guardian | The US and its allies would destroy Russia’s
troops and equipment in Ukraine – as well as sink its Black Sea fleet –
if the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, uses nuclear weapons in thecountry, former CIA director and retired four-star army general David Petraeus warned on Sunday.
Petraeus
said that he had not spoken to national security adviser Jake Sullivan
on the likely US response to nuclear escalation from Russia, which administration officials have said has been repeatedly communicated to Moscow.
He
told ABC News: “Just to give you a hypothetical, we would respond by
leading a Nato – a collective – effort that would take out every Russian
conventional force that we can see and identify on the battlefield in Ukraine and also in Crimea and every ship in the Black Sea.”
The
warning comes days after Putin expressed views that many have
interpreted as a threat of a larger war between Russia and the west.
Asked
if the use of nuclear weapons by Russia in Ukraine would bring America
and Nato into the war, Petraeus said that it would not be a situation
triggering the alliance’s Article 5, which calls for a collective
defense. That is because Ukraine is not part of Nato – nonetheless, a
“US and Nato response” would be in order, Petraeus said.
Petraeus
acknowledged that the likelihood that radiation would extend to Nato
countries under the Article 5 umbrella could perhaps be construed as an
attack on a Nato member.
“Perhaps you can make
that case,” he said. “The other case is that this is so horrific that
there has to be a response – it cannot go unanswered.”
Yet,
Petraeus added, “You don’t want to, again, get into a nuclear
escalation here. But you have to show that this cannot be accepted in
any way.”
Nonetheless, with pressure mounting
on Putin after Ukrainian gains in the east of the country under last
week’s annexation declaration and resistance to mobilization efforts
within Russia mounting, Petraeus said Moscow’s leader was “desperate”.
“The
battlefield reality he faces is, I think, irreversible,” he said. “No
amount of shambolic mobilization, which is the only way to describe it;
no amount of annexation; no amount of even veiled nuclear threats can
actually get him out of this particular situation.
“At
some point there’s going to have to be recognition of that. At some
point there’s going to have to be some kind of beginning of
negotiations, as [Ukrainian] President [Volodymyr] Zelenskiy has said,
will be the ultimate end.”
Been thinking about Putin’s speech after having read it earlier. I
swear that in one or two parts, he said something that gives context to this war. The outlines
of the plan are long visible.
Force Russia to take action to save the
people of the Donbass
Have the entire west hit them with massive
sanctions unprecedented in history
Seize all their off-shore wealth
Cause the Russian economy to implode
Have the locals topple Putin for Navalny or some other traitorous compradore
Move in and privatize & de-industrialize
everything
Break up Russia into smaller countries
Exploited these and turn them against one another like Iraq.
None of this is secret now but these were the broad outlines. But why? I
had assumed that given a choice of Russia and China, that Russia would
have seemed the easier target which when successful, would leave
China ripe for the taking. After that, the rest of the world will have
to fall in line for the west.
But in his speech, Putin said this:‘And here it is important to recall that the West bailed itself
out of its early 20th century challenges with World War I. Profits from
World War II helped the United States finally overcome the Great
Depression and become the largest economy in the world, and to impose on
the planet the power of the dollar as a global reserve currency. And
the 1980s crisis – things came to a head in the 1980s again – the West
emerged from it unscathed largely by appropriating the inheritance and
resources of the collapsed and defunct Soviet Union. That’s a fact.’
Putting it together, what if this is all of what this is all
about?
Think of the 2008 crash which is supposed to have only cost $2
trillion (and the rest!). Think of the unholy amounts of Quantitative
Easing that has been done since then to make the banks whole and
profitable, to keep the FIRE sector safe. And then think of the massive
amount of money that has been printed since the pandemic started.
It is a veritable ocean of
debt!
It cannot stay that way. In fact it is getting worse. It is not
sustainable.
So if Nuland and the Neocons could cause Russia to fall, wouldn’t all the
untold wealth (~$77 Trillion) of that country not serve rather handsomely toward the goal of making some of this mountain of debt go away? Is all of WW-III about making western debt go
away? A lot of already wealthy people would become even wealthier. This great pirate adventure would advance a lot of careers.
gilbertdoctorow | The United States and Collective West are in open conflict with
Russia for its insubordination, for its insistence on being itself and
not following a diktat from anyone. The Collective West is intent on
Russia’s destruction, its break-up into smaller units easier to control
and colonize. The spoliation of Russia by the West at the time the
country was flat on its back in the 1990s amounted to 1 trillion
dollars.
Putin characterized the information war and lies propagated by the
West about Russia as worthy of Goebbels, following the principle that
the more outrageous is the lie, the more it is repeated, the greater the
likelihood it will be believed and accepted.
The speech had very little content drawing on current events, aside
from the referendums in the respective territories which have now become
‘subjects of the Russian Federation.’ He did mention the destruction
of the Nord Stream pipelines in one sentence, as the work of the
‘Anglo-Saxons,’ which in the context we may take to mean the United
Kingdom. It will be interesting to see in the coming days whether
Russian diplomats put forward this allegation in international forums
like the United Nations.
As for the speaker, he was in top form. His delivery was self-assured and smooth. He looked radiant and in good health.
Judging by the faces of those who were repeatedly captured by the
cameramen, the mood of the audience was predominantly, almost
exclusively somber, similar to when Putin delivered his announcement on
recognition of the sovereignty of the Donetsk and Lugansk republics in
the days leading up to the 24 February launch of the ‘special military
operation.’ I call out in particular Prime Minister Mishustin, chief of
the presidential administration Kiriyenko, speaker of the Federation
Council Matviyenko, Speaker of the State Duma Volodin, former president
and head of the Security Council Medvedev, head of the Just Russia party
Mironov, head of Foreign Intelligence Naryshkin, head of the foreign
affairs committee of the Federation Council Kosachev, minister of
foreign affairs Lavrov. The weight and responsibility before history
for the fate of the country at this critical time could be read on all
these faces.
Curiously, the party leader of the Communists, Zyuganov, was not
picked out by the cameras; presumably, he would have been in a more
celebratory mood. And the only major Russian politician who surely would
have smiled broadly, Zhirinovsky, has been dead now for six months. Oh,
yes, there was on the dais one man who was clearly in very good
spirits: the leader of the Donetsk Republic, Pushilin.
Where does the campaign in Ukraine go from here? There was
absolutely nothing in Putin’s speech to answer that question. The only
mention of Kiev in this connection was his insistence that Russia stands
ready to enter into negotiations on condition that the status of the
four new ‘subjects’ of the Russian Federation not be discussed, since
their fate was solved now once and for all.
For the world at large, Vladimir Putin has set out a broad and vastly
damaging condemnation of the Collective West which no one can ignore.
He has thrown down his gauntlet.
From the beginning of the ‘special military operation’ there has been
speculation among expert observers of all political stripes that Russia
would never have dared to invade Ukraine had he not had the backing of
China’s president Xi. It was assumed by others that the stress of the
war and of the sanctions imposed by the West has made Russia a junior
partner of China, with all the loss of independence that implies.
However, I would maintain that with this speech the Russians have both
the Chinese and the Indians by the tail, not the other way around.
There is no way that either of these great powers can walk away from
Russia without losing all credibility in the Global South as champions
of a multipolar world and challengers to the rapacious collective West.
globaltimes | Europe's energy issues are growing even bigger. The recent sabotage of
Nord Stream pipelines has exposed how fragile European energy
infrastructure security is. But even as the energy crisis deepens,
Europe is still following Washington's hard line against Russia,
disregarding the impact such a policy may have on itself.
On
Wednesday, in response to the results of referenda on "joining Russia"
in four Russian-occupied regions in Ukraine, European Commission
President Ursula von der Leyen claimed that the European Union (EU) was
proposing the eighth round of sanctions against Russia, including a
price cap on Russian oil. This continues to jeopardize the hope for
Europe to resolve its current energy problems.
It is an absolute
tragedy for Europe that its dependence on Washington has grown to such
an extent that it has to dance to US' tune regarding its Russian policy.
EU countries have escalated their sanctions against Russia step by
step. In the end, the EU and Russia will both suffer, but the needs of
the US will be satisfied.
Europe's strategic autonomy and control
over its economy have been substantially crippled by the Russia-Ukraine
conflict and US' manipulation. Europe has fallen into confusion after
losing its strategic autonomy, which is leading to the emergence of
certain irrationality. The imprudent sanction decisions made by EU
officials harm Europe itself, because some people and businesses have to
leave the continent in the face of worsening crises.
When the
military conflict between Moscow and Kiev broke out, many Europeans
believed that it's them plus Americans against the Russians. But reality
has proven them wrong: Europe is also a piece of meat on Washington's
chopping block.
Europe's sufferings are worth thinking about by
countries all over the world, especially some of the US allies and
partners in the Asia-Pacific region: When they blindly follow the US to
consolidate its dominance in the world, who on earth will actually
benefit?
These countries also need to see that while the European
economy falls deeper into recession, Washington continues leeching onto
it to rake it in from the disasters Europe is suffering from.
“The gap between what the administration is claiming as their foreign policy objectives, and what it is actually willing to do, is a serious problem for American security, for Russia and beyond,” writes @KoriSchake. https://t.co/SX32lJKNgM
Desperate ruling classes are now ideologically,
economically,
and institutionally primed to undergo this phase-shift. Public reaction will now only accelerate a process that has been going on
for some time. Anyone naive enough to believe their person or monies safe in the United States has yet to realize that they dwell in the very eye of
this storm.
The U.S. has gotten into the habit of
abusing the rights of foreigners outside the rule of law e.g. , Guantanamo Bay for alleged terrorists, sanctions against citizens of
other countries, bombing those countries - and so forth. Cutting and pasting these habits for use against U.S. citizens is a simple step. We have all witnessed it big time
being used against anyone who steps out of line with the current “narrative du
jour”.
NeoCons are the point of the spear. They are _not_ the spear itself. Do you seriously believe that the NeoCons – all
by themselves – could mount an effort which destroyed the middle-east, attempted the subversion of China - and now the systematic dismemberment of Russia
… all without a plan?
Without a broader team?
Not likely.
It’s a few thousand key
people forcing some billions to their will.
It took decades to get all this work done, in the face of the other 7 billion people’s rage and opposition.
A few thousand people have planned for and managed to hang on to a perfectly untenable position with sheer nerve, audacity,
and the malevolence of modern-day Divine Right of Kings.
Look what they have been willing to kill and destroy to hold on to their prerogatives!!!
It’s never a good idea to underestimate your adversary, and this talk of “incompetence” and “stupidity” is exhibit A
of blithe self-delusion.
Let’s review a few facts:
a. They control the media. Lockstep. Same in the EU. Controlled - Lock - Stock - Barrel.
b. They control all the politicians. All across the Anglo-Zionist hegemony - Locked-down. c. They control the money supply, and the flow of money and resources in
order to keep the minions on their side.
You don’t get that level of control – all, and I mean every single key point of control – without a plan.
“The European energy war..one of the biggest
economic policy errors in history”?!?!
Nah...,
That’s not an economic policy
blunder, it’s a deliberate foreign policy decision dealing with energy.
In regard to the international recognition of the incorporation of the plebiscite - three issues are relevant.
Russia is a federation of states and incorporation is amenable under the Russian Federation constitution.
Annexation of territory since WWII is prohibited absolutely under
international law. Although not apparently under the law of the United
States as in United States v. Huckabee (1872). The Russian Federation
constituted its action in Ukraine as a 'Special
Military Operation' and did not declare war on Ukraine precisely for
this reason under international law and for the political objective of
incorporating the ethnic Russian oblasts democratically within the
Russian Federation. Putin is NOT Hitler and the Russian
Federation is NOT Nazi Germany under international law (contra the
annexation of Austria and the Sudetenland by Nazi Germany by military
conquest).
The recognition under international law of the plebiscite oblasts as
constituent parts of the Russian Federation can and will proceed under
the principle of cession where Ukraine either by treaty or waiver over a
period of time gives up its sovereignty claims
to the oblasts. Article 1 of the Montevideo Convention on Rights and
Duties of States provides that a stateshould possess a defined territory. So it will be a question of time or treaty.
The legal recognition of the plebiscite oblasts
under international law will be effected over time if the fascists in
Kiev refuse to recognize the de facto loss of territory by the
international law principle of prescription. Prescription is activated by occupation, and refers to the acquisition of
sovereignty by way of the actual exercise of sovereignty, maintained for
a reasonable period of time, that is effected without objection from
other states.
If the strutting little penis piano player in Kiev maintains his defiance of
reality, time and the facts of occupation - along with the NON-OBJECTION of
states - will effect the legality under international law.
The brilliant
action of the Russian Federation and Putin will be vindicated under international law.
With the exercise of the democratic will of the good and brave
people of the ethnic Russian oblasts - it is all over.
en.kremlin.ru |President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Citizens of Russia, citizens of the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, residents of the Zaporozhye and Kherson
regions, deputies of the State Duma, senators of the Russian Federation,
As you
know, referendums have been held in the Donetsk
and Lugansk people’s republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions.
The ballots have been counted and the results have been announced.
The people have
made their unequivocal choice.
Today
we will sign treaties on the accession of the Donetsk People’s
Republic, Lugansk People’s Republic, Zaporozhye Region and Kherson
Region to the Russian Federation. I have no doubt that the Federal
Assembly will support the constitutional laws on the accession to Russia
and the establishment of four new regions, our new constituent entities
of the Russian Federation, because this is the will of millions
of people. (Applause.)
It is undoubtedly their right, an inherent
right sealed in Article 1 of the UN Charter, which directly states the principle
of equal rights and self-determination of peoples.
I repeat, it is an inherent right of the people. It is based on our historical affinity, and it is that right that led
generations of our predecessors, those who built and defended Russia for centuries since the period of Ancient Rus, to victory.
Here in Novorossiya, [Pyotr] Rumyantsev, [Alexander]
Suvorov and [Fyodor] Ushakov fought their battles, and Catherine the Great and [Grigory]
Potyomkin founded new cities. Our grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought here
to the bitter end during the Great Patriotic War.
We
will always remember the heroes of the Russian
Spring, those who refused to accept the neo-Nazi coup d'état in Ukraine
in 2014,
all those who died for the right to speak their native language,
to preserve
their culture, traditions and religion, and for the very right to live.
We
remember the soldiers of Donbass, the martyrs of the “Odessa Khatyn,”
the victims of inhuman terrorist attacks carried out by the Kiev regime.
We commemorate
volunteers and militiamen, civilians, children, women, senior citizens,
Russians, Ukrainians, people of various nationalities; popular leader
of Donetsk Alexander Zakharchenko; military commanders Arsen Pavlov
and Vladimir
Zhoga, Olga Kochura and Alexei Mozgovoy; prosecutor of the Lugansk
Republic
Sergei Gorenko; paratrooper Nurmagomed Gadzhimagomedov and all our
soldiers and officers who died a hero’s death during the special
military operation. They are
heroes. (Applause.) Heroes of great Russia. Please join me in a minute of silence to honour their memory.
(Minute of silence.)
Thank you.
Behind
the choice of millions of residents in the Donetsk and Lugansk people's
republics, in the Zaporozhye and Kherson
regions, is our common destiny and thousand-year history. People have
passed this
spiritual connection on to their children and grandchildren. Despite all
the trials they endured, they carried the love for Russia through
the years. This
is something no one can destroy. That is why both older generations
and young
people – those who were born after the tragic collapse of the Soviet
Union – have
voted for our unity, for our common future.
In 1991 in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, representatives
of the party elite of that time made a decision to terminate the Soviet Union, without
asking ordinary citizens what they wanted, and people suddenly found themselves
cut off from their homeland. This tore apart and dismembered our national community
and triggered a national catastrophe. Just like the government quietly
demarcated the borders of Soviet republics, acting behind the scenes after the 1917
revolution, the last leaders of the Soviet Union, contrary to the direct
expression of the will of the majority of people in the referendum of 1991,
destroyed our great country, and simply made the people in the former republics
face this as an accomplished fact.
I can
admit that they didn’t even
know what they were doing and what consequences their actions would have
in the end. But it doesn't matter now. There is no Soviet Union
anymore; we cannot
return to the past. Actually, Russia no longer needs it today; this
isn’t our
ambition. But there is nothing stronger than the determination
of millions of people who, by their culture, religion, traditions,
and language, consider
themselves part of Russia, whose ancestors lived in a single country
for centuries. There is nothing stronger than their determination
to return to their true historical homeland.
For eight
long years, people in Donbass were subjected to genocide, shelling
and blockades; in Kherson and Zaporozhye, a criminal policy was pursued
to cultivate hatred for Russia, for everything Russian. Now too, during
the referendums, the Kiev regime threatened
schoolteachers, women who worked in election commissions with reprisals
and death. Kiev threatened millions of people who came to express their
will with
repression. But the people of Donbass, Zaporozhye and Kherson weren’t
broken,
and they had their say.
I want the Kiev authorities and their true handlers in the West to hear me now, and I want everyone to remember
this: the people living in Lugansk and Donetsk, in Kherson
and Zaporozhye have become our citizens, forever. (Applause.)
We
call on the Kiev regime to immediately cease fire and all hostilities;
to end the war it unleashed back in 2014 and return to the negotiating
table. We are ready for this, as we have
said more than once. But the choice of the people in Donetsk, Lugansk,
Zaporozhye and Kherson will not be discussed. The decision has been
made, and Russia will not betray it. (Applause.) Kiev’s
current authorities should respect this free expression of the people’s will;
there is no other way. This is the only way to peace.
We
will defend our land with all the forces and resources we have, and we
will do everything we can to ensure the safety of our people. This is
the great liberating mission of our nation.
businessinsider | A new poll
suggests that many Americans are growing weary as the US government
continues its support of Ukraine in its war with Russia and want to see
diplomatic efforts to end the war if aid is to continue.
According
to a poll conducted by the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
and Data for Progress, 57% of likely voters strongly or somewhat support
the US pursuing diplomatic negotiations as soon as possible to end the
war in Ukraine, even if it requires Ukraine making compromises with
Russia. Just 32% of respondents were strongly or somewhat opposed to
this.
And nearly half of the respondents (47%) said they only
support the continuation of US military aid to Ukraine if the US is
involved in ongoing diplomacy to end the war, while 41% said they
support the continuation of US military aid to Ukraine whether the US is
involved in ongoing diplomacy or not.
The Biden administration
and Congress need to do more diplomatically to help end the war,
according to 49% of likely voters, while 37% said they have done enough
in this regard, the poll showed.
"Americans
recognize what many in Washington don't: Russia's war in Ukraine is
more likely to end at the negotiating table than on the battlefield. And
there is a brewing skepticism of Washington's approach to this war,
which has been heavy on tough talk and military aid, but light on
diplomatic strategy and engagement," said Trita Parsi, executive vice
president at the Quincy Institute.
"'As
long as it takes' isn't a strategy, it's a recipe for years of
disastrous and destructive war — conflict that will likely bring us no
closer to the goal of securing a prosperous, independent Ukraine. US
leaders need to show their work: explain to the American people how you
plan to use your considerable diplomatic leverage to bring this war to
an end," Parsi added.
The poll found close to half of likely US
voters (48%) somewhat or strongly oppose the US providing aid to Ukraine
at current levels if long-term global economic hardship, including in
the US, occurs. Meanwhile, the poll showed that only four-in-10
Americans somewhat or strongly support the US providing aid to Ukraine
at current levels if this occurs.
The poll also found 58% of
Americans somewhat somewhat or strongly oppose the US providing aid to
Ukraine at current levels if there are higher gas prices and a higher
cost of goods in the US, while just 33% somewhat or strongly support
continuing aid if this occurs.
A
majority of poll respondents (57%) also said that they think the
Russia-Ukraine war will end with a negotiated peace settlement between
the two countries, while 61% said they believe the war has impacted them
financially on some level.
President Joe Biden has warned that US
sanctions on Russia could hurt the US economy, but he has maintained
that supporting and defending Ukraine is worth the cost. He's framed the
war as a battle between democracy and autocracy.
"Every day,
Ukrainians pay with their lives, and they fight along — and the
atrocities that the Russians are engaging in are just beyond the pale.
And the cost of the fight is not cheap, but caving to aggression is even
more costly," Biden said in May. "That's why we're staying in this."
The
US has provided over $15 billion in security assistance to Ukraine
since Russia launched its unprovoked war in late February. The Ukrainian
armed forces have received numerous weapons packages from the US and
other partner nations, packages that have included anti-tank missiles,
air-defense systems, and long-range rocket artillery that have allowed
Ukrainian troops to not only halt Russian advances but even drive
Russian forces back.
While
Western support has aided Ukraine's war efforts, recent data indicates
there are growing concerns about what further support without diplomacy
and a continuation of this brutal conflict could mean not just for
Russia and Ukraine, but for other countries as well.
"Policymakers
are far too sanguine about the risks posed by an indefinite
continuation of this war, even minimizing the dangers posed by Vladimir
Putin's nuclear threats," said Marcus Stanley, advocacy director at the
Quincy Institute.
"Americans largely
agree that efforts to strengthen Ukraine's hand on the battlefield need
to be accompanied by efforts to secure lasting peace at the negotiating
table. However, as Congress approaches another vote to approve military
aid to Ukraine this week, there's no sign Washington is exploring
opportunities to seek a settlement that preserves and protects Ukraine's
independence."
TAC | The same media sources who have been telling us
that Putin is a madman now assure us, without any sense of
contradiction, that he would never use tactical nuclear weapons to avoid
total defeat in Ukraine. “Don’t let Putin bluff us” exhorted Max Boot, an exemplar of hawkish neocon wrongthink ever since he urged us into the Iraq War with lies
about WMD and Saddam’s connection to 9/11. Having been wrong about so
much over the past twenty years, one would expect more humility and less
certainty from Boot as he confidently waves away Putin’s nuclear
threat. But in Washington, neoconservatism means never having to say
you’re sorry.
Neocons aren’t the only voices in media and academic circles blithely
assuring us that Putin is bluffing. Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia,
now Stanford professor, Michael McFaul, giddy with the success of the
Ukrainian counteroffensive, declared
that this is the moment for the U.S. “to go all in” on Ukraine, with
“more and better weapons and more and better sanctions.” Clearly, he too
dismisses the nuclear threat.
Charles Pierce mocked Putin in Esquire, saying “he has decided to butch it up quite seriously for the public” and “his speech reeks of a monumental bluff.” Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Trudy Rubin
shrugged off the threat while calling for the West to escalate its
support for Ukraine, writing that “Putin and his circle have made
nuclear threats frequently in recent years – and they have always been a
bluff.” Michael Clarke, professor of war studies at King’s College
London, told NBC News
that Putin “is doubling down politically because he is losing
militarily… He says, ‘This is not a bluff,’ which shows that it is.”
Cloistered within the high walls of the media, academy, or government
bureaucracy, most of these commentators have never held a job that
required serious risk-taking. They have not conducted a cost-benefit
analysis or even played a hand of high-stakes poker. Yet they claim to
know exactly what cards Putin is holding and how he will play them.
Smart poker players understand that they can’t precisely know their
opponent’s hand, so they seek to put them on a range of possibilities
and then evaluate whether their previous actions tell a story more
consistent with a credible hand or a bluff.
What story is Putin telling about Ukraine? Since 2008, Moscow has
warned that the admission of Ukraine into NATO was an unacceptable red
line for Russian security because it meant American troops, weapons, and
bases directly on their most vulnerable border. Current CIA director
Bill Burns, who was our emissary to Moscow at the time, conveyed these
concerns back to Washington in his now-famous memo Nyet Means Nyet. Since then, Putin and his Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov have warnedrepeatedly
that Moscow regards NATO weapons inside Ukraine, most particularly
American missile systems that could hit Moscow in minutes, as an
existential threat. Putin repeatedly warned
that he would invade Ukraine if his security concerns weren’t
addressed, and indeed he did when they weren’t. This decision was
immoral, criminal, and barbaric, but it was not the act of a bluffer.
sonar21 | On the very day the world learns about the sabotage of Russia’s
Nordstream 1 and Nordstream 2, guess what else happened? Well,
Ukrainians from the Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporhyzhia and Kherson oblasts
voted in overwhelming numbers to become Russians. While that is a game
changer that is not what I had in mind.
There is at least one prominent Polish citizen who believes the
United States merits praise for sabotaging the Nordstream pipelines.
Former former Polish Defense Minister, Radek Sikorski, who happens to be married to Anne Appelbaum,
an enthusiastic neo-con masquerading as a journalist, tweeted the
following upon learning that the Nordstream lines were now “złamany”
(Polish for”kaput”): “Thank you, USA.”
But, perhaps that is a bit of deflection. Poland has longstanding
animus towards Nordstream. In other words, Poland has a clear motive for
backing the destruction of the Russian pipeline. More than a year ago
-April 2021 to be precise–this appeared in print:
Poland strongly opposes the
development of Nord Stream 2, which will give Gazprom a subsea
alternative route for supplying natural gas to Western European
customers. At present, that gas has to pass through overland pipeline
networks in Poland and Ukraine, bringing in valuable transit fees and
providing both nations – which do not always have cordial relations with
Russia – a measure of energy security.
Poland has reacted angrily to
President Joe Biden’s decision to waive US sanctions on Nord Stream II,
warning the move could threaten energy security across Central and
Eastern Europe.
“The information is definitely not positive from
the security point of view, as we know perfectly that Nord Stream II is
not only a business project – it is mostly a geopolitical project,” said
Piotr Muller, a spokesman for the Polish government. . . .
Announced following a phone-call
between Joe Biden and Chancellor Angela Merkel, the US decision to lift
sanctions was welcomed in Berlin, with Foreign Minister Heiko Maas
noting that “it is an expression of the fact that Germany is an
important partner for the US, one that it can count on in the future.”
The highly controversial pipeline has met with vigorous opposition across Central and Eastern Europe, including in Poland
and Ukraine where officials say the project would be used by the
Kremlin as a geopolitical weapon, de-facto increase Europe’s dependence
on Russian gas and threaten energy security in the Eastern half of the
continent.
Makes you wonder if there was some wheeling and dealing was going on
between Washington and Warsaw. Given Warsaw’s critical location and role
in ensuring U.S. and NATO military supplies is delivered to Ukraine,
the Poles have a bit of leverage to push the United States to take out
the pipelines or to help Poland take out the pipelines. Poland’s message
to the United States was simple–reverse course on Nordstream and
rupture the pipelines or you can find another way to move your military
supplies to Ukraine.
But wait, doesn’t this create some real problems for Germany? Sure.
But Poland “don’t” (sic) care. There was this little incident called
World War II and it seems that the Poles are still miffed at the
Germans. If revenge is a dish best served cold, then this sucker is a
frozen dinner:
Poland’s top politician said
Thursday that the government will seek equivalent of some $1.3 trillion
in reparations from Germany for the Nazis’ World War II invasion and
occupation of his country.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the Law
and Justice party, announced the huge claim at the release of a
long-awaited report on the cost to the country of years of Nazi German
occupation as it marks 83 years since the start of World War II. . . .
Germany’s
Foreign Ministry said Thursday the government’s position remains
“unchanged” in that “the question of reparations is concluded.”
With this new supply of Polish controlled natural gas, Germany is in a
tough spot. Buy from Poland or buy from the United States. Either way,
the Germans pay a premium while the United States and Poland make some
bank.
johnhelmer | The military operation on Monday night which fired munitions to blow
holes in the Nord Stream I and Nord Stream II pipelines on the Baltic
Sea floor, near Bornholm Island, was executed by the Polish Navy and
special forces.
It was aided by the Danish and Swedish military; planned and
coordinated with US intelligence and technical support; and approved by
the Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.
The operation is a repeat of the Bornholm Bash operation of April
2021, which attempted to sabotage Russian vessels laying the gas pipes,
but ended in ignominious retreat by the Polish forces. That was a direct
attack on Russia. This time the attack is targeting the Germans,
especially the business and union lobby and the East German voters, with
a scheme to blame Moscow for the troubles they already have — and their
troubles to come with winter.
Morawiecki is bluffing. “It is a very strange coincidence,” he has announced, “that on the same day that the Baltic Gas Pipeline
opens, someone is most likely committing an act of sabotage. This
shows what means the Russians can resort to in order to destabilize
Europe. They are to blame for the very high gas prices”. The truth
bubbling up from the seabed at Bornholm is the opposite of what
Morawiecki says.
But the political value to Morawiecki, already running for the Polish
election in eleven months’ time, is his government’s claim to have
solved all of Poland’s needs for gas and electricity through the winter —
when he knows that won’t come true.
Inaugurating the 21-year old Baltic Pipe project from the Norwegian
and Danish gas networks, Morawiecki announced: “This gas pipeline is the
end of the era of dependence on Russian gas. It is also a gas pipeline
of security, sovereignty and freedom not only for Polish, but in the
future, also for others…[Opposition Civic Platform leader Donald] Tusk’s
government preferred Russian gas. They wanted to conclude a deal with
the Russians even by 2045…thanks to the Baltic Pipe, extraction from
Polish deposits, LNG supply from the USA and Qatar, as well as
interconnection with its neighbours, Poland is now secured in terms of
gas supplies.”
Civic Platform’s former defence and foreign minister Radek Sikorski also celebrated the Bornholm Blow-up. “As we say in Polish, a small thing, but so much joy”. “Thank you USA,” Sikorski added, diverting the credit for the operation, away from domestic rival Morawiecki to President Joseph Biden; he had publicly threatened to sabotage the line in February. Biden’s ambassador in Warsaw is also backing Sikorski’s Civic Platform party to replace Morawiecki next year.
The attack not only escalates the Polish election campaign. It also
continues the Morawiecki government’s plan to attack Germany, first by
reviving the reparations claim for the invasion and occupation of
1939-45; and second, by targeting alleged German complicity,
corruption, and appeasement in the Russian scheme to rule Europe at
Poland’s expense. .
“The appeasement policy towards Putin”, announced
PISM, the official government think tank in Warsaw in June, “is part
of an American attempt to free itself from its obligations of
maintaining peace in Europe. The bargain is that Americans will allow
Putin to finish building the Nord Stream 2 pipeline in exchange for
Putin’s commitment not use it to blackmail Eastern Europe. Sounds
convincing? Sounds like something you heard before? It’s not without
reason that Winston Churchill commented on the American decision-making
process: ‘Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once
all other possibilities have been exhausted.’ However, by pursuing such a
policy now, the Biden administration takes even more responsibility for
the security of Europe, including Ukraine, which is the stake for
subsequent American mistakes.”
“Where does this place Poland? Almost 18 years ago the Federal
Republic of Germany, our European ally, decided to prioritize its own
business interests with Putin’s Russia over solidarity and cooperation
with allies in Central Europe. It was a wrong decision to make and all
Polish governments – regardless of political differences – communicated
this clearly and forcefully to Berlin. But since Putin succeeded in
corrupting the German elite and already decided to pay the price of
infamy, ignoring the Polish objections was the only strategy Germany was
left with.”
The explosions at Bornholm are the new Polish strike for war in
Europe against Chancellor Olaf Scholz. So far the Chancellery in Berlin
is silent, tellingly.
MoA | The Poles should be reminded that other countries also have the capabilities to sabotage sub sea pipelines.
Radosław Sikorski is a former Minister of Defense and Foreign
Minister of Poland. He is now a Member of the European Parliament.
Yesterday he posted a picture of the gas escaping the damaged Nord
Stream pipelines and thanked the U.S. for blowing them up.
In 2014 during the Maidan coup in Ukraine another notorious
neoconservative, Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, told the
U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt, who should become the new
prime minister of the Ukraine. She famously expressed her opinion about
European concerns: "Fuck the EU" Nuland said. She is currently the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs.
Over the last decades Germany has financed the Euro zone with up to 1.24 trillion Euros. (See also this thread).
This was possible because Germany was exporting lots of industrial
products and had a yearly surplus from its trade. With Germany's
industry going down because a lack of cheap energy that surplus will
vanish. Europe, all of it, will become a poor continent.
9/ The European energy war will likely go down in history, together
with the Treaty of Versailles and the trade wars of the 1930s, as one of
the biggest economic policy errors in history.
10/ Another thing: when Trump was elected on a platform of milder
protectionism, many people rightly pointed to the 1920s and 1930s and
warned against these policies. These same people appear to have
supported these much more 1920s/30s-like policies this past year.
Ironic.
This reminds of President Joe Biden's warning of a Russian invasion in Ukraine early this year.
It is easy to predict such events when you are the one who intends to cause them.
The U.S. knew that the Ukraine was going to launch an attack on the
Donbas republics. The U.S. knew that Russia would intervene to help its
brethren. Russia had said so. The Ukrainian attack started with artillery preparations on February 17. Russia intervened on February 24.
The above is a collection of the currently available facts. You can draw your own conclusions from them.
antiwar | As a child growing up in Leningrad, Vladimir Putin lived in a run-down five-story
building. He and his parents shared an apartment with two other families. The
yard was filled with garbage, and the garbage was filled with rats.
"Putin and his friends used to chase after them with sticks, until one
day a large rat, which he had cornered, turned and attacked him, giving him
the fright of his life. The memory stayed with him, and years later he would
draw the lesson: ‘No one should be cornered. No one should be put in a situation
where they have no way out."
The story is recounted in Philip Short’s biography, Putin. Several lessons
from childhood can be found in the biography that seem to have been formative
for Putin. Three of them stand out.
No One Should be Cornered
Despite the repeated
promises of the US, Germany, the UK and NATO that NATO would not move further
east, NATO kept moving east. NATO kept encroaching, moving closer and closer
to a Russia that had been explicitly left out of the European Union and now
saw the US led military alliance devouring territory as it moved right up to
its borders. Russia was being cornered.
As early as 2008, when NATO first announced at the Bucharest summit that Ukraine
and Georgia will become members of NATO, the Russian leadership made clear that
they saw this decision as an existential threat. Putin warned
that NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine was "a direct threat"
to Russian security. John Mearsheimer quotes a Russian journalist who reported
that Putin "flew into a rage" and warned that "if Ukraine joins
NATO, it will do so without Crimea and the eastern regions. It will simply fall
apart."
Over a decade later, Putin was issuing the same plea to the US. On December
2, 2021, Putin asked the US for immediate
negotiations and sent a proposal on mutual security guarantees. He
asked the US for "reliable and long-term security guarantees"
that “would exclude any further NATO moves eastward and the deployment of weapons
systems that threaten us in close vicinity to Russian territory.”
The US declined and closed the door. Russia had no way out.
With NATO crowding Russia’s borders, Ukraine being flooded with lethal NATO
weapons and tens of thousands of elite Ukrainian troops massing along the eastern
border with Donbas, like that rat in Putin’s yard, Russia was cornered. With
its warnings and pleas for immediate negotiations being ignored, Russia saw
no way out.
That does not justify the invasion of Ukraine. But the next move had been learned
by Putin in his childhood.
Never Bluff
There were many rules taught by the KGB that Putin had already learned as a
child "scrapping with the other kids." One of them was "Don’t
reach for a weapon unless you are prepared to use it . . . It was the same on
the street. [There] relations were clarified with fists. You didn’t get involved
unless you were prepared to see it through."
When Putin said in 2008 that "if Ukraine joins NATO, it will do so without
Crimea and the eastern regions," the West ignored him, thinking it was
a bluff. But Putin learned as a child not to bluff. You don’t threaten action
unless you are "prepared to see it through."
With the US becoming increasingly directly involved in the war, not only providing
weapons, training and targeting intelligence, but even going so far as war-gaming
with and advising the Ukrainian military, Russia set a new red line.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelensky has asked the US to go beyond the HIMARS rocket systems with their
50 mile range and provide "a missile system with a range of 190 miles,
which could reach far into Russian territory."
On September 15, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova declared
that if the US agrees to supply those longer range missiles to the Ukrainian
army, "it would cross the red line and become an actual party to the conflict."
The Russian spokeswoman then added that "In such a scenario, we would have
to come up with an adequate response." Russia, she reminded the West, "reserves
the right to defend its territory using any means available."
A week later, on September 21, Putin
repeated that warning himself. On top of the threat of longer range missiles,
Putin said some leading NATO countries had talked about the possibility of using
nuclear weapons against Russia and said, “I would like to remind those who make
such statements regarding Russia that our country has different types of weapons
as well, and some of them are more modern than the weapons NATO countries have.
In the event of a threat to the territorial integrity of our country and to
defend Russia and our people, we will certainly make use of all weapon systems
available to us. Putin then said, “This is not a bluff.”
As a child, Putin learned that you "Don’t reach for a weapon unless you
are prepared to use it."
Recognizing that providing Ukraine with longer range guided missiles that could
strike Russian territory "would likely be seen by Moscow as a major provocation,"
that that provocation could lead to World War III and that the benefits "during
the next stage of the war" "would be minimal," Biden
seems to be resisting Zelensky’s latest request.
Never Back Down
Putin is not spontaneous or rash. His ex-wife, Lyudmila, said that "Everything
he did was always thought through." A Swedish diplomat who knew him said
that "he sizes up his opponents coldly and soberly, and anticipates his
own and others’ actions well before he makes the first chess move."
When you do make that move, you commit to the sequence of moves it sets off.
"If something happens," Putin once said, "you should proceed
from the fact that there is no retreat. It is necessary to carry it through
to the end." The KGB taught that rule, but Putin says that he already knew
it because he "learnt it much earlier, scrapping with kids."
Putin would repeat that "carry it through to the end" formulation.
"If you want to win a fight," he said, "you have to carry it
through to the end, as if it were the most decisive battle of your life."
Though the US and its NATO allies repeatedly commit to arming
and aiding Ukraine for
the duration, Putin has shown no sign of retreating or backing down. Having
seemingly now concluded that Russia is fighting, not a regional war against
Ukraine, but a protracted global war against "the
entire Western military machine," on September 21, Putin ordered a
partial
mobilization of up to 300,000 reserves. The mobilization will
include only military reservists "who served in the armed forces and
have specific military occupational specialties and corresponding experience,"
representing about 1% of Russia’s full potential.
Russia sees NATO encroachment and NATO presence in Ukraine as an existential
threat. Putin learned as a child that "there is no retreat" and that
"you have to carry it through to the end, as if it were the most decisive
battle of your life."
The Biden administration has depleted the strategic reserve to levels
not seen since the 1970s, and lifted exports permitted by Obama for
the first time since Carter banned them, in an attempt to limit the rise
in US gasoline and natural
gas prices before the mid-term elections. Unfortunately, the oil
companies have taken the reserves, refined them, and exported most of
the resulting fuel, as this allowed them to increase their profits far
above their normal larceny. Then, the administration
has already committed to replace the reserves at market and given that
the oil companies control the fuel price, we know that this will be at
the highest price ever achieved in history. In this way, our politicians
continue to enable their owners to make out
like the looters they are, as usual, at public expense.
schiffgold | Even as the August inflation data was coming out higher than expected, President Joe Biden was bragging about his “Inflation Reduction Act.” Peter Schiff appeared on NewsMax and argued that the president is putting Americans at risk just so he can improve his image as we approach election time.
Peter
pointed out that one reason energy prices have come down is because the
Biden administration dumped millions of barrels of oil from the
strategic reserve into the market.
That’s not going to
last. And if you look below the surface, we’re seeing an acceleration
in food prices, in shelter, in health care — so, everything is really
going up. We just have one thing right now that’s pulled back. But of
course, energy prices are still up dramatically from where they were a
year ago. So, the inflation tax is falling even more heavy on
middle-class Americans now than it was a few months ago.”
Peter said the “Inflation Reduction Act” is inappropriately named. It should be called “The Inflation Acceleration Act.”
That is going to have consequences next year in helping push that inflation rate even higher than the inflation from 2022.”
As far as the strategic oil reserve goes, now Biden will have to
refill it at a much higher price. Peter said he doesn’t think they’ll
refill it at all.
I think more likely, they’re going
to deplete the reserve until it’s empty. And then what are we going to
do? Then we’ll have no oil to sell. And what if we have an actual
emergency, and we have shortages? We won’t have any strategic reserve to
fall back on.”
Peter reminded the audience that inflation is even worse than advertised because the CPI formula is rigged.
You
really have to double the CPI to get the actual increase in prices that
Americans are experiencing. Take one example, which is shelter, which I
think rose about 6.1%, which really was the highest, I think, since the
1980s. If you look at the real cost of housing, … medium home prices
are up 30% and mortgage rates have gone from 3.1 to 6.1. So, the cost of
buying a home and paying a mortgage in the last two years is up by 84%.
… And of course, rents are skyrocketing too. And so, what the
government claims as the increase in the cost of shelter is just a small
fraction of what Americans are actually paying for shelter.”
The
anchor pointed out that interest rates need to rise above the CPI in
order to tame inflation. Meanwhile, we’re already technically in a
recession. Peter agreed we are in a recession, as much as the Biden
administration and others, including the Fed, try to deny it.
We’ve
already had two quarters of falling GDP. We’re about to have a third,
because I think this quarter is going to be another negative quarter.
And I think the fourth quarter will also be negative.”
And Peter said the anchor was also correct in asserting rates need to go much higher to tackle inflation.
What worries American diplomats is that Germany, other NATO
nations and countries along the Belt and Road route understand the gains
that can be made by opening up peaceful trade and investment. If there
is no Russian or Chinese plan to invade or bomb them, what is the need
for NATO? And if there is no inherently adversarial relationship, why do
foreign countries need to sacrifice their own trade and financial
interests by relying exclusively on U.S. exporters and investors?
These are the concerns that have prompted French President Macron to
call forth the ghost of Charles de Gaulle and urge Europe to turn away
from what he calls NATO’s “brain-dead” Cold War and beak with the
pro-U.S. trade arrangements that are imposing rising costs on Europe
while denying it potential gains from trade with Eurasia. Even Germany
is balking at demands that it freeze by this coming March by going
without Russian gas.
Instead of a real military threat from Russia and China, the problem for American strategists is the absence of such a threat.
What the U.S. needed was to provoke Russia, and later China, into
reacting to U.S. arranged threats in a way that would oblige its
'allies' to follow its sanction policies.
The rather dimwitted European leadership fell for the trick.
Pres. Biden: "If Russia invades...then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it."
Reporter: "But how will you do that, exactly, since...the project is in Germany's control?"
The U.S. arranged for a Ukrainian attack on the rebel held Donbas
region. This started on February 17 with intense artillery preparations
against Donbas positions as recorded by the OSCE observers
at that border. Russia had to react or see the ethnic Russians in those
areas getting maimed and killed by Nazi devoting Ukrainians.
There was no way to prevent that but by other than military means. On
February 22 Russia recognized the Donbas republics as independent
states and signed defense agreements with them.
The same day the German chancellor Olaf Scholz canceled the launch of
the undersea Nord Stream II pipeline which was to transport Russian gas
to Germany's industries and consumers.
The Europeans launched a sequence of extremely harsh economic
sanctions against Russia which, prodded by the U.S., had been prepared
months in advance.
Russia's Special Military Operation, under Article 51 of the UN Charter, commenced on February 24.
A follow-up piece by Michael Hudson on February 28 stated that Germany had been defeated for a third time in a century:
The active military force since 1991 has been the United
States. Rejecting mutual disarmament of the Warsaw Pact countries and
NATO, there was no “peace dividend.” Instead, the U.S. policy by the
Clinton administration to wage a new military expansion via NATO has
paid a 30-year dividend in the form of shifting the foreign policy of
Western Europe and other American allies out of their domestic political
sphere into their own “national security” blob (the word for special
rentier interests that must not be named). NATO has become Europe’s
foreign-policy-making body, even to the point of dominating domestic
economic interests.
The recent prodding of Russia by expanding Ukrainian anti-Russian
ethnic violence by Ukraine’s neo-Nazi post-2014 Maiden regime aims at
forcing a showdown. It comes in response to the fear by U.S.
interests that they are losing their economic and political hold on
their NATO allies and other Dollar Area satellites as these countries
have seen their major opportunities for gain to lie in increasing trade
and investment with China and Russia. ... As President
Biden explained, the current military escalation (“Prodding the Bear”)
is not really about Ukraine. Biden promised at the outset that no U.S.
troops would be involved. But he has been demanding for over a year that
Germany prevent the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from supplying its industry
and housing with low-priced gas and turn to the much higher-priced U.S.
suppliers. ... So the most pressing U.S. strategic aim of
NATO confrontation with Russia is soaring oil and gas prices. In
addition to creating profits and stock-market gains for U.S. companies,
higher energy prices will take much of the steam out of the German
economy.
(Some people currently peddle a 'Secret RAND study from January
2022'. It is obviously faked. It is simply a write up of Hudson's
analysis.)
Nord Stream II was created to make Germany independent from pipelines
running through Poland and the Ukraine. Blocking it was the most stupid
thing for Germany to do and thus chancellor Scholz did it.
In the following months Poland blocked the Yamal pipeline which also
brought Russian gas to Germany. Ukraine followed up with cutting off two
Russian pipelines. The main compressor stations of the Nord Stream I
pipeline, which the German company Siemens had build and has the
maintenance contract, failed one after the other. Sanction are
prohibiting Siemens from repairing them.
It is not Russia that has blocked its gas and oil from European
markets. It were the German, Polish and Ukrainian governments that did
it.
Russia would in fact be happy to sell more. Putin has recently again offered to push as much Russian gas as possible through Nord Stream II to Germany:
After all, if they need it urgently, if things are so bad,
just go ahead and lift sanctions against Nord Stream 2, with its 55
billion cubic metres per year – all they have to do is press the button
and they will get it going. But they chose to shut it off themselves;
they cannot repair one pipeline and imposed sanctions against the new
Nord Stream 2 and will not open it. Are we to blame for this?
It is the German government that is to blame for rejecting that offer.
The economic war against Russia that the sanctions against were meant
to win has failed to move Russia. The Rubel is stronger than ever.
Russia is making record profits even while selling fewer gas and oil
than before the war. Russia may have a small recession this year but its
standard of living is not in decline.
As was easy predictable and, as Michael Hudson explained, the
economic consequences of the anti-Russian sanctions within Europe have
in contrast huge catastrophic consequences for the Europe's industries,
its societies and its political standing in the world.
Governments and the media had so far refrained from noting the
gigantic problems that are coming up and which industry leaders had
pointed out early on. Only over the last two weeks or so have they
picked up the urgent warnings.
The first German companies have begun throwing in the towel
and consumption is collapsing in response to the fallout from exploding
energy prices. The economy is sliding almost uncontrolled into a crisis that could permanently weaken the country.
The piece discusses the five stages along which the catastrophe will happen.
Act One: Freezing Production - It is becoming prohibitively expensive to produce in Germany. Act Two: The Price Trap - No one buys at the high prices German products now cost. Act Three: The Consumer Crisis - Needing to pay high energy prices German consumers buy less of everything else. Act Four: The Wave of Bankruptcies. Act Five: The Final Act on the Labor Market.
When Germany will have some 6 to 10 million unemployed people, and
the government less tax income as only a few companies will be
profitable, the social system will break down.
Volkswagen, Europe’s biggest carmaker, warned last week
that it could reallocate production out of Germany and eastern Europe if
energy prices don’t come down.
Europe is paying seven times as much for gas as the US, underscoring a
dramatic erosion of the continent’s industrial competitiveness that
threatens to cause lasting damage to its economy. With Russian President
Vladimir Putin redoubling his war efforts in Ukraine, there’s little
sign that gas flows - and substantially lower prices - would be restored
to Europe in the near term.
All eyes may be on the Italian election results this
morning, but Europe’s got much bigger problems on its hands than the
prospect of a Right-wing government. Winter is coming, and the
catastrophic consequences of Europe’s self-imposed energy crisis are already being felt across the continent.
As politicians continue to devise unrealistic plans for
energy rationing, the reality is that soaring energy prices and falling
demand have already caused dozens of plants across a diverse range of
energy-intensive industries — glass, steel, aluminium, zinc,
fertilisers, chemicals — to cut back production or shut down, causing thousands of workers to be laid off. Even the pro-war New York Times was recently forced to acknowledge
the “crippling” impact that Brussels’s sanctions are having on industry
and the working class in Europe. “High energy prices are lashing
European industry, forcing factories to cut production quickly and put
tens of thousands of employees on furlough,” it reported. ... It’s
truly a sign of the feebleness of Europe’s politicians that despite the
fast-approaching cliff, no one can bring themselves to state the
obvious: that the sanctions need to end. There’s simply no
moral justification for destroying the livelihoods of millions of
Europeans simply to school Putin, even if the sanctions were helping to
achieve that aim, which they clearly aren’t.
The U.S., while also going into a recession, will profit, as it had planned, from the European catastrophe.
The Handelsblatt, a business daily, reports that Germany companies are moving production to North America.
Washington is attracting German companies with cheap energy and low taxes.
RT | Preliminary results on the third of five voting days shows the threshold
having been reached in Donbass and Zaporozhye and almost met in Kherson
The referendums on joining Russia are continuing in the Donbass
republics and Russian-controlled regions of southern Ukraine. On Sunday,
the turnout already reached the required 50% threshold in the Donetsk
and Lugansk republics and Zaporozhye Region, with only Kherson lagging
behind.
In the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR), more than 76% of
eligible voters have already cast their votes, according to official
figures. The referendum in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) is
proceeding at a similar pace, with some 77% of voters having shown up at
the polling stations.
Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, which were largely seized by Russian
forces amid the ongoing conflict, have demonstrated a lower turnout.
Still, the latter region has already met the required legal threshold,
with some 51.55% of registered voters already casting their ballots,
according to the head of the Zaporozhye electoral committee, Galina
Katyshenko. Kherson has so far demonstrated lower turnout, with nearly
49% of voters showing up for the referendum. Polls across the two
regions and in the Donbass republics are set to stay open for the next
two days.
Ukraine and its Western backers have rejected the referendums on
joining Russia as illegal and have vowed to not recognize them
regardless of their outcome. Speaking to US broadcaster CBS on Sunday,
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky warned that should Russia complete
the referendums, it would “make it impossible, in any case, to continue any diplomatic negotiations” with Moscow.
voltairenet |It was immediately after the creation of the United Nations that
American leaders found it necessary—as a matter of interest—to break the
new rules they publicly lauded. In doing so, they developed new systems
by which to evade accountability for lawbreaking–including an enormous
apparatus for covert intervention–and, by means of extraordinary effort,
to present the United States’ actions, whatever their nature, as in
accord with international law. [5]
At the same time as the west was planning its covert actions against
its WWII ally, it also created the formation of the terror club known as
NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Almost in its entirety it
was a Nazi enterprise. Nazi General Reinhard Gehlen, for example, who
had headed the Russia Desk in the Oberkommando der Wermacht (OKW -
Hitler’s Supreme Headquarters) and a consultant on the Final Solution,
was secretly brought to the United States where he would deliver his
vast storehouse of previously hidden files on the Soviet Union and then
set up the Russia Desk for the soon-to-be-formed CIA. [6]
Gehlen would then be returned to postwar Germany where he was put in
position as head of Germany’s new Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), the
German Secret Intelligence Service. In essence, two Russia desks (at
least) now functioned instead of just one; both with the same ultimate
aim: destroy the Soviet Union and communism.
Hundreds if not thousands of old Nazis found new life working for the US,
Britain, and Canada as the Cold War was cranked up and now the mass
murderers were brought into policy making for the same Lords of the
Manor who had supported Hitler to begin with. And, with the same old
Nazis back in charge, every foul means was employed against the Soviets
to prevent any challenge of global capital’s right to dictate the terms
of enslavement.
West Germany, now being run by ex-Nazis under Chancellor Konrad
Adenauer, joined NATO in 1954 and Gehlen liaised with his pro-Nazi
mentor Allen Dulles who would become head of the CIA, with brother John
Foster as Secretary of State. Soon NATO began appointing the old tried
and true Nazis into high positions within the organization.
General Hans Speidel, for example, became commander-in-chief in 1957
of AFCENT (Allied Forces Central Europe). Nazi Admiral Friedrich
Guggenberger joined the highly important NATO military committee in
Washington and General Adolf Heusinger (Gehlen’s old chief at Hitler’s
OKW), became its chairman. At Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers in
Europe (SHAPE), Gehlen managed to install several Nazi collaborators
into vital positions [7].
Amongst these was Col. Hennig Strumpell, who became deputy to British
Maj. Gen. Charles Traver, the Assistant Chief of Staff (Intelligence) at
SHAPE. Col. Heinz Koller-Kraus was made head of logistics at Speidel’s
AFCENT. Many other Gehlen men would soon join NATO to define its
policies. [8]
With the same Nazis well integrated into NATO and the CIA becoming an extension of Gehlen’s old Nazi intelligence agency, the Nieue World Ordnung was essentially relocated from the Reichstag in Berlin and dropped into the Pentagon and CIA Langley, Virginia.
Added to the anti-Soviet battle plans, US elites recognized the value
of Goebbel’s Ministry of Truth and turned the lessons learned into the
world’s most sophisticated propaganda network ever created. All western
wars would now be given illusionary titles, such as: "wars for
democracy", "wars for peace", "wars for justice", "wars for
humanitarianism" and on and on. The corporate funded elites that run the
UK and Canada were quick to adopt the same essential elements.
Two of those components of the propaganda wars for the US/UK/Nazi Nieue World Ordnung was the creation of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty - both staffed with Gehlen’s old Nazis and funded by the CIA. [9]
These Nazi mass murderers set up an Hungarian Desk, provided arms and
assistance to underground pro-Nazi elements in Hungary and together
with the CIA, instigated the Hungarian uprising - which the Soviets
brutally put down [10].
The prime use of this episode however, had little to do with the dead
and dying, rather it was the propaganda value which portrayed an "Evil
Empire" that had to be destroyed. [11]
Dr. Eberhardt Taubert joined the Nazi party in 1931 and was soon promoted to the rank of Sturmführer,
following Goebbels to the Ministry of Propaganda. After the war Taubert
slid down to South Africa where he found comfort among the neo-Nazis in
power in Johannesburg busy designing the apartheid system. In 1950 he
returned to Germany and joined his old Nazi pal Reinhard Gehlen,
becoming a member of the BND. In his new BND/CIA post, Taubert became
chairman of the CIA-backed "National Association for Peace and Freedom"
becoming also an adviser to German Minister of Defense, ex-Nazi Franz
Josef Strauss and was then assigned by Strauss to NATO as adviser to the
"Psychological Warfare Department". Goebbel’s Ministry of Truth being
recirculated to feed the Christian fundamentalists some newly
constructed, yet old and familiar Tales from the Dark, only having
different packaging. [12]
NATO has also been closely linked to a series of terrorist bombings
in Italy in the 1980s in order to create a "Strategy of Tension"
designed to allow the fascist right wing into power and thereby bring
"stability" to the country. This program made use of numerous far right
terrorists like Stefano Delle Chiaie of Ordine Nuovo and other
demented souls who planted bombs in public places that killed hundreds,
aided in implementation by Gehlen’s NATO/Nazi terrorists. Though well
covered in Europe, thanks to media complicity, the story barely made a
blip here.
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