that is, on the streets or with tanks and jets. But financial and economic war. And one more, as so often with the usa, the glamorous packaging and outside looks don’t match the content. In the usa there is high unemployment, high poverty, bad state support (healthcare, education, etc)’ – and – they are used to a rather luxurious life. Russians on the other hand can do with quite little for a while. It’s still present in their minds.
Actually I’m so confident that I find myself often thinking “Come on, americans, bring it on. Don’t just blablabla and threaten, DO IT!”
It’s about time we get done with it and break usa’s spine and move ahead. This world has already lost decades with stupid greedy cruel usa games.
@Anonymous (10:32)
Oh well, let the us-americans declare all they want. To have any effect, the usa needed to be strong and credible and it is neither.
What if….Russia itself *is* the Prize?
This makes it an utterly sane and ruthless geopolitical gambit.
Russia has abundant energy to feed the Empire for the new Neocon century. As long as Empire controls most of the world’s fuel, the Dollar-Euro hegemony is unbeatable.
The writing is on the wall. Russia is the linchpin to BRICS. Instead of bricks for a multipolar world, China, India, Brazil will simply fall like Dominoes at the knees of the new Energy Empire. And Putin must be toppled by hook or by crook and a new “Yeltsin” installed as the Puppet as in Kiev for the new Oligarchy dismembering and draining of Russia’s military and natural assets.
@Larchmonter445 and @Andrew
Dear Larchmonter445 and Andrew,
Thank you for extending the overall political picture towards the East and Siberia. Perhaps you know the blogger called Da Russophile (http://darussophile.com/)? He had a very interesting take on the Russian-Chinese relationship (A VERY BRIEF HISTORY OF CHINESE RUSSIAN RELATIONS). Whatever one thinks about it (see also the comments), it is important to look at this relationship from all angles.
Best regards
Angelika
I think the danger of a hot war is very real and this is what is being planned in Washington at the moment. The reason seems to be the imminent demise of the US dollar.
This year the propaganda movie “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” spread the meme that Russia is trying to bring down the US dollar. The rationale might be simply that the US are trying to hide their collapse with a war. Blame it on Putin instead of Obamna and the bankers.
Have a look at this interview from Moldova. US military advisors are already in that country training the military of Moldova for a war:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcahO2ZC2qI
Given the latest escalation with the MH17 false flag, the course seems to be set on creating an incident to draw the other NATO countries into the mess. I guess the plan looked somewhere like this:
1. Finish off the rebels in Eastern Ukraine before all the 8 NATO maneuvers with Ukraine overlap in September
2. Start the “liberation” of Crimea and Trans-Dniestr. The Moldovan and Ukrainian armies are sent on the same suicide mission as the Georgian army in 2008.
3. This time the US promises to protect it’s “important allies” and supports the ground attacks with bombings from the Black Sea. Remember – in the US world view Crimea rightfully belongs to Ukraine and needs to be liberated from the Russian occupiers. An attack on Crimea could simply be sold to the US public as an internal Ukrainian conflict.
At this point Russia faces the choice to either roll over and let the US do their thing, or they defend Crimea. If they sink the attacking NATO fleet this will become the new Pearl Harbour, justifying all upcoming actions.
At the moment their actions look desperate and sloppy. The MH17 story will not hold up forever and I do not see an exit strategy. But that also implies that they believe that it won’t make a difference when their scheming is uncovered. We will see their next steps soon…
lem
Some answers for people asking questions. The militia has 4 BUK launchers, all of them were disabled before the soldiers fled the scene and can nto be used without repairs. Cant use missiles with a hole in it.
Plank time is the time between space and time. The big bang occured in plank time in that one second more things happened than will happen to the end of time. If you get there, matter and time are irrelevant since they are almost the same. Can someone somehow get there? Time itself cease to exist and the future and past become one. Space and dimension also changes. So you can go past time, past space and past dimension. Maybe Buddha could do it!
Iraq had some of those GPS jammers. Mhey needed a LOT of them but did not have the money. Which is why some of those tomahawks almost ended up in Turkey. Cant really track a terrain full of sand or water or mountains. They go off track and without something to reorient them back they end up until the fuel runs out. Could be how Iran got its hand on how cruise missiles work. US always scolds China for stealing secrets.. Iran on the other hand gets secrets dropped in their lap.
Saker, Wash’s Blog post re; ukraine/russia comes from a dif angle, but just as scary.
Kolomoiskiy and the Kiev Junta have prepared groups of Russian-speaking militants who, under the guise of militiamen, will organize a “night of long knives” in Pavlograd. Hundreds of peaceful civilians will die! This will be staged as “payback” for those [Ukrainian Government troops] who died in the Lugansk and the Donetsk Republics.
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/08/obamas-presidency-hangs-thread-ukraine-updated-31-july-2014.html
Thanks for saying this, Mr Pragma at 15:22 –
I find myself often thinking “Come on, americans, bring it on. Don’t just blablabla and threaten, DO IT!”
It’s about time we get done with it and break usa’s spine and move ahead. This world has already lost decades with stupid greedy cruel usa games.
I suspect others feel this way also. One of the great strengths I gained from Saker was his lessons bringing me up to date on modern Russia – who the people are and what their capabilities are. I always enjoy watching competence and skill in any field, and the Russians have been a joy to watch these last few months.
Until this year I’ve had a growing despair that the whole world would become Orwellian soup, that the bankers would get their new world order everywhere and the human spirit would gradually extinguish.
Now I know the hegemon will not prevail. I take satisfaction in its setbacks, and to see how sloppily it executes its evil (evil is often doen badly). What happens to the US, my country, is of far less importance to me than knowing that countries like Russia are getting on with life.
This year, because of Russia and the glorious Novorossiya – even though death and desperation is everywhere – the sun is also shining through the clouds.
This article containing the Saker’s thoughts on our possible future (which may well be shorter than we assume) can now be viewed (with typos corrected) at
http://www.serendipity.li/the_saker/thinking_the_unthinkable.htm.
Links to this page are welcome.
I have the feeling Obama wants something similar as Austria in 1914. Just as Austria wanted to “teach Serbia a lesson” so that it would stop making trouble for Austria for a long time so Obama wants to humiliate Russia enough so that it stops interfering with America’s plans like it does now for example in Syria.
The equity markets seem to be selling off in the last couple of days. They didn’t react much at the start of the Ukraine crisis. Have the insiders got wind of something ? Why now ?
The unthinkable.
Is a world in which we aspire to get along unthinkable?
Is a world in which we manage to get along unthinkable?
Is a world without dysfunctional leadership unthinkable?
To those addicted to psy-op-doom-porn:
BREAKING!!!!!!
The world is not about to end.
…
Grieved,
Yes.
VladTheFluffy says (Part 1):
Saker
Useful and thoughtful article. My short answer is I think they would. The long answer is as follows:
PNAC
I think it clarifies things today a bit by remembering the PNAC agenda. Many in the West say that PNAC is now defunct. They’re either wrong or lying. It doesn’t need to exist as a “Think Tank” (more like a septic tank) any more since its agenda has been adopted by the CFR and thus is official fourth reich foreign policy. Many of its members (Kristol, Kagan, Wolfowitz, Reichsmarshall Cheney, Perle, Libby etc.) are still influential in the deep state. A good article summarising it is here: http://goo.gl/26AUe .Briefly its doctrine is that the demise of the USSR gave the fourth reich a unique historical opportunity to establish itself as the pre-eminent power economically, diplomatically and militarily. To achive the latter, the “fr” needed to build its military up to be able to fight multiple similtaneous wars anywhere in the world and win them. It then needed to use all means available to it to prevent any power, or power block, emerging that might challenge the pre-eminence of the “fr”. A bit like “Mein Kampf” including how its doctrine and their implications have been ignored or obfuscated by the presstitutes.
An even wider perspective about what’s happening can be obtained here: http://goo.gl/4zVuWN .
BTW when I refer to the “fr”, I’m not referring to America and its inhabitants in general, I refer to its 0.01% and the ghoulish hyeanas who assist them in murdering, impoverishing and enslaving much of the rest of the world, in order to get crumbs from their table.
Manifest Destiny
In many influential parts of the “fr” establishment, the concept of “manifest destiny” (http://goo.gl/oAqXoW) has been key. But it now doesn’t just apply to continental America, it applies to the whole world. It’s a mission, a crusade. Anyone who opposes it must, by definition, be “bad” and must be cleansed. “Can’t these savages see that we have a right, a destiny, to rule over all of them, for their own good (and plenty of good for us)”.
US War History
It’s certainly worth remembering that the “fr” has been in a nearly continuous state of war since its inception. It first started by killing a large proportion of the native population, by gunfire and starvation. It then started a war with its southern neighbour in order to grab it’s most desirable land (California, Texas, etc.); it then started a war by false flag with Spain, grabbing it’s Carribean posessions and the ‘Pines, in the latter massacring many of its MMA’s (men of military age) in reprisals for having the temerity to resist. Strange how things repeat themselves. And on and on it went: http://goo.gl/wAT6n7 . It’s also worth noting George Kennan’s (http://goo.gl/TepYV5) thoughts here: http://goo.gl/tgilCV
VladTheFluffy says (Part 2):
Dollar Standard
The foundation stone of “fr” power is the dollar standard, established towards the end of WW2 at Bretton Woods. This in effect erstablished the greenback as the world currency and allows the “fr” to print as much as it likes to buy other peoples real assets and goods. It was further enhanced in 1973 when, after the war between you-know-who and Arab nations, the latter shut off oil deliveries. The US threatened to invade and replace all of the oil states ruling families, who have been remarkably compliant and supportive of “fr” interests, including you-know-who, since then. As a result the “petro-dollar” was born, requiring anyone who bought oil to have to pay for it in dollars, even if it were, say, China buying oil from Dubai. This allows the dollar printing presses to run amok whilst still keeping the greenback’s value high. If it wasn’t for the world reserve status for the dollar, the “fr” would have Zinbabwean style inflation. This is the “fr’s” biggest Achilles heel: lose this and the “fr” has to start paying back its debts in foreign currency or real assets. With $17 trillion in external debt which, with the current “fr” government income receipts, can’t be paid (probably not even the interest) it’s default time and third world status for the “fr”. Same’s true for the “fr’s” little attack poodle, the sad little once Great Britain. Can you see them starting a war to preserve this? They think so here: http://goo.gl/YDoxiv . With Vladimir Putin pushing to unhitch Russia and the BRICS countries from the dollar standard, you have one reason why the “fr” establishment and elites fear and hate him so much.
BRICS
Now along come the BRICS countries and announce a rival to the IMF and World Bank, which won’t scalp third world countries and put them into debt slavery. This latter approach has been one of the “frs” major means of profiting from third world countries, see John Perkins’ writings. Once this goes into operation, I suspect that as many third world countries as possible will borrow from it to pay back their IMF/World Bank loans. Bang goes the “fr’s” hold on these countries raw materials and, quite likely, their supportive UN votes too.
Euro
The Euro is a potential rival to the dollar hegemony, perhaps one reason why the EU apparatchiks insistence that they will defend it to the last EU inhabitant. Since a war with Russia (the “fr” hopes) would devastate Europe more than the “fr”, is this a further incentive?
VladTheFluffy says (Part 3):
Syrian Situation
As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, there’s evidence that at the height of the crisis, the “fr” fired two cruise missiles at Syria and the Russian navy shot them down: http://goo.gl/pVGxJc and http://goo.gl/EBUkHx . It seems plausible, partly due to the references in these articles and also by how quickly the White House Puppet backed down and agreed to Russia’s proposals to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons.
Conclusion (e.g. my opinion only)
I think the “fr” both fear and hate Russia in general, and VP in particular. Reichsmarshall Cheney has already stated that he wants to see Russia broken up into regions so that it can no longer be a threat to the “fr”. I doubt that he is alone in that opinion. I believe that they see Russia as an existential threat and intend, as per PNAC doctrine to eliminate it. I’m sure that if I know some of these things, VP and the Kremlin know vastly more. They must know that the “fr” is an existential threat to Russia. I don’t see this as something that can be settled by diplomacy. The only things that can prevent a war are a) a rapid collapse of the US economy, preventing the “fr” from conducting a war b) The US population rising up and cleaning out the Augean stable that is Washington and going back to State Primacy c) Large parts of the world making it very clear that they will stand with Russia in the case of any act of war by the “fr”. Incidentally, the SCO charter apparently does include a mutual defence arrangement, like NAziTO. Since the major SCO members are Russia and China, if this is the case it’s difficult to see how the “fr” think they can win. However they may be prepared to play poker on the basis of “if we can’t have it all, no one can have anything”. If they are so demented with hubris to play that game, it’s hasta la vista baby for all of us. And some of them are so crazy they’ve convinced themselves that they can win a nuclear war with Russia. If there is one, the scientists say we’re all goners.
BTW Russia and China have, for a number of years, been accumulating gold like thay ain’t making it anymore. The only reason its price hasn’t rocketed is Fed, Wall Street and London market manipulation. Might be a hint for all of us, if we get out alive.
Hope in a few years I’ll be able to say what a craphead I am for thinking this, but facts on the ground don’t look good.
Today India vetoed the WTO’s extension of the Anglo-Zionist imperial globalization project.
<a href=”http://stateofthenation2012.com/?p=5357/>Narendra Modi’s Victory Spells Disaster For US Foreign Policy</a> as the Indian electorate elevate a man who cannot be bribed or coerced by the Anglo-Zionist Empire. After the last bloody century ignited reason and recognition of human pathology in high place in the collective human mind we begin to see a class of statesmen emerge who will not tolerate the ‘chosen people’ meme adopted by the Anglo-Zionist Empire which relegates the vast majority of humanity to subhuman slavery. The soulless nihilism of the global elites is finally arousing the sleeping tradition and knowledge of humanity’s collective past.
Men such as Vladimir Putin, Narendra Modi, Hassan Nasrullah, etc. are the result of humanity’s deep reserve of tradition, decency, and courage surfacing in the face of soulless evil of the Anglo-Zionist Psychopaths. The Age of Oligarchy is finished. The tell is the rage and hysteria in the Anglo-Zionist world press.
NO….the Anglo-Zionist Empire will not go far in attacking Russia. It is my opinion, the world governance elites are desperate to prepare a scapegoat to escape justice for war crimes and treason when the USD system collapses. When the USD goes to fiat heaven, someone will pay to maintain the infrastructure of society. In the West there exists two pools of wealth. The wealth of the twenty percent who staff the apparatus of government, academia, military, technology, infrastructure, etc. is one pool of wealth. The other is the stolen wealth of the less than one percent oligarchy. When the USD event occurs someone’s wealth will be sacrificed to maintain continuity of the edifice and infrastructure of civilization. I know people in the twenty percent who might be considered to be the ‘deep state’ as this term was originally conceived. These people will think long and hard before they will sacrifice their lives for the benefit of the one percent.
The wars and rumors of war are noise generated by the one percent mainstream media mind control apparatus as their greatest fear is the people they depend upon in their barely controlled ‘deep state’ apparatus. Putin represents the Russian people as a whole, not just the oligarchy. The oligarchy is global nihilist psychopathic families who will not maintain their privilege beyond the end of the two decade unipolar period. The Anglo-Zionists and their narcissistic ideology, criminality, greed, and pathology are being confronted world wide in the Age of the internet when we can meet human minds alert and aware of the crisis thrust upon us by the ‘chosen few’ whose thousand year project of human slavery is nearing an end. I do not fear the hysterical rage. The oligarch’s fear truth and justice asserting its self from the collective human mind. The human mind is sharpened in times of crisis and danger.
I do not believe life will commit suicide!
“I don’t agree with the idea of the US trying to win this conflict as a country. They seem to be doing everything they can to torpedo their own culture, economy, morals, etc.”
This is the critical point. The banking mafia are programmed for self-enrichment both at home and abroad so they are looting and destroying America while at the same time wanting to use the American military to help them loot and destroy abroad. They are in the process of destroying their own weapon.
And they can’t stop themselves doing it because they have no brakes.
The US economy is their weak spot and ironically Russia’s second worst enemy – the banking mafia – are also their biggest ally.
While we are talking about nukes and mil. wars, the weapons actually used by the usa are quite different.
– the us $
– image and incumbent status
– propaganda
The us$ needs no explanation and major attacks on it are well prepared.
Image and incumbent status are closely coupled with the third point, propaganda so much so as to be one evil but powerful melange.
It is the image of the (former) “super power” and its incumbent status as the leader within the nato world and some colonies like japan that provide the basis for the creation – and use – of images like “the international community”. Similarly it allows the usa to act with many faces and to enforce compliance of its colonies and vassals.
This weapon is getting dull and weak, however, as more and more citizens in the nato world, seeing more and more inconsistencies and even cracks, find their beliefs challenged and increasingly often even shattered. One major contributor to this decline is what was originally planned as yet another major stronghold and image, similar in power to nato, albeit non-military, the eu. It is the eu monstrosity that awakened discomfort and mistrust in many european citizens by bluntly obviously ignoring both belief system pillars like democratic rule and social, financial, and legal consistency.
Once awake the road to recognizing more inconsistencies and cracks in the western systems, beliefs, images and finally even the leader, the usa, was opened and quickly getting wider.
Of course Russia recognized and understood and supported this, for instance through their media. In fact, Russia turned this into a powerful weapon of their own, the “weapon of truth”. To reliably work and to achieve the best effects Russia needed to stay away from propaganda and to – also formally – stay close to the truth. It might, as a side note, in fact well have been a psyop by Russia to allow and tolerate very public criticism by even their own employees (RT); of course this made them look stupid on the surface but, in fact, that transported the core message of honesty and truth.
Similarly, while it would, of course, be desirable to convince people of the true event around the taken down MH017 flight, the primary and strategic target of Russias information and clearing campaign was not to convince that kiev was the culprit – the core message was that the us-americans and everyone in their empire were and are lying, smearing, faking and falsifying.
This is directly targetting the european citizens and, more specifically, to increase their mistrust. This again tightens and limits the actionable space of their politicians, i.e. american puppets selling out their own populace while actually serving the usa. Similarly, it vastly decreases the chance of the eu citizens accepting any outright aggression against Russia. The major component, of course, is to first make the people doubt “their” politicians and their media and then to discreetly suggest the question “cui bono?” which is bound to lead to washington but also to nurture the question “Whom do they our politicians actually serve? Us, the citzens of europe? (Hardly.)”
(… part 2)
(part 2)
Of course, this directly mirrors the real battle which is *not* attacking Russia here and now but to achieve something the declining ex-superpower vitally needs, united, trusting and obedient european vasalls and keeping the control over europe.
It might sound shocking but I’m convinced that what was meant and planned as an attack against Russia was, once that failed to smoothly proceed, actually turned into a counter attack by Russia and a *defense* by the usa. The battle we see now unfolding is about usa staying in control of europe. This is absolutely vital for the usa; failing to achieve this goal will quite directly lead to usa exit from the world-power stage. Without europe the usa is but a broken loudmouth with a worn out military that moreover has been victimized by corporatocracy that delivered ever less capability and ever more PR for ever higher prices.
Looking closer one will realize that the only quite reliable and powerful weapon still in its arsenal is propaganda, i.e. control over or willful compliance of the media.
From what I hear and see this weapon also gets more and more dull within the usa and in Russia and many not usa-aligned countries it never really worked but, from what I see, it still seems to work quite well in europe.
But this weapons will be completely dull, too, rather soon because the usa made two major errors. First, it arrogantly grossly overestimated the capabilities of the ukratine regime and their own “advisors” which led to less and less credibility of usa or, more correctly zio, remote controlled eu mass media. In fact, so much so that – look at the fine shades! – the usa didn’t serve their fake “satellite proof” themselves but rather let the ukratine regime do it; this leaves an emergency exit for the usa to say “We’ve been fooled, too! We supported them and trusted them but they lied!” but more importantly from the strategic point of view it clearly demonstrates that the usa a) doesn’t trust their ukratinian allies any more and b) that the usa lost confidence in its ukratine/Russia plan and, probably most importantly, that the usa itself doesn’t feel to avethe international standing anymore to simply say “That’s how it is, period” and to trust that this is sufficient.
Second the usa supported israel again and, making things worse, israel is behaving particularly evil and obviously and ignorantly and confrontationally evil this time attacking even UN schools and obviously being on a fashist slaughter spree.
This btw. creates a quite powerful and strategically important side effect: It draws a clear boundary line between nazis and nationalists, stealing israels classical interpretative authority and creating room and acceptance for national movements and voices in europe. To put it simple and straight: Le Pen in France is nationalist and that is acceptable while the thugs in ukratine are Nazis and so are the israelis. This might look minor to us-americans who are used to relatively high levels of free speech. In europe, however, the zionists are in almost 100% control of the terms and meanings and at great liberty to label whatever they please as anti-semitism. This is very important because it basically blocked or least made very hard the existence or growth of nationalist movement which, however, are a conditio sine qua non to go against the eu monstrosity.
The zio usa is using their last weapons to fight their survival battle and the are very close to losing on all fronts.
Saker, Many thanks for your efforts and super analysis. Great topic here and all good comments by the collective. It is said predictions are hard, especially those about the future. The end game here is tough as it is Dependant on variables beyond the purview of most. To muddy the waters I will offer a totally possibility. What if the ultimate sstrategyis to cause the end of the USA. For some reason or another anything is possible, no?
Here is an interview with an ordinary Russian volunteer with the rebels. I guess that he hasn’t seen much action. It is also clear that he isn’t a GRU agent. I think that he is very misguided. I worry that my Russian landlady’s 14 year old son will be tempted into such an adventure. She is a fanatical nationalist.
http://www.4vsar.ru/articles/sobesednik/50693.html
@What happened to those 4 ballistic missiles reported by CNN and so mysteriously disappeared as a hot news item? This is significant. If the Russians just shot them down and no one said anything on either side this is of supreme importance
It is indeed. And like after the downing of the missiles (also unobtrusively)launched against Syria we hear that music again:
“Barack Obama spoke by telephone with Russia’s Vladimir Putin for the first time since a Malaysian airliner was shot down in Ukraine….The president reinforced his preference for a diplomatic solution to the crisis in Ukraine.
The Kremlin statement said “significant differences” remained between the two leaders but that both emphasised the importance of an “immediate and sustained ceasefire” in eastern Ukraine.
The two leaders agreed to keep open their channels of communication, the White House said.
Obama also raised his concerns about what Washington says was a violation by Russia of the 1988 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty designed to eliminate ground-launched cruise missiles”.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/01/putin-obama-sanctions-russia-ukraine-counterproductive
IMHO it is a new plain demonstration that Russia has the upper hand in matters of intelligence and that any adventure would be extremely costly.
I see the Zionists controlling the western nations as veritable termites chewing at the foundations of our collective cultures. The sooner we come to grips with this and deal with the real problem the better for all of us. How far do they have to push before we come to our senses?
Saker what do you think of this notion of orchestration in regards to limited nuclear exchange? If the exchange is in the Ukraine and is limited in scope is this the war to end all wars redux? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-08-01/internationalists-are-pushing-world-towards-globally-engineered-economic-warfare?
Saker what do you think of this notion of orchestration in regards to limited nuclear exchange? If the exchange is in the Ukraine and is limited in scope is this the war to end all wars redux? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-08-01/internationalists-are-pushing-world-towards-globally-engineered-economic-warfare?
For those that may be interested in a theory proposed back in early march of this year in response to a rather long thread topic relating to the proposed isolation of Russia and the position of Germany at the time. Please ponder the following, keeping in mind that much time has passed and some things may have swayed a bit…
This one is very tricky and there are a couple of ways to look at it sorta but if ya may remember a while back I mentioned that Germany was gonna play into all of this somehow. Here are a couple of scenarios that may have actually converged. the first is the blatant lie that was attributed to Merkel about Putin that fueled the fires and the rhetoric since they spoke the other day, but more on that later. Let’s take a trip down memory lane first and explore the Target Germany theory in two parts since the first try was too large to fit in one comment box.
Way before this Ukraine situation came up and before the intervention into Libya and even further back before Iraq was invaded, occupied and destroyed, and even further back before Afghanistan was invaded and occupied it really seemed like there was a long play being made on Germany.
Basically around the time of the dot com bubble burst and before the Enron scandal emerged, let’s pick a month, say Septemberish. At the time te USD was under great pressures due to the massive debts that were accumulated under GW’s first term and a lot of missing $$$. this little tidbit was made public by the Donald on say, the 10th.
The following day there was a great diversion that allowed the missing $$$ to be long forgotten and it also provided some cover for the, known to select insiders, to conceal the pending Enron Scandal that was beginning to emerge.
This was gonna be a great problem for the USD so there needed to be some very expensive, in the hundreds of billions of $$$ to provide an excuse to start printing $$$ willy nilly to bury the losses in the figures and assure that certain insiders did not lose their shirts, so to speak.
Since markets hate uncertainty and investors like to short currencies and since there was an issue surrounding pressures being placed on the USD as the worlds trading currency, there needed to be pressure placed upon the Euro and the Dinar(s) to assure the USD did not collapse.
(cont’d…)
(…cont’d)
In order to remove any potential competition as the global trading currency the Euro had to be suppressed and the Dinar(s) needed to be eliminated since it was the only gold backed currency. This would remove the Euro and/or Dinar from being an option for Iran, Iraq, China, Russia, Libya, etc. as an alternative trading currency if the USD collapsed, which it should have as it was pretty much worthless, comparatively speaking. If not, trading nations would not be so reliant upon the USD as there would be at least 2 acceptable currencies available in the event it did collapse.
Moving forward a bit, the Dinars have been dealt with by the assassinations of Saddam and Gaddafi as well as the utter destruction of Iraq’s and Libya’s infrastructures and societies. But that cost even more $$$ so the presses had to keep printing USD’s because those “stupid” 6th century warriors that collapsed the USSR in 10yrs also did the same to the US, in 10yrs.
Now, in between those 20yrs the euro was created pretty much by the US and UK to assure that neither France’s Franc nor Germany’s Deutsche Mark could become the next global currency. Keep in mind that after they decoupled the USD from the gold standard in ’73 and swapped into the petrodollar model, the USD had already been firmly established as the global black market currency and the CDN dollar was pegged to the USD at the same time.
The play then went into China to attempt to decouple it from a mixed commodities base currency. That actually did not work, but at the same time there were additional pressures placed on the Ruble and the Dinar. While the USSR did collapse, the Ruble did not die out thanks to Putin who decoupled the oligarchs from it and in return provided acceptable reforms that Gorbachev would not and the first attempt at crushing the Dinar failed as well but it was set back.
(cont’d…)
(…cont’d)
Moving forward and back sorta here, with the Franc and Mark outta the picture, the CDN dollar being converted into a petrodollar pegged to the USD and in anticipation of the death of the dinars, the new Euro needed to be contained. This paved the way for the initial EU creation and steady expansion to root out all of the other currencies and build up massive debts as a counter balance. This was due to the costs and looting associated with engaging those 6th century warriors that did not allow the balance to be reached, which threatened the USD once again.
Now in order to assure the USD had any chance, there had to be a financial crisi of epic proportions so that there was an excuse to begin massivly printing USD’s. This allowed massive debts within the EU, whic would require more members to absorb and redistribute the debts further. The problem was that both France and Germany had strong and stable economies but still took a hit. France was screwed into becoming the police for Africa to contain it and they had to use austerity measures to pay for their military endeavours. Around the same time, Ireland, Iceland, Spain, Italy and Greece were about to default on their debt obligations.
While Iceland chose an unanticipated off the beat solution and came out of it, Ireland chose to become the middle man partner for global corporate tax avoidance with the established offshore Commonwealth zero tax havens, the others were forced to trade drastic austerity in exchange for IMF loans.
During this period, the BRICS began creating a multi-commodities based trading currency which has, behind the scenes, put a real chill into the future of the USD. So, there needed to be some action taken to thwart this potential competition.
While all of this was going on, over the past couple of years or so, the Fed assUmed that most of the black market hard USD’s were outside the country since the push towards credit/debit vs hard currency has been pretty successful, or so they though. it turned out that up to 80% of that hard currency was actually inside the US and is where the Detroit(s) factor in, in many ways.
(cont’d…)
(cont’d…)
While all of this was going on, over the past couple of years or so, the Fed assUmed that most of the black market hard USD’s were outside the country since the push towards credit/debit vs hard currency has been pretty successful, or so they though. it turned out that up to 80% of that hard currency was actually inside the US and is where the Detroit(s) factor in, in many ways.
Within the City itself, virtually all transactions are cash and because everybody knows, based upon the past 20-40 yrs, that the Feds and State only loot cash out to the suburbs and the City officials loot what does trickle in, they won’t pay taxes or due to the lack of jobs, can’t pay taxes. The people pretty much gave the entire system the big FU a long time ago and it has been pretty much off the grid, as they say, and why it went eventually went bankrupt. This was not due to the people because the revenues the City was taking in, was continuously looted by corrupt public officials and why there was no appetite for any investors. The problem really was that after industry left in the 60’s and 70’s due to an aging infrastructure that dates back to the industrial revolution and moved to newer modern facilities in brand new cities (suburbs) that offered massive tax incentives and large parcels of land. Now that the damage is done, the neighbourhoods are overgrown, burned out and abandoned, it is getting sold off to the lowest bidders, many of which are the offspring of the industrialists that left a couple of generations ago. So that proves, ya actually can go home again.
Now moving to today, and Germany. It is the only Western nation that knows how to actually manage an economy and historically dating back to at least the early 1800’s has. Germany also has one of the strongest economies, modern up to date infrastructures and strong social institutions with a high quality educated society and a good standard of living that still has unions and good pay with benefits.
So in a nutshell and back to Ukraine, the proxy. The reason for WW1 was to crush it and it worked for a generation. The reason for WW2 was to crush it and that worked for a generation. The reason for the Euro was an attempt at crushing it that really did not work so the reason for non-stop EU Integration is to crush it and they need to collapse the Euro to do it.
As for Russia, it is a great play in many ways, first it will help crush Germany and Russia by way of the same proxy, Ukraine, and it will also allow the blame to be spread between them for a generation or two. Now it’s the mercenaries and para-military neo-Nazis being the foot soldiers for the oligarchs and capitalists that prefer the the currency of their own creation, the USD. This is the face of the first large scale 6th Generation Warfare operation.
But of coarse, it is just a theory…
VladTheFluffy says:
Saker
As an addendum to my post above, here are two interesting articles. Unfortunately they are interesting in the sense of the ancient Chinese curse:
By Pepe Escobar: http://goo.gl/sSyf5f
From Chris Martenson: http://goo.gl/1MVhNu
Escobar’s article is his usual sharp insight. Martenson’s is particularly scary in this section: “A GOP Ultimatum to Vlad”.
I’ve said in previous posts that Washington is already at war with Russia, even if it doesn’t have the cojones to come clean and say so outright. Its unilateral sanctions assault is tantamount to an act of war, and it’s black propaganda is beating the war drums with 14 pound sledgehammers.
Corker’s bill, if adopted, is tantamount to an open declaration of war. If you make threats knowing full well that the “threatenee” can’t or will not under any circumstance comply with the threat, only one outcome is possible. Corker’s bill is basically saying “Do what the fourth reich tells you or else …”. Even if Vladimir Putin had any notion of complying I suspect that the rest of Russia would ditch him in favour of a real hard-line “bring it on” replacement. It doesn’t leave a lot of room for manoeuvre unless the White House Invertebrate Puppet borrows a backbone from someone and vetoes the bill.
This may be a black psyop so that the WHIP can say “I’m trying to hold them back but look what pressures I’m under”, i.e. a type of “Good cop, bad cop” scenario. Hope VP’s upgraded ballistic nukes are ready. It really looks like they’ll be performing more than just a trial soon if the psychopathic hubris epidemic in Washington doesn’t break soon. PCR published this article recently: http://goo.gl/XTaVZj . There’s no such thing as a containable or winnable nuclear war. Unfortunately the multiple winners of the Washington insanity contest (held multiple times per day) think otherwise. Been nice knowing you.
What on earth makes you want to live in that madhouse, or anywhere in the West anymore?
Hi Saker …”The destruction of the future of mankind, which belongs for a certain time, to Russia, just as much as the time period when it belonged to Egypt, or Greece or India…this is what the Anglo-American Establishment wants to prevent….and keep it for themselves…Like the parliaments in every country now, that dictate all the decisions made in the world today is English…”
Saker: I just wanted to correct the faulty English I used for this sentence…
The future of Mankind that rightfully belongs to Russia for the next 3 or 4 thousand years, is willfully being destroyed by the decadent members of the Anglo-American Establishment…the English… whose rightful time is now and the recent past…for example… the English Parliament…now its part of every country in the world with small differences in the details. That’s part of history that was rightful but now is becoming decadent.
I would also like to point out that when I think of Rothschild, who is a fervent Zionist…I think of him as English long before I conceive of him as Jewish…its the English that have created modern Israel…
I
http://www.infowars.com/ukrainians-protest-against-conscription-orders/
This is very encouraging to see. Opposition to the war and to conscription are spreading across Ukraine.
“It is very important that people who speak out against the mobilization of the civilian population should see that they are not isolated. There are a great many of them,” a well-known Ukrainian television journalist and commentator, Ostap Drozdov, said as the protests grew.”
“My program yesterday (on the regional television channel ZIK) can be considered the start of an informal campaign to boycott the mobilization. I state my intention to give my utmost support to this initiative, which goes by the provisional name ‘Mobilization Equals Genocide,’” he said.”
I believe your re-assessment in “thinking the unthinkable” is close enough to the reality of the situation that the scenarios envisioned could very likely come to pass if not precisely for the stated reasons. America rulers are not irrational to the point of taking everyone down with them because they can’t get their own way like some sort of spoiled child. However, never assume that these western rich and powerful play for anything other than keeps. Don’t assume that a brinkmanship play, especially if based on known lies as in Syria or with MH 17, is backed up by their honour, because it isn’t. They will simply regroup and try another or different ploy. These western rich and powerful will appear to be madmen if that is what it takes to win….
This looks more like a typical declining empire’s “strategy”, that is building up and relentlessly demonizing the image of a new “foe” (Putin’s Russia) to strenghten its own weakening coalition (the “West”).
The French dissident Michel Drac (close to Alain Soral and possibly even brighter…yes) describes it extremely well: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x21a0a9_le-mondialisme-enjeux-et-perspectives-partie-2_webcam
Considering what has happened in the last 20-30 years:
– the destruction of the family with the attendant demographic consequence of a serious deficit in the number of our children
– the destruction of our education with the attendant result that our (remaining) children and students have become the helpless prey of destabilizing and destructive social theories.
– the destruction of our individual and social values with the resuling destruction of our human relations (money is apparently the only “value” that is still tolerated – the idea of helping/needing others is disappearing fast)
so:
if some power wanted to destroy the West by subversive means, they would be hard pressed to find a better and more successful way.
Now what is the link with war?
Wouldn’t a world war – of the Empire of lies against the sole remaining defender of freedom, with hopefully lots and lots of victims on all sides – be the crowning jewel of such a plan?
Great analysis from The Saker. Enjoyed reading it.
I would like a ad another possible option the war crazies in the US & EU might be planning:
The guerilla war scenario similar to the one in Syria.
How vulnerable is Russia to such a scheme?
Lots of forest to hide in, lots of vulnerable infrastructure,