Progress Report on the US-Russian War
The Saker
In my very first column for the Unz review entitled “A Tale of Two World Orders” I described the kind of multipolar international system regulated by the rule of law Russia, China and their allies and friends (whether overt or covert) worldwide are trying to build and how dramatically different it was from the single World Hegemony and AngloZionist attempted to establish worldwide (and almost successfully imposed upon our suffering planet!). In a way, the US imperial leaders are right, Russia does represent an existential threat, not for the United States as a country or for its people, but for the AngloZionist Empire, just as the latter represents an existential threat to Russia. Furthermore, Russia represents a fundamental civilizational challenge to what is normally called the “West” as she openly rejects its post-Christian (and, I would add, also viscerally anti-Islamic) values. This is why both sides are making an immense effort at prevailing in this struggle.
Last week the anti-imperial camp scored an major victory with the meeting between Presidents Putin, Rouhani and Erdogan in Sochi: they declared themselves the guarantors of a peace plan which will end the war against the Syrian people (the so-called “civil war”, which this never was) and they did so without even inviting the USA to participate in the negotiations. Even worse, their final statement did not even mention the USA, not once. The “indispensable nation” was seen as so irrelevant as to not even be mentioned.
To fully measure how offensive all this is we need to stress a number of points:
First, lead by Obama, all the leaders of the West declared urbi et orbi and with immense confidence that Assad had no future, that he had to go, that he was already a political corpse and that he would have no role whatsoever to play in the future of Syria.
Second, the Empire created a “coalition” of 59 (!) countries which failed to achieve anything, anything at all: a gigantic multi-billion dollar worth “gang that could not shoot straight” lead by CENTCOM and NATO and which only proved it most abject incompetence. In contrast, Russia never had more than 35 combat aircraft in Syria at any time turned the course of the war (with a lot of Iranian and Hezbollah help on the ground).
Next, the Empire decreed that Russia was “isolated” and her economy “in tatters” – all of which the Ziomedia parroted with total fidelity. Iran was, of course, part of the famous “Axis of Evil” while Hezbollah was the “A-Team of terrorism”. As for Erdogan, the AngloZionist tried to overthrow and kill him. And now it is Russia, Iran, Hezbollah and Turkey who defeated the terrorists and who will call the shots in Syria.
Finally, when the USA realized that putting Daesh in power in Damascus was not going to happen, they first tried to break up Syria (Plan B) and then tried to create a Kurdish statelet in Iraq and Syria (Plan C). All these plans failed, Assad is in Russia giving hugs to Putin while Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corp Quds Force Commander General Soleimani is taking a stroll through the last Syrian city to be liberated from Daesh.
Can you imagine how totally humiliated, ridiculed and beat the US leaders feel today? Being hated or resisted is one thing, but being totally ignored – now that hurts!
As for a strategy, the best they came up with was what I would call a “petty harassment of Russia”: making RT sign up as a foreign agent, stealing ancient art from Russia, strip Russian athletes from medals en masse, trying to ban the Russian flag and anthem from the Olympics in Seoul or banning Russian military aircraft from the next Farnborough airshow. And all these efforts achieve is making Putin even more popular, the West even more hated, and the Olympics even more boring (ditto for Farnborough – the MAKS and the Dubai Air Shows are so much ‘sexier’ anyway). Oh, I almost forgot, the “new Europeans” will continue their mini-war against old Soviet statues to their liberators. It’s just like the US mini-war on the Russian representations in the USA, a clear sign of weakness.
Speaking of weakness.
This is becoming comical. The US media, especially CNN, cannot let a day go by without mentioning the evil Russians, the US Congress is engaged in a mass hysteria trying to figure out who of the Republicans or the Democrats have had more contacts with the Russians, NATO commanders are crapping their pants in abject terror (or so they say!) every time the Russian military organizes any exercise, US Navy and Air Force representatives regularly whine about Russian pilots making “unprofessional intercepts”, the British Navy goes into full combat mode when a single (and rather modest) Russian aircraft carrier transits through the English Channel – but Russia is, supposedly, the “weak” country here.
Does that make sense to you?
The truth is that the Russians are laughing. From the Kremlin, to the media, to the social media – they are even make hilarious sketches about how almighty they are and how they control everything. But mostly the Russians are laughing their heads off wondering what in the world the folks in the West are smoking to be so totally terrified (at least officially) by a non-existing threat.
You know what else they are seeing?
That western political leaders are seeking safety in numbers. Hence the ridiculously bloated “coalitions” and all the resolutions coming out of various European and trans-Atlantic bodies. Western politicians are like schoolyard nerds who, fearing the tough kid, huddle together to look bigger. Every Russian kid knows that seeking safety in numbers is a surefire sign of a scared wimp. In contrast, the Russians also remember how a tiny nation of less than 2 million people had the courage to declare war on Russia and how they fought the Russians hard, really hard. I am talking about the Chechens of course. Yeah, love them or hate them – but there is no denying that Chechens are courageous. Ditto for Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. The Russians were impressed. And even though the Nazis inflicted an unspeakable amount of suffering on the Russian people, the Russians never deny that the German soldiers and officers were skilled and courageous. There is even a Russian saying “I love/respect the courageous man in the Tatar/Mongol” (люблю молодца и в татарине). So Russians have no problem seeing courage in their enemies.
But US/NATO armies? They all act as if Conchita Wurst was their Commander in Chief!
Remember this:
None of these man were kind or “nice” in any way. But they mattered. They were relevant. And they wielded some very real power.
Today, real power looks like this:
And you know what is really offensive to the AngloZionist leaders?
That this photo shows one Orthodox Christian and two Muslims.
Now that’s offensive. And very frightening, of course.
We are very, very far from the “birth of a new Middle-East” promised by Condi Rice (it is a new Middle-East alright, just not the one Rice and the Neocons had in mind!)
As for the “only democracy in the Middle-East” it is now in full panic mode, hence their now overt plan to work with the Saudis against Iran and their clearly staged leaks about bombing all Iranian assets up to 40km from the Israeli border. But that train has already left the station: the Syrian won and not amount of airstrikes will change that. So just to make sure they still look really fierce, the Israelis are now adding that in case of a war between Israel and Hezbollah, Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah would be a target. Wow! Who would have thought?!
Can you hear the giggles coming out of Beirut?
The scary thing is that the folks in DC, Riyadh and Jerusalem hear them loud and clear which means that sooner or later they will have to do something about it and that “something” will be the usual nonsensical bloodbath this “Axis of Kindness” has been made famous for: if you can’t beat their military, make their civilians pay (think Kosovo 1999, Lebanon 2006, Yemen 2015). Either that or beat the shit out of a tiny, defenseless victim (Grenada 1983, Gaza 2008, Bahrain 2011). Nothing like a good massacre of defenseless civilians to make them feel manly, respected and powerful (and, for US Americans – “indispensable”, of course).
Setting aside the case of the Middle-East, I think we can begin to see the outlines of what the USA and Russia will be doing in the next couple of years.
Russia: the Russian strategy towards the Empire is simple:
- Try to avoid as much as possible and for as long as possible any direct military confrontation with the USA because Russia is still the weaker side (mostly in quantitative terms). That, and actively preparing for war under the ancient si vis pacem para bellum strategy.
- Try to cope as best can be with all the “petty harassment”: the USA still has infinitely more “soft power” than Russia and Russia simply does not have the means to strike back in kind. So she does the minimum to try to deter or weaken the effects of that kind of “petty harassment” but, in truth, there is not much she can do about it besides accepting it as a fact of life.
- Rather than trying to disengage from the AngloZionist controlled Empire (economically, financially, politically), Russia will very deliberately contribute to the gradual emergence of an alternative realm. A good example of that is the Chinese-promoted New Silk Road which is being built without any meaningful role for the Empire.
USA: the US strategy is equally simple:
- Use the Russian “threat” to give a meaning and a purpose to the Empire, especially NATO.
- Continue and expand the “petty harassment” against Russia on all levels.
- Subvert and weaken as much as possible any country or politician showing any signs of independence or disobedience (including New Silk Road countries)
Both sides are using delaying tactics, but for diametrically opposite reasons: Russia because time is on her side and the USA because they have run out of options.
It is important to stress here that in this struggle Russia is at a major disadvantage: while the Russians want to build something, the US Americans only want to destroy it (examples include Syria, of course, but also the Ukraine or, for that matter, a united Europe). Another major disadvantage for Russia is that most governments out there as still afraid of antagonizing the Empire in any way, thus the deafening silence and supine submissiveness of the “concert of nations” when Uncle Sam goes on one of his usual rampages in total violation of international law and the UN Charter. This is probably changing, but very, very slowly. Most world politicians are just like US Congressmen: prostitutes (and cheap ones at that).
The biggest advantage for Russia is that the USA are internally falling apart economically, socially, politically – you name it. With every passing year the once most prosperous United States are starting to look more and more like some backwater Third World country. Oh sure, the US economy is still huge (but rapidly shrinking!), but that is meaningless when financial wealth and social wealth are conflated into one completely misleading index of pseudo-prosperity. This sad, really, a country which ought to be prosperous and happy is being bled to death by the, shall we say, “imperial parasite” feeding on it.
At the end of the day, political regimes can only survive by the consent of those it rules. In the United States this consent is clearly in the process of being withdrawn. In Russia it has never been stronger. This translates into a major fragility of the USA and, therefore, the Empire (the USA are by far the biggest host of the AngloZionist imperial parasite) and a major source of staying power for Russia.
All of the above applies only to political regimes, of course. The people of Russia and of the USA have exactly the same interests: bringing down the Empire with the least amount of violence and suffering as possible. Like all Empires, the US Empire mostly abused others in its formative and peak years, but as any decaying Empire it is now mostly abusing its own people. It is therefore vital to always repeat that an “Empire-free USA” would have no reason to see an enemy in Russia and vice-versa. In fact, Russia and the USA could be ideal partners, but the “imperial parasites” will not allow that to happen. Thus we are all stuck in an absurd and dangerous situation which could result in a war which would completely destroy most of our planet.
For whatever it’s worth, and in spite of the constant hysterical russophobia in the US Ziomedia, I detect absolutely no sign whatsoever that this campaign is having any success with the people in the USA. At most, some of them naively buy into the “the Russians tried to interfere in our elections” fairytale, but even in this case this belief is mitigated by “no big deal, we also do that in other countries”. I have yet to meet a US American who would seriously believe that Russia is any kind of danger. I don’t even detect superficial reactions of hostility when, for example, I speak Russian with my family in a public place. Typically, we are asked what language we are speaking and when we reply “Russian” the reaction normally is “cool!”. Quite often I even hear “what do you think of Putin? I really like him”. This is in severe contrast with the federal government whom the vast majority of US Americans seem to hate with a passion.
To summarize it all, I would say that at this point in time of the US-Russian war, Russia is wining, the Empire is losing and the USA is suffering. As for the EU it is “enjoying” a much deserved irrelevance while being mostly busy absorbing wave after wave of society-destroying refugees proving, yet again, the truth of the saying that if your head is in the sand, your ass is in the air.
This war is far from over, I don’t even think that we have reached it’s peak yet and things are going to get worse before they get better again. But all in all, I am very optimistic that the Axis of Kindness will bite the dust in a relatively not too distant future.
The Saker
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48332.htm