It’s over, Ukraine is finished. The Israel project is finished. Both disasters are a direct result of decades of our own Suicidal Statecraft as Barbara Tuchman termed it. There can be no doubt as to our culpability. As Pogo observed “We have met the enemy and he is us”. We must now focus on firstly, ending this mess without sliding into unwinnable nuclear war and associated global destruction and secondly, forging a new, realistic, path for the United States in a multipolar world. My biggest fear is that the leaders of the deep state may prefer to die, taking western civilisation with them in a nuclear holocaust , rather than admit failure and their own guilt.
There is no question that Ukraine has lost the war we encouraged them to start. In my opinion, Putin is going to leave whats left of Ukraine as an object lesson, a chamber of horrors, for the rest of the world – the seven billion people in some one hundred countries outside the West, of exactly what relying on America will get you. Similarly NATO is finished – exposed as a pack of barking chihuahuas. The countries of Europe and the European Union have trashed their economies through sanctions and been exposed as run by gutless compradors doing our bidding despite the reservations and wants of their own citizens. I’ve just come back from Europe; nobody tells you about the signs “expressing displeasure with Israel” scrawled on walls in Italian cities or the shuttered German factories. My reading of the Germans and Italians is that they are sullen and miserable, conscious of the fact that their votes no longer count – actions are determined by un-elected bureaucrats in Brussels who dance to American tunes. Anyone who disagrees is labelled a “far right extremist”, strangely, there is no category of ‘centre right” , everyone not a centre left globalist is an extremist. What’s worse, anything classed as ‘extremist’ is criminalised and as events in Britain appear to indicate, the utterance of anything not sufficiently newspeak is grounds for prosecution. We, the great bastion of free speech, appears to have nothing too say about this, which is unusual considering our staunch defence of democracy in Venezuela for example.
Sanctions? What a great idea that has been. First it demonstrates the level of risk involved in holding any assets where America can reach them, second it has stimulated the Russian and Chinese economies into an orgy of import replacement. It has also escaped the financial geniuses who developed sanctions that the sanctionees might object to this hindrance of their business activities and might decide to make alternative financial arrangements, a project which I believe is nearing completion. To put that another way; we aren’t indispensable after all.
The “arsenal of democracy?” Not any more. The addictive western military dream – a small professional boutique army – highly professional, trained to a fault, gilded with special forces and dripping with high tech complex and expensive weaponry has been shown to be a bad joke by Russia. Drone wars mean volumes of soldiers. That means conscription, standardised training and simple to use weaponry. The Russians have that; we don’t. We cannot even match Russias production of ammo. The performance, of our weapon systems, or lack of, is available for viewing on youtube. Pity the poor dumb Ukies who relied on it. In my opinion, we have twenty years work to reshape our defence forces and their equipment and training before we can match Russia and China. For a start, we are going to require an honest draft. “But look at what we did in WWII” you say? That was indeed the greatest generation doing the work, not todays self absorbed, badly educated and unmotivated youth.
We did this to ourselves, Pogo was right. We confused financial masturbation with real economic achievement. We hollowed out our economy. We forgot about character, trust, honesty, persistence and hard work. Greed isn’t good. If we elect tricksters and crooks we have only to blame but ourselves.. The stock market once existed to raise capital not to be a casino. We used to hire people on the basis o experience and achievement not because they won some sort of corporate beauty contest. Look at Boeing. We allowed our institutions, all of them, to become corrupt political toys instead of servants of the people. But worst of all, we allowed our universities to pedal snake oil and poison to our children to the point where most Americans have no idea where the rest of the world is located, still less who might live there and this deliberate profound ignorance goes all the way to the White house.
Folks, we are heading for a showdown with the facts of life as demonstrated by Russia and China. Given that the same idiots who got us in to this mess are still in charge, then in all probability we are sleepwalking into nuclear confrontation. All it will take is one or two more missteps and it will not be stopped. If we were smart, which we are not, we would stop both wars right now by ceasing weapons supply and other measures. We could then consider how we might reform ourselves so that there is a chance of planetary survival for all of us, because from where I sit, there is no way out.
Shovelling ….
https://x.com/i/status/1831290935147172186
Walrus, I salute you!
Soviet Armed Forces Medley | English Subtitles
https://youtu.be/cDbDOCLoLIs
The Soviet Armed Forces Medley is a compilation of short exerts from various Soviet military songs all sung into one song, each representing a branch of the armed forces of the Soviet Union.
0:00 Мы – армия народа – We Are The Army Of The People
0:48 Три танкиста – Three Tankists
1:50 Марш сталинской артиллерии – March Of The Artillerymen
2:34 Авиaмарш – Aviators March
3:18 А Если Повезет – If You’ll Be Lucky
4:03 В путь! – Let’s Go!
The Sea is Spread Wide : Dmitry Bormatenkov
https://youtu.be/_gqYwTyE-K4
A classic song from Russian imperial times about a sailor who dies of heatstroke on the red sea. This version performed by Dmitri Bormatenkov and sailors of the twice red banner Baltic Fleet in 1988.
——————————
There are many Russian military songs of this conflict. Maybe my favorite is this performance by the wonderful Mariya Grozdova. You should be able to get the subtitles translated in English in real time. On an iPhone its easy in the YouTube App.
Mariya Grozdova — “Держитесь, Ребята!” (Hold On , Guys!)
https://youtu.be/73a0kuqGwTk
That is certainly a lengthy crying wolf and the delusions are positively Trumpian. But if you compare the Russian economy with that of the EU and US, there is a glaring discrepancy. As far as a way out, try sitting in front of a TV and watch some sports. You will see reality at work and in real time, even if it is an uneven match. I think this is a matter of what I consider failed future event calculus. A minor, or two, incidents are used to predict the future. It seldom works. If Russia is as mighty as posed, they would have won a long time ago and they are not even today. They have even been invaded! The Tsars were replaced. The Soviets were replaced and so will the fascists in Moscow. What will replace them is not known and it may not be an improvement, but the more extremist, the shorter the lifespan.
Walrus –
You start out with a false premise. Ukraine did not start this war, Putin started this war. Ukraine has one fifth of the population of Russia, less than one percent of the land area. Ukraine has zero nuclear weapons compared to Russia nuclear arsenal, which at over 5500 warheads is the largest in the world. The Ukrainians standing up to Putin are patriots, Davids refusing to be cowed by Goliaths, but they are not idiots to start a war with such a huge disadvantage. Nobody in the West encouraged Ukrainians to go to war, they did so on their own to resist an invasion of their country by Putin’s neo-NAZIs.
You did make some valid points in your post (financial masturbation – displeasure with Israel), when you were not repeating Moscow’s lies. Too bad that those valid points were overshadowed by your diatribe against Ukraine. Two and a half years and the missile attacks on civilians have not stopped. UNHCR reports more than 3.5 million people inside Ukraine have been displaced from their homes another six million Ukrainian refugees have fled to Europe. We should all stop ignoring Putin’s malevolent revanchist colonial empire re-building.
leith,
Jeffrey Sachs has a rather different view than you do – and he is actually in a position to know because he had a front row seat when the precipitating events were all going down:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWYZpF2ngnc&t=427s
James
Sachs’ account seems to understand everything that happened in terms of personal relationships. One participant offended another. Or lied to another. Withheld assistance. All Sachs’ thinking seems focused on these sorts of interactions rather than on any underlying realities factoring into national or personal behavior.
The G7 nations denied credits. Why? Sachs posits hostility to Russia as a singular reason. But what were the actual considerations? Certainly there was plenty of hostility left over from prior relationships. But people and nations seem to get over that sort of thing rather easily when they see advantage. See China. Or was the situation more akin to Greece in the 2010s? Did they envision whatever help they gave disappearing into a vast maw of corruption and inefficiency. And no, Russia’s society was not just Poland times 4. The independent agency of both Solidarity and the Catholic church resulted in very different expectations of government. It was not even like Ukraine, which developed much more similarly. Ukraine held elections in 1994, which the government of Kravchuk lost. They then stepped down, as did Kuchma in 2005. Ukraine was very different from Russia in ways that made them more able to adapt to change.
Ukraine, like Russia, got very little help from anybody until Russia invaded. Was that because the West hated Ukraine? No. It was because Western governments and institutions saw very little chance of investment producing results. Even when invasion came, there was very little actual help at first. Was that because we hated Ukraine? No. It was because we had very little faith in the Ukrainians’ ability to use such aid. We didn’t want whatever we provided to just end up in Russia’s hands in short order. It was only after the Ukrainians demonstrated an unexpected strength to defend themselves that it made sense to chip in some help.
It is not the frictions of individual massive egos rubbing against each other that determines relations in the longer term. At a more mundane level, the participants are always sizing each other up, estimating capabilities and potential advantages. If you demonstrate that you are capable, that working with you can make things better, then relations improve. That is what Russia failed to do.
On the other hand, I have been continually amazed since the fall of the Soviet Union by the Russians’ tone deafness toward others’ views of them. They always seem bewildered to discover that they are hated and feared by people they have brutalized.
Lieth, I feel sorry f’or Ukraine; they were stupid enough to eat Nulands poisonous cookies and will pay the price.
Russia has consistently warned about the consequences of Western aggression but we have not listened and are still not listening.
My question remains. How do we get ourselves out of this mess without. nuclear armageddon? We are not winning and cannot win because we have destroyed the physical and mental infrastructure necessary to run a viable nation state. WE did it because the globalists said itt was cheaper and better that way.
Even if we start right now, it will take at least twenty years to undo the damaggge we have done to ourselves.
James –
Sachs’ front row seat was in Russia where he canoodled with Solovyov and other sanctioned propagandists. 340 of Sachs’ economist peers published a letter condemning his false presumptions about Ukraine. The Euromaidan did not start because of Sachs’ claims about NATO and the US, that protest was triggered by Yanukovych’s decision not to sign the EU-Ukraine Agreement, even though it had passed the Ukrainian Parliament with a 90% majority and had wide support with the Ukrainian people. Sachs listens too much to the Kremlin line.
Sachs is another SuperPower proponent. Like Mearshimer he believes Ukraine should be a good little girl and obey Papa Putin. But Ukraine is no longer a colony of Moscow, and neither are the other little countries in Eastern Europe. Sachs needs to get his head out of his Cold War arse. Big dogs don’t rule the world as much as they’d like to do so.
Kind of sounds like the 51 intelligence experts who said the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation. I’ll take Jeffrey Sachs word any day.
Walrus –
I’m not a fan of Nuland, but she was a latecomer. The Revolution of Dignity in Kyiv was ongoing long before she arrived. It was Yanukovych’s beatings of peaceful protesting students that started the Euromaidan. Then he (Yanukovych) shut down freedom of speech by the press and even by individual citizens. The protests intensified due to Yanukovych’s abuse of power, corruption, police brutality, and human rights violations.
Regarding your 2nd paragraph, Moscow has no need for concern. There has been no Western aggression against Moscow. It is the West that has consistently warned about the consequences of Putin’s aggression but he just goes on invading other countries. Maybe he’ll start cleaning up his messes after Ukraine gets finished rubbing his nose in it.
They we not ‘peaceful’ that night of the beatings the peaceful protesters had mostly gone home and agreed to clear the square. Provocatuers infiltrated the movement started throwing bricks and other objects which in turn resulted in the police reacting…then the ‘revolution’ began with help from Nuland and the National Endowment for Democracy. How is it a US politician was able to meet with opposition and encourage protesters. Euromaidan was a western backed coup following a blueprint that has worked around the world for decades. If you truly look into the events of November 20 forward this will become glaringly obvious. Much of the sniper fire that occured in February was from positions held by the opposition and police were also getting shot. It was never going to be a peaceful protest. Ukraine did not start this war Ukraine has been a pawn of Neocons since February 2014. They didn’t think Russian would have the nerve to sieze Crimea and support the counter insurrection in the Donbass which was a reaction to the rapid change of government in Kiev. The fighting resulted in the Minsk agreements and for 8 years Russia showed restraint in respect to this the fire was stoked by NATO.
Victor –
You have your dates wrong. And you mixed up your provocateurs: it was Titushky thugs hired by Yanukovych that did the rock throwing in an attempt to tarnish the protestors. The sniper fire you mention killed 108 protestors. It was done by the Berkut ‘special’ police, who had a history of racketeering, plus torture & voter intimidation against those who wanted to elect non-Yanukovych candidates.
Maybe you are drinking too many of those Smirnoff lattes.
Perfect .
But
Maybe you are drinking too many Kool aid.
My dates are not wrong, you clearly don’t have an understanding of the events that you are claiming to be knowledgeable about: the maidan protests started on the night of November 20-21 and the shooting/sniper attacks occured 18-20 February. You can find plenty of footage online of gunmen in the maidan crowd if you care to actually look… which I doubt you will as your indoctrination seems quite advanced.
You can resort to the ad hominem pro Russian slurs or whatever you people do but its clear you in desperate need of a history lesson. Why don’t you start with researching all the regimes/around the world that the US/NATO has overthrown in the last 70 years. It is one of the bedrock methods of US foreign policy and isnt a secret. Once you are educated to this reality you will realise that using paid mercenary thugs, death squads and hidden snipers is their modus operandi. They did it in Venezuela in 2002, Syria, Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Chile, Romania, Nicaragua, Brazil and a dozen more examples. There is a pattern like I said but I doubt you will be able to unplug from your Neocon programming…cool aid msm intoxication is a potent addiction.
Victor –
I agree that the peaceful protests started on the evening of 21 November.
The beatings of protestors and journalists started not long after that just a week or so later. The shootings of protestors started in late December. Maybe that was authorized or maybe not because Yanukovych only waited to 21 January to publicly order a “bloody crackdown”. His Minister of the Interior complied and signed an order authorizing deadly force. There were more shootings of protesters in late January.
Yes, you’re correct, right wing nationalists such as Svoboda and RightSector were there and re-acted by attacking the Berkut police. 108 protestors were killed, most by gunfire from Yanukovych’s snipers. There were 13 police that died. That’s a six to one ratio. There were also 2500 injured protesters. Many other police decided not to carry out their orders to kill fellow Ukrainians and so they joined the protestors.
War began by military coup in Feb. 2014.. which deposed legal ukr.president….
Sejmon –
There was no coup. Ukrainian Parliament by a vote of 328 to Zero stripped Yanukovych of the presidency. Even 36 members of his own party voted against him.
It was a coup. Do your research.
Walrus, glad you made your European trip.
This is a fight of values. No elites or cultures including the West, while selling woke ideologies, double standards and satanism can expect to ,,win”.
Good point. The biggest problem with the ‘evangelisation’ of corruption is its effect on one’s self.
I recently read of a comment attributed to the Taliban (who, if it’s true could be considered in a position to know) : “The Russians fight like men, the Americans fight like homosexuals”.
American war theory now consists of killing distant civilians, with little or no risk intended for their combatants, with gross national mourning if body-bags begin returning home. An insult to their great WWII generation.
Lara, you are not connected to reality. Those little figures on TV are not actors.
F & L, Putin is coming out of this smelling like roses.. Everything we do drives more people into his arms because he and his colleague Lavrov are the ones looking reaonable. Comparisons with trump, Biden etc are not flattering. They look measured, competent and professional. We look like idiots. People notice.
Here’s an idea: why don’t we find some competent individuals who maybe have a little humility and let them craft our foreign policies.
Have taken the liberty of linking your superb summary to Andrei Martyanov’s site. On the question of where this shambles leaves Europe, have given my view under a summary from Professor Robinson:-
“There’s a sort of feeling around that it was the Washington neocons who led us all into the disaster. Inaccurate, as I think Baud is saying. Project Ukraine could not even have been thought of without the complicity, or rather the intemperate enthusiasm for the project and that right back to the early days of Merkel’s chancellorship, of the Europeans. I’m watching in England and Germany the politicians and the press preparing us for the failure of the high hopes of 2022.
“Maybe they’ll succeed. Maybe we’ll transition into the forthcoming Cold War without much fuss or recrimination. We’re dumb enough. Baud doesn’t go into further possible consequences.
“It has been my settled conviction since ’22 that the Russians are not interested in recovering “lost empire” in Europe. They merely wish to close the door on a declining and rancidly Russophobic Europe and get on with business elsewhere.
“But if the Scholz’s and the Macrons and the Starmers, or whoever replaces them, continue to see the Russians as the sinister enemy, and their electorates with them, and continue to act on that assumption by ringing Russia with missiles and “Rapid response forces”, I see little reason for the Russians continuing to deliver the essential supplies upon which Europe depends for its future.”
https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/ukraine-rolls-the-dice-on-kursk-incursion
One of the two questions that have interested me since 2022. The first question is how the Russians will deal with the question of remnant Ukraine. The second, whether the Russians will continue to deliver lifeline supplies to a fiercely Russophobic Europe.
English Outsider
The government has finally begun going after Russian agents on social media.
https://www.npr.org/2024/09/05/nx-s1-5100829/russia-election-influencers-youtube
Your friend Martyanov should take note of this and start packing his bags. Mother Russia eagerly awaits him.
John and EO,
Martyanov is open about who he is and where he stands. He has nothing to worry about from the DOJ. The election interference that the DOJ is targeting is being conducted covertly by the Russian government and intelligence.
Typical communist set of mind
John – have a rethink. Martyanov is quite invaluable.
Martyanov’s now an American citizen with a deep and genuine affection for his adopted country. But with a Russian military/naval background that enables him to tell us exactly what’s going on over the other side of the fence and how they think. There are people like Sleboda who also know both sides of the fence pretty well. They’re invaluable too. But Andrei Martyanov adds to that a comprehensive knowledge of military technology – and of course an insight into this mysterious “Operational Art” that all talk about but few understand.
That few doesn’t include me! I decided a while ago that it was unlikely I’d find myself on the General Staff of any army, let alone the Russian, so I’d let the “Operational Art” go hang. But like everyone else I do keep an eye on the maps from time to time and what I see there confirms my belief that when it comes to co-ordinating the movements of and supplies for large numbers of men, the Russians know what they’re about and we don’t.
That disastrous “Kursk offensive” a recent case in point, though that’s fairly minor compared with our amateur night direction of the big so-called Ukrainian “Counter-offensive”. Yes, Martyanov’s utterly contemptuous of our generals who dream up such disasters, but what else can you be? At the very start we had a massive army of proxies, the toughest fighters in Europe, and we screwed up so comprehensively that they were, in the first few days of the SMO, up-ended by a comparatively tiny force of Russians and never recovered!
We don’t do “Operational Art” in the Western military, seems. But we’re red hot on Operational Screw-ups and painful for us though it is to have Martyanov pointing that out, we’d do well to listen to him.
EO,
I agree that Sleboda and Martyanov are worth a listen. They both know things, but they both are hopelessly slavish to Mother Russia’s story line. They still Russia is an exceptional country with an invincible military. She is not exceptional, nor is her military invincible. Their performance against a much smaller Ukraine has proven that.
As for your understanding of the military situation, I’m glad to see you are well aware of your shortcomings in this field. I don’t begrudge your romanticism about the LNR and DNR. I shared that romanticism until those plucky rebels descended into a 1930s Stalinist horror show. An interesting claim by Girkin (Strelkov) is that without his intervention, the Donbas rebellion would have fizzled before it started like it did in Odesa, Kherson and Kharkiv. Girkin’s assault on Sloviansk made it much worse for all Ukrainians.
TTG – I have an uneasy feeling that you don’t share my view of the first few days of the SMO. But nor does anyone else! Where I see a triumph of Russian military planning you, and I think most in the West, see nothing but a fiasco around Kiev.
Girkin I agree on. A bullshit artist, like so many of the Hurrah Patriots as they were termed. We pay far too much attention in the West to such people.
On the Donbass, the Federalists would not have got going had not Kiev and the thugs we gave a boost to gone heavy duty neo-Nazi. That was the only reason for the war in the first place.
Eric’s brought in the American revolutionary war. But American independence was just waiting to happen. If it hadn’t happened that way it’d inevitably have happened another.
Not so in the Donbass. No inevitability there. Had it not been for the Maidan – which you Americans obstinately refuse to acknowledge was Mrs Merkel’s baby as much as yours! – the Donbass would still be Ukrainian and Crimea with it.
So too in 2022. Much as I admire Mearsheimer, and the more I hear of him the more I admire his courage, his deterministic view that this war was some inevitable clash of great powers that must have happened one way or the other is, I insist, entirely erroneous.
This was the unnecessary war if ever there was one. To Putin, a nuisance he’ went a long way out of his way to avoid. But the provocation we piled upon provocation eventually forced him to move. The FAFO war, and we’re now doing the finding out.
With respect I don’t agree with you, however, that had the Russians stopped at the LoC and contented themselves with merely occupying the Donbass, that would have been the end of it. I don’t agree that Biden and the Euros would not have imposed the sanctions had the Russians stopped at the LoC.
I think, on the contrary, that provoking the Russians to make a military move was done with the sole intention of deploying the sanctions it was hoped would wreck the Russian economy, depose Putin, and destabilise the RF.
On what’s happening now, I do believe that the Democrats are hoping to put off final defeat in Ukraine until after the Presidential election. They’ve not had a good run, the Democrats, since 2020, and their chances of getting in again aren’t that solid. Losing yet another war would discredit them further and I see their conduct of the Ukrainian war as aimed only at keeping it all looking OK somehow until November.
That that’ll lead to tens of thousands more deaths and the entire loss of a country will be regarded by the Democrats as unavoidable collateral electoral damage. If they give any thought to the plight of our proxies at all.
Here’s Daniel Davis putting forward a different view. He looks at the current military situation and then tears the propagandists to bits, from Petraeus to Koffman, and throws away the pieces.
Rightly so. Such people – and we have even more of them in England than you do in the States – are in no sense credible generals or analysts. They’re PR merchants pure and simple and a disgrace to us all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wTRwDUej8s&t=1s&ab_channel=DanielDavis%2FDeepDive
English Outsider
What value is that ?
He is a former Soviet naval officer. Most of his military knowledge is outdated. As we’ve seen in Ukraine, the Black Sea fleet has suffered heavy losses and are trying hard to keep afloat.
It was people educated in the same schools as Martyanov that lead that force. At first I thought he was just a romantic fool, rooting for the Russian side but I’m not so sure any more.
You say he has “deep and genuine affection for his adopted country”. Well free speech is one of America’s core values. He is certainly taking advantage of these freedoms yet if you look at the content of his blog and especially the comment section you will see it is full of hatred towards the West and his “adopted country”. Anyone even remotely critical of Russia’s conduct is immediately banned.
Martyanov is not alone in this. Larry Johnson, who I believe was a regular on this forum, follows the same pattern. He even gave a speech in the UN promoting Russian point of view. Guess which country made that possible !! Scott Ritter, yet another one, travels to Russia to receive standing ovations from Kadyrov’s brutes. Who pays for all this ?!
TTG seems to think they have nothing to worry about. Well, it is all fun and games until the DOJ decides to prosecute you. The case of Tim Pool and Dave Rubin shows that sometimes you just need to scratch the surface and look at the finances to uncover ugly truths.
Where is the line between exercising the right of free speech and spreading divisive foreign power propaganda ?
John,
The line seems to be getting paid by the Kremlin, especially under the table or through cutouts. Dimitri Simes is discovering those lines.
TTG,
“The line seems to be getting paid by the Kremlin, especially under the table or through cutouts. Dimitri Simes is discovering those lines.”
That’s a very serious accusation. I don’t think money is a motivation for people like Lary Johnson.
TonyL,
I know of no instance where Larry Johnson was paid by a Russian entity, sanctioned or unsanctioned. He’s plenty smart enough to understand the ramifications of such payments. Simes was indicted for payments he received from Channel One Russia, a sanctioned entity.
John – I think you’ll find that Andrei Martyanov is fully up to date on the various types of modern weaponry. On the disposition of the Black Sea fleet, contact him directly on his blog and he’ll correct one or two misconceptions you might have picked up.
I think Larry Johnson’s great, too. I think you might be being a little uncivil about him.
But let’s look on the bright side. Seems yours is one vote Kamala won’t have to fake, so it can’t be all bad.
English Outsider
I see you’re drinking the Kool-Aid by the gallon.
You are so impressed by these self proclaimed experts, they could sell you the moonlight if they wanted to.
John, you speak of
“divisive foreign power propaganda.”
I have read some of what LJ says, e.g.
https://sonar21.com/more-shoes-drop-on-the-russian-election-interference-meme/
and I have listened to what he said to the UN Security Council.
https://youtu.be/qXoZBn1hgpo
I think he speaks as a patriotic American,
trying to prevent America from making mistakes.
As to some of the comments at LJ’s blog and especially Martyanov’s blog,
I will agree that many may be anti- American.
But I think we should pay some attention to those who feel America has harmed them.
As to your use of the word “divisive”,
it is my observation that when people express conservative opinions, that is instantly labeled “divisive”.
OTOH, when people express far-left opinions,
e.g., support for genital mutilation, under the Orwellian term “health care”,
that doesn’t get labeled divisive.
Keith Harbaugh
Pretty much every blog post and every comment on LJs and AMs blogs are pro Russian. It is always the same theme; Russia good, US bad, Ukraine a country 404, meaning a country that, in their opinion, does not exist.
Neither LJ or AM are impressionable teenagers. Tell my, why would they consciously choose to create echo chambers promoting views pretty much exclusively favoring Russia ?
What would their motivation be ?
Here’s one of these “conservative opinions” from today’s LJs blog’s comment section.
You can argue that it is just a comment, but LJ moderates the comment section so he allowed this to be published. This is just one of many such examples.
John asked:
“What would their motivation be ?”
My opinion:
To not get the U.S. into a totally needless war Russia.
What on earth difference does it make to the U.S. over who controls Ukraine?
Keith Harbaugh
So LJ and AM turned their blogs into echo chambers promoting exclusively Kremlin talking points to prevent the US from getting into war with Russia ? I don’t quite follow your logic.
Well, here is a country fighting for survival. You don’t think we should help them with training, economic support and military equipment ?
John – if we’re going to deprecate everyone who finds Western foreign policy unsatisfactory we have a long weary road in front of us. Chas Freeman, Ray McGovern, Daniel Davis to whom I link above … the list is endless. Dozens upon dozens in fact. People with their own expertise and insights to offer. People who care about their country and are worried where it’s being taken.
You want to damn them all for saying what they think? You reckon that running them all down somehow serves to invalidate their views? That you can dispute what they have to say simply by sneering at them all?
You wouldn’t have lasted two seconds on Colonel Lang’s site had that been all you had to offer.
EO,
Those you mention may have to endure some deprecation, but they’re not going to be subject to arrest. Russians who finds Russian domestic and/or foreign policy unsatisfactory face the danger of poisoning, imprisonment or being thrown out a window.
Sorry about that, TTG. I rather sounded off there. But it took matters far away from the two points that I have always believed are the outstanding questions when the Ukrainian war is done with:-
The first question is how the Russians will deal with the question of remnant Ukraine. The second, whether the Russians will continue to deliver lifeline supplies to a fiercely Russophobic Europe.
On the first question, it seems unrealistic at the moment but I still think Putin is angling for a political settlement that will come from within Ukraine itself.
The second question is key. All the commentators go on about how Germany’s getting a hammering and how that could become worse.
But that’s not only tough on the Germans. Germany is the economic superpower of Europe and the lynchpin of the entire EU set-up. That includes us because we still do half our trade with the EU.
If Germany catches a cold therefore, the rest of us in Europe get pneumonia.
So that second question is no mere debating point! Apart from the little countries on Germany’s periphery the Germans are the fiercest opponents of Russia in Europe. From Merz’s speech in the Bundestag in the first days of the SMO to all the Scholz/Habeck/Baerbock diatribes since there has been nothing much from them except Russia hate.
And we needn’t take too much notice of Wagenknecht or the AfD. They’re merely cashing in on the popular discontent with the economic downturn or with mass immigration.
So there’s Russia still feeding in fuel and raw materials to Germany. Quite a lot of that being turned into weapons, and lots of them, to kill Russian soldiers.
And although you and I will see the use of old German helmets and German tanks in the recent Kursk incursion as merely isolated incidents, which they are, to Russians brought up on the memory of WWII that’s going to be full confirmation of the White Tiger side of this war.
Add to that silly comments made recently by some of the Balts that they still want to see the RF broken up – we scarcely notice them but you can be sure the Russians do – and there’s not a lot of incentive for the Russians to keep feeding fuel and raw materials in.
Putin said in ’22, at the start of it all, that the Russians would honour existing contracts but would reconsider when those contracts came up for renewal later. That was before NS got blown up.
The NS1 contract for natural gas was an advantageous contract for Germany. It was their get out of jail free card in the sanctions war. It was a long term contract – decades to run, if I remember correctly – and it supplied natural gas to Germany at rates below current spot and several times below LNG spot.
Presumably that contract’s gone. The Germans must now pay spot and increasingly have to pay spot LNG prices.
There’s one NS2 pipeline left and that, so far, the Russians have said they’re prepared to supply natural gas through. The problem there is that the Germans refuse to take gas through that remaining pipeline. They’ll probably continue to refuse to do so.
So we move from the position at the start of the SMO, when the Germans were sitting pretty as far as natural gas went, to the position today when they are no longer sitting pretty. The fact that that’s by their own choice is neither here nor there – I think it’s politically impossible for the Germans to take natural gas supplies through the one remaining NS pipeline.
They’re also paying well over the odds for some other fuel supplies they get from Russia. All the “Latvian blend” nonsense and getting fuel through third parties adds to the price they pay. In effect though not in law they’re sanctions busting and that always costs money.
In addition to all that they’ve lost market share in Russia, and that was a very good market for them. The Russian crash programme of import substitution means they’re unlikely to get that market back.
So there’s the economic lynchpin of Europe paying over the odds for fuel and raw materials, much of that fuel and raw materials still coming from Russia, and earning less than it used to.
At the same time still vehemently anti-Russian, talking of putting many more troops on the Russian border, and installing missiles that could be nuclear aimed directly at Russia. If we remember, the very things the Russians were going on about in late ’21.
If it all gets a little too much for the Russians they can, while scarcely damaging themselves at all, respond by imposing, quite legally, counter sanctions that would ditch the remnants of the Wirtschaftswunder and the rest of the continent with it!
As you might recall I go on a bit about the Eurocrats, but it must astonish anyone that Berlin/Brussels is quite blind to this obvious risk. Has been all along. They move heaven and earth to damage the Russians while seemingly unaware that if they chose the Russians could ditch them tomorrow!
They Russians might not so choose. They don’t want their new friends to see them wielding the energy weapon. But the risk that they might choose to do so is a risk the Europeans seem not to take the slightest notice of.
Nor of course Starmer. But he’s set on felo de se anyway so I doubt the risk bothers him either.
EO,
The Russians won’t be supplying gas to Europe after the end of this year. Right now they are continuing to pay Ukraine to transfer the gas and Ukraine allows it to flow, but the contract expires at year end and Zelenskiy has said it will not be renewed. The oil transshipment contract will remain in effect and will still be honored by both sides… at least for now.
On a much reduced basis Russia will continue to supply the EU, mainly Hungary, via the Turk Stream pipeline.
Whilst, as you say, Zelensky has said the current transit contract will not be renewed this could be a ploy. The transit revenue is in the order of $1.5B. But, will the bankers in the West, or the EU countries still taking very large quantities of gas with no alternative, allow him to walk away?
JohninMK,
Zelensky won’t renew it, but once his term is up. Oh, wait, never mind.
TTG – I see I got out of sequence and submitted a comment on European energy and raw material supplies well after your remarks on the same subject. On reflection, I think the Europeans – or the dreaded Eurocrats as I call them affectionately – are aware of the cul de sac they’ve got themselves into.
It’s a while now since Josep Borrell, the thinking man’s Eurocrat, set out the problem far more succinctly than I was able to do above. The twin pillars upon which the European economy rests, Borrell stated, were access to cheap Russian energy and access to the global market.
So they do know what the reality is, the Europeans.
This is the difference between the US and the EU. The main problem the loss of Ukraine poses for Washington is the PR problem. How to walk away from the mess while still looking good to the electorate. An urgent problem, that, since the forthcoming election is hotly contested and it would be better if the Ukrainian debacle didn’t figure too much in that election.
Not so for the EU. They do have a PR problem, true, and the loss of face for the European politicians will be a factor, but they have a problem the US doesn’t have.
The European economy urgently needs a return to pre-’22. They need not only the Russian market. They need the nascent Brics market they’re also slowly losing. When Boris Johnson remarked that the Ukrainian war had to be won to sustain Western hegemony, that was flowery language for the plain truth. The world is starting to split into two trading blocs and it’s essential for European prosperity that the West retains its grip on both. We Europeans do need Borrell’s full access to the global market. My pension – hope it’s still safely waiting for me! – does depend on the Germans keeping on selling their ultra-reliable escalators to China and the City insuring the world’s shipping.
Among other sometimes less creditable activities. I have a feeling we were also getting our cut from stolen Syrian oil, and am hoping we weren’t in on the bargain basement sale of Ukrainian assets. If that pension kicks in, I’d want it cleaner than that.
Not done to talk about all that. To return to Borrell’s pillars. On energy, the current downturn in the European economy, and in the all-important German economy, masks the effect of the partial loss of access to cheap Russian hydrocarbons. But Borrell’s right there too. In particular, the loss of piped natural gas from Russia direct to Germany and on cheap long term contract goes a fair way towards knocking out Borrell’s first pillar. And the cost of evading or reducing the impact of the EU energy packages – I think we’re on the fourteenth now – is also not negligible.
Add to that that the drive for Net Zero, if it’s to work at all, does need cheap hydrocarbons for the transition phase. Digging up half Germany for brown coal and keeping clapped out nuclear power stations going is no substitute for what they had, if that transition is to have any chance of success. To get to Net Zero without driving household energy bills up further in the interim they need cheap hydrocarbons.
That’s ignoring, as the Euros do, the obvious side effect of the drive to Net Zero. Aside from the war, why should the Russians put in the heavy investment on energy infrastructure and maintenance if the Europeans are aiming to do without their hydrocarbons anyway? Especially since there’s the long running dispute between the Russians and the EU on pricing. The EU wants to price on spot, the Russians want long term contracts to ensure a reliable return on investment. They never got that dispute sorted our before ’22. And of course haven’t since.
Given those factors as well, it’s not surprising that the Russians have already earmarked for other uses hydrocarbon supplies that they had earlier earmarked for Europe. .
So for the Europeans there’s a lot more than loss of face consequent on the loss of the Ukrainian war and Borrell knows it. They need a defeated Russia that will be more obliging when it comes to supplying fuel and raw materials. They very much don’t need a victorious Russia that is drawing more and more countries into a trading bloc from which they are excluded.
Hence we see, as the Americans increasingly blow cold on the conflict, the Europeans quite frantically attempting to keep the thing going. The Americans would quite like to win but if they can get the PR right they can accept not winning. The Europeans can’t.
Hence, also, the frantic attempts to get the Americans to come into the war more forcefully. The Euros don’t seem to recognise that in this theatre and in these circumstances, the Americans have nothing much to come in forcefully with. Bar nuclear, of course, and I very much doubt the Biden team, whatever that is these days, will threaten nuclear to get the Europeans out of the hole they’ve dug for themselves.
So Borrell stated the obvious but can’t accept the consequences of the obvious. His twin pillars gone or weakened, the Eurocrats are as stuck as a sheep stuck in a bramble patch.
Borrell, who does seem to have the odd interlude of sanity every now and again, stated another obvious truth some time ago. This war will be won or lost on the battlefield, he declared.
But it took no prophet to see that. It’s been obvious since at least the failure of the Istanbul talks that this war was going to go the distance. In fact I discovered recently that Patrick Armstrong knew that back in 2014 and had said so. Wish Borrell had listened to him.
Note – didn’t say much about raw materials above.
That’s partly because it’s the very devil finding out exactly what the Russians are still supplying to Europe. An extensive trade in titanium was mentioned a while back. It’s said, can’t check, that that’s still going through Ukraine! That leads to the question that’s also seldom discussed – to what extent the interests of the Ukrainian and Russian oligarchs run counter to the military imperatives of this war.
An account of the trade, and a look at alternative sources for Europe, given here:-
https://rmis.jrc.ec.europa.eu/uploads/220616_Briefing_Titanium.pdf
On steel, just seen a link on MOA (courtesy of “too scents”) discussing the effect on the trade of the loss of Southern Donbass. Reminiscent of Hitler’s otherwise foolish insistence on holding the lower Don. Foolish as far as his generals were concerned, but Hitler urgently wanted to hang on to the raw materials he needed – manganese and so on. Maybe todays insistence on hanging on against the odds east of the Dnieper could also in part be due to the fact that this area is or was a source of supply for Europe’s industry.
In the article linked to, Europe’s purchase of Russian steel is mentioned in the context of the loss of Ukrainian steel resulting from the fighting around Pokrovsk. That that loss is likely to be permanent is indicated by the reports that the coal mines are being flooded. So that’s a whole lot of steel that Europe will no longer get from Ukraine but will need to get at least in the near future from Russia.
“Together with the Donetsk territories, mineral deposits are being lost, which until recently were somehow extracted, fueling exports and industry. The front line has come within 8-10 kilometers of Pokrovsk, where the last coking coal deposit in Kiev-controlled territory is located.
“The loss of the city will lead to a complete shutdown of the metallurgical plants, which already exist with difficulty. For example, the same Akhmetov’s Metinvest reduced steel production by 31% and pig iron production by 36% to 2.05 million and 1.7 million tons last year.
“In general, Ukrainian metal has already turned out to be uncompetitive even on the European market. Metinvest CEO Yuriy Ryzhenkov complained about this in late August in an interview with the Italian publication Corriere della Sera. In December last year, the EU postponed the decision to ban imports of Russian steel in slabs until 2028, which allowed Russia to sell an additional 10.7 million tons of its steel to the EU.
“In the summer, Sergei Belenky, chairman of the Federation of Metallurgists, estimated a ton of pig iron at $230 in exports, 600 hryvnia in taxes and 16200 hryvnia in GDP. And this is without taking into account the problems in individual cities with both unemployment and public utilities – many places where heat supply to apartment buildings depends on the work of steel mills. And there is no talk of any recovery at all: steel in the EU is expensive and will not become cheaper, and Ukraine is already actively importing rolled steel. Metal exports will in any case drop drastically, and in the worst case Ukraine will be able to export only ore – over 20 million tons of it was exported in 7 months at a price of about $100 per ton.
“Ukraine’s steel industry will plunge into a serious crisis. The industry has accumulated so many problems that even a sharp rise in steel prices will not be able to overcome them. The loss of Pokrovsk risks becoming a “black swan” for the metallurgical, coke and chemical and other industries. Because of the Kursk adventure, Ukraine risks losing a fair share of its resource base. In the Kursk region, where the advance stalled and began to develop the transition of initiative to the RF Armed Forces with the displacement of the AFU from the occupied settlements. And here Ukraine has not acquired any resources at all.”
machine translated
https://t.me/nabludatels/46399
Just a tiny corner, that, of the trade in raw materials between the EU and Russia that the Europeans are going to have to find a substitute for. I find it amazing that the Russians still allow the trade to persist, given that some of those raw materials comes right back where it came from in the form of weapons. But it does persist, and the EU is clearly hoping it will do so in the medium term. All the talk has been of the damage it is hoped EU sanctions will do to the Russians. None talk of the risk to the EU were the Russians to impose sanctions the other way.
……………………..
TTG – that brief look at European dependence on Russian hydrocarbons and raw materials also accounts for the rejection of the Mearsheimer argument. Mearsheimer and many others argue that NATO pressure on Russia had become so great that military action was the only way to relieve that pressure.
What a nonsensical argument! How could invading a neighbouring country relieve NATO pressure! It was bound to intensify that pressure, and has.
Not only that, that NATO pressure on Russia was and is exerted through Europe. If relieving the pressure was such a vital consideration for the Russians, then they had the means to hand to relieve it without going to all the bother of starting a war with a neighbour. They merely needed to turn off a few taps and rupture the supply chains. That would have cooked Europe’s goose and prevented the use of Europe as a means of exerting NATO pressure on Russia.
No, there was more immediate and urgent cause of the invasion. Pre-empting a Kiev incursion into the Donbass, which would have led to a brutal occupation of the Donbass that would have been very difficult to reverse.
EO,
Good analysis. All the more reason for Europe to support an intact Ukraine as an integral part of the EU. It will take many years and a ton of money, but it’s still less devastation than Europe after WWII.
As for the devastation of the self-proclaimed LNR and DNR, Russia has destroyed the male population quite handily. There would have been far less devastation across the Donbas if Kyiv did retake that territory by military means.
After some careful thought and also being fortunate enough to meet a Jewish doctor who lived in Hungary during the 1940’s and had to flee the war,who remarked that after 7/10 it feels like 1940 all over again.In othe words first hand experience talking.
I dismissed his comment and said times have changed.
I have now concluded that hamas itself has not acted on there own but with support of non governmental Western society.
The attack was aimed at jews worldwide Absolutely no doubt about it.
The attempted whitewashing of the atrocities against women and children is proof.The persistent anti semitism in Western countries has led me to believe that a second holocaust is becoming possible.
This is besides what is happening in Israel.The video’s produced on 7/10 were not aimed at israelis.They know there enemy well. They are to be used as psychological warfare against the Jews in the diaspora
Absolutely no doubt.
To be spread on western social media to threaten Jews with what we will face.
Hamas inc. felt emboldened because they believed they could get away with it.
Carte blanche..Like Endlosung..interesting words from europe.Historical connotations.
All I can say to my fellow Jews in the diaspora.If the shit does hit the fan then Israel is our best bet.Might be time to make Aliyah.If i do who will come with me?
mcohen,
I definitely see the point of view expressed by your old Jewish doctor. Most of these pro-Palestinian protests are drenched in old fashioned anti-Semitism. The tearing down of posters of the hostages brutally abducted by Hamas terrorists serves no purpose other than to express anti-Semitism. Why protest at synagogues? Protests should be in front of Israeli embassies and consulates. Supposedly intelligent university students and faculty stoop to these same anti-Semitic levels in their campus protests. Why is it so hard to protest the killing of Palestinians and their decades of subjugation while still condemning the vile terrorists of Hamas and the murders and abductions of Israelis on 7 September? I’m pretty sure those protesting on the streets of Tel Aviv get it. They love Israel and surely hate Hamas. Perhaps they see that Netanyahu’s conduct of this war is playing into the hands of Hamas and fueling the ugly expression of anti-Semitism we now see all around us.
Israels slaughter of Palestians is what is fueling antisemitism Hamas slaughter of Israelis had people sympathize with Israel but their reaction turned this sympathy into disgust and anger.
Gordon, I agree that Israel started off with a quite justifiably large groundswell of sympathy around the World but. as you say, their subsequent actions have dissipated it in virtually all populations. Only those Governments tied in some way to Israel (from Balfour’s time) are still supporting it, mainly against what seem to be the wishes of their peoples.
With their destructive activities now expanded to the West Bank, Israel seems oblivious to the angst of the World and is going for broke, seemingly trying to persuade all their Palestinians to leave.
The saddest aspect is that it could have been such a fantastic country. The mirage that it was is now gone. It is economically destroyed, peak Israel is in the rear view mirror. Sad.
I just hope they don’t drag the rest of us down with them.
I have now concluded that hamas itself has not acted on there own but with support of non governmental Western society. … If the shit does hit the fan then Israel is our best bet.
With all due respect, mcohen, this sounds a bit crazy. 7/10 surely did not ingratiate Hamas in “Western society”, I am sure. A second Holocaust in Western society by “non govermental agents”? Are you emotionally countering the genocide accusation?
Could you elaborate on how that could/would/will unfold? Exactly where you are presently? Thus Aliyah? Same, same country, obviously? If the latter you are not in danger. Are you?
Leander An experiment
Put on a kippa,head covering,maybe a black suit with a black hat like the rabbis wear and take stroll around London,new York,Paris,Warsaw and see for yourself
Go to a few American university campuses.
Religious intolerance is a risky business.The most dangerous type of all
Jewish communities worldwide have to pay a security levy.Armed guards on holidays,security systems
Schools have armed guards,24 hr security
When I drive past state schools or private schools there is no security.Maybe a camera here and there
Jewish institutions have been under attack for centuries in Europe.Old news.
England and France are becoming no go areas for Jews regardless who they support.
Get onto the street then ask me that question again
MCohen, I put on my late Uncles Kippa for an orthodox wedding a few months ago. No problems. I just sponsored a Jewish gentleman into a very exclusive club – not a whisper of opposition.
There are students for Palestine and also Jewish rallies for the hostages – nobody is talking anti semitism here; Anti Israel Government? That is a different matter.
Mr..
Mr. Cohen,
Let us consider:
Jews in Russia: Victims.
Jews in Nazi Germany: Victims (I certainly agree with that).
Jews in Israel, on 7/10: Victims.
And, in your words, “The persistent anti semitism in Western countries”.
My thoughts:
I most definitely admire and respect the many profound contributions Jews have made to the various countries in which they have lived, and to total world culture.
If I might be permitted to utter a Jewish phrase, “Mazel tov”.
But does it occur to them that the problems they have encountered in so many countries, in so many eras,
just maybe due to, not to others, but to their priorities?
An example that comes to mind:
George Soros “broke the Bank of England”
https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/08/george-soros-bank-of-england.asp
“the pound rapidly devalued, leading to an estimated $1 billion profit for Soros and his Quantum Fund.”
And so he got quite rich.
But did that benefit the larger society?
I have heard the phrase “Is it good for the Jews.”
I have never heard “Is it good for Christians”.
Keith Harbaugh,
So what are you trying to say? Do you believe they had it coming? Or are you just genuinely curious about why antisemitism has been so prevalent for centuries? If it’s the latter, I’m with you. If it’s the former, you’re treading on thin ice.
TTG,
I taught English in Warsaw for one year in 1997 – which I believe was a good laboratory to learn about antisemitism. At least back then the Poles were very antisemitic – I found that about 1/3 of my class was antisemitic, 1/4 were pro-Jewish – and the remaining students looked like they were just trying to figure out which group was larger so they could follow the herd.
In my observation there was a correlation coefficient of about -0.9 with IQ. All the smartest kids in the class were pro-Jewish while all the dumbest kids in the class were antisemitic. I have observed this correlation in Canada as well. People who have their shit together are not antisemitic in my experience.
There was an interesting war going on in Warsaw at that time between the antisemitic graffiti scrawlers and the pro-semitic graffiti scrawlers. Antisemites would draw a swastika on the side of a building and a pro-semite would come along and hang it from a gallows.
The pro-semites were clearly winning which was quite heartening. Then I went to Moscow for a week in February 1998 and there was the same sort of thing … except that it was 100% antisemitic. I like to think that the Russians eventually figured out that everything they were blaming the Jews for in 1998 was actually the handiwork of the CIA. I think a lot of Russians did figure that out.
James,
At one time, the Catholic Church put the blame for Christ’s crucifixion squarely on the Jews. We took that “Let his blood be upon us and our children” seriously. That was true up to Vatican II as far as I know. Even though the crucifixion was a necessary part of the prophesy of salvation, the Jews ended up being set up for persecution and extermination for centuries for their part in fulfilling that prophesy.
Keith,
Sorts wasn’t behind the run on the gilts that required a BOE bailout and drove Liz Truss form the PMs office.
The link Keith provided referred to the Soros operation in 1992, so nothing to do with the Liz Truss saga a couple of years ago.
JohninMK,
You miss the obvious in his comments.
JohninMK – I’ve heard informed commenters allege that Liz Truss was the victim of a palace coup. Apparently she was a little too Brexity for the grey men of Westminster so I expect that might have been a factor.
On Soros, I wouldn’t say he did anything wrong in 1992. He just sat around while the British Chancellor of the Exchequer poured a billion or so into his lap.
Could happen to anyone. Often does. Another Chancellor, in a similar fit of absent mindedness, gave most of our gold away.
Come to think of it, I suppose I paid for a stanchion on Soros’ yacht. I don’t know who got my teaspoonful of gold. The grey men aren’t always communicative on such matters.
Funny to see how, whatever the subject, these israeli propagandists whine about their little racist-colonialist fictitious state, the latest avatar of european colonialism.
mcohen,
My twitter feed is full of videos like the one of this little girl (the second video):
https://x.com/MoriDiscipline/status/1831684250774479159
Watch her and try and feel some compassion.
Twittet makes you bitter.
Sir I beg to differ with your views “The attack was aimed at jews worldwide Absolutely no doubt about it.
The attempted whitewashing of the atrocities against women and children is proof.The persistent anti semitism in Western countries has led me to believe that a second holocaust is becoming possible.” The Western powers are supplying all the weapons they could for Israel. With 500 sorties of airlifts to Israel from US itself never mind Great Britain, Germany, France etc are you saying that west is complicit in antisemitism? Those Hamas guys have to smuggle their weapons I imagine, because so far no one is claiming that these guys are being provided with weapons. The question would be how this rag tag fighters can anhilate the Israeli Govt and its people when the IAF can freely drop 2000 lb bombs on Palestenian regugee camps. I believe Biden who claims to be zionist has stopped the delivery of 5000Lb bombs and PM Nethanyahoo is not too happy about it. I am really appalled that people who have suffered through Hitler’s Halocaust have decided to practice his ways to cleanse the Holy Lands of Palestenians (Both Christians and Muslims). The secular west now wants to practice ancient rituals (Hanibal doctrine) while castigating Hindus/ Muslims of superstitious beliefs. The irony is not lost on sane people.. Thanks
MCohen,
Well said.
It is funny to me that people like Walrus have convinced themselves that Ukraine has no agency. Its government and people are mere zombies who do whatever the US tells them to. I’m not sure how that works exactly, perhaps the ultimate fruit of MK ULTRA, or something like that. The believers never explain it. They just say it’s true. Anyhow, the same people have also convinced themselves that Hamas are brave independent minded freedom fighters with a just cause and understandably brutish methods. Why, how on earth could Iran get them to do anything? Inconceivable!
Everyone enjoys their personal delusions while accusing others of being delusional.
We Armenians were only hated and slaughtered locally by our muslim neighbors. If I were a Jew, like your doctor friend, I’d be worried wherever I found myself on this big blue sphere. I used to express to Col Lang that Jews only have Israel and the world needs to understand that when discussing the situation there. He dismissed the idea or dodged around it. He might have snidely responded once that could always live in New York City. Yes, antisemitism is everywhere and it’s strong.
“But but The Plight of the Palestinians!” is a cry heard from a range of people, from soft of heart and with no skin the game, to the hardcore antisemites looking to score a political hit. IMO, the Palestinians are merely Arabs who have the entire Arab world in which to relocate. Once upon a time they could have assimilated into coexistence with Israel – perhaps in their own state – but, being perpetually given to murderous behavior, that window of opportunity has closed. Now they must relocate or be wiped out. It is a story as old as history and all of our ancestors have been on one or both sides of such an equation. Mostly those who cry for Palestinians are just antisemites.
Eric Newhill,
I think all those who say the Ukrainians have no agency have their heads firmly lodged in the age of empire. They believe only a few large countries matter and all others are nothing more than colonies, satellites or the near abroad of those large countries. They often cheer for a multipolar world, but deny the existence of all those peoples who make up that multipolar world.
TTG,
Well said. I agree with you concerning the honest members of that set.
A lot of these people are anarchists and antisocial. They have daddy issues or something similar and therefore want to see their own culture and society destroyed. They put a microscope on the flaws of the west and rose colored glasses when looking at the west’s enemies. They identify with and root for the enemies of the west. They see Ukraine as aligned with the west and, therefore, needing to be destroyed. Same with Israel.
Of course, some of this rust and mold class are actually card carrying agents of the west’s enemies.
Walrus, what a insightful post.
I have posted the link over at Moon of Alabama and hope some come over here and read it.
“they had it coming”
That might mean many things.
No, I don’t agree with that as stated.
So, it’s “the latter”.
But I will add this caveat:
I am not willing to place 100% of the blame for antisemitism on gentiles.
Losers and decliners always hate the successful. Heck, the ideology of socialism is based on that kind of envy and it’s alive and well. Jews, on average, are successful.
Wow, and Thanks, Walrus! Very well stated, and I strongly agree.
IMO, there are three root causes of the hole(s) we have dug for ourselves:
1. “Natural” decline (organizational senescence).
Lotsa ways to phrase it: “Good Times create Weak Men”; “Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely”, etc, but these factors didn’t have to lead to such a quick decline.
2. The MBA Revolution.
Promoting “Shareholder Value” as an almost theological moral tenet destroyed the economic and social fabric of the USA in only a few decades. Once Upon a Time, hourly workers in the USA could support a family, buy a house, and send their kids to college. Wall Street made a few $T lending China money to build factories, because they didn’t want to pay US Union wages.
Walrus mentions Boeing, which was destroyed by MBAism after the bean-counters wrested control from the Engineers.
Private Equity (Vulture Capital) killed Toys-R-Us and lots of other companies.
And as Millionaires became Billionaires, they were able to purchase more “influence” in our Governments (Fed, State, Local), grabbing no-bid contracts, and neutering agencies like OSHA, EPA, and FDA. (don’t eat meat from Boar’s Head…)
3. The NeoCons.
IMO, “the NeoCons” were a Cabal that slowly gained control of every aspect of US Foreign Policy decision making across the last few decades. I don’t believe that it’s a coincidence that their policies always seem to benefit Israel (or its most right-wing factions).
They ingratiated themselves to Reagan by supporting right-wing forces in Latin America (see: Iran-Contra). Bush Sr. had enough FP experience to resist their radicalism; he refused to occupy Iraq, and was probably sincere when he promised Gorbachev that NATO wouldn’t expand eastwards to Russia borders.
It seems likely to me – though I have no proof – that NeoCon disappointment with GHWB’s lack of enthusiasm for their Projects contributed to the election of Clinton in 1992. But [most of?] the NeoCons from the Reagan-Bush years retreated to cushy jobs in various Institutes until 2001, when Dick Cheney brought them back into power. The Invasion and Occupation of Iraq was their crowning achievement; it was also our Crossing of the Rubicon, the point when the USA changed from Republic to Empire.
Part of the NeoCon “Project for a New American Century” was to replace the people in US FP bureaucracies with their own ideologues. During the Iraq mess, people in the State Department, the CIA, the Pentagon, etc, who actually understood the countries and cultures of the Middle East – and who spoke the local languages – were sidelined and replaced by NeoCon loyalists with no such knowledge. (This is the clearest example of *intentional destruction* of institutional wisdom – bring it all back to Walrus’ lamentation of how & why our FP is now so stupid & counter-productive).
Americans came to view our Invasion & Occupation of Iraq as a complete failure, but from the NeoCons perspective, it was a great success. Iraq was destroyed – economically, socially, technologically – so it would no longer be able to assist Palestinians with funds or weapons, much less threaten Israel with missiles. Muslims and Arabs now saw the USA as an even bigger threat than Israel. The USA was locked into being a National Security State; our soldiers are now Warriors, our diplomats are now ignored.
I didn’t recognize it at the time, but looking back, it appears that Hillary Clinton – as Secretary of State – became a conduit for NeoCons to insinuate themselves into Democratic administrations (Victoria Nuland is the obvious example, but the takeover seems pretty complete now). This is probably correlated with the Clinton’s financial power within the Party.
One of the reasons that Trump was able to capture the GOP in 2016 was that he was not saddled with loyalty to the traditional GOP financial base – nor the NeoCon policies which had proved so disastrous under Bush/Cheney. But Trump is not immune to, ah, “financial incentives”, so Sheldon Adelson was able to rent a Cabinet seat for John Bolton. Luckily, Trump & Bolton couldn’t get along; sadly, the MSM has used that as a way to rehabilitate Bolton. Bottom line: I have no faith that Trump can protect us from the NeoCons.
There is one factor which kinda unites the three above – the one that President Eisenhower warned us about in his Farewell Speech. The Military-Industrial-[Congressional] Complex is in some ways the nexus of (1) inevitable collapse of huge complex organizations, (2) the corrupting power of Big Money, and (3) a Cabal that wants to use US military power for their own purposes.
I wish I saw a way out of all this. I am deeply pessimistic about the future of my country and the world, and the fact that I won’t live to see the worst of it provides me little solace.
elkern:
Great comment, and fact is you barely got started.
To see one angle on how deep the rot is check out this article yesterday in Popular Mechanics. “..a rare opportunity to study explosive phenomenon in the ionosphere.” Yes, if California falls into the ocean many unique “opportunities” will present themselves.
Yes a rare opportunity to study atomic weapons use in space. Absolute cretins. If people had any idea what a sinister person Elon Musk is …
What am I saying … Did I forget that if you’re obscenely rich it means Americans will bow down because money is their religion?
“But F&L — it didn’t mention nuclear weapons in the article,” said little Johnny.
——————————————–
Whoopsie, SpaceX Blew Up Two Rockets and Punched a Massive Hole in One of Earth’s Layers –
We learned something, though.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a62047078/starship-explosion-ionosphere/
In mid-November 2023, a disastrous SpaceX launch, which saw the explosion of not one but two rockets, offered a rare opportunity to study the effects of such phenomena on the ionosphere.
A study by Russian scientists revealed how this explosion temporarily blew open a hole in the ionosphere stretching from the Yucatan to the southeastern U.S.
Although far from the first rocket-induced disturbance in the ionosphere, this is one of the first explosive events in the ionosphere to be extensively studied.
Elkern – great summary! Gets it all in and this I believe gets to the root of it:- “There is one factor which kinda unites the three above – the one that President Eisenhower warned us about in his Farewell Speech. The Military-Industrial-[Congressional] Complex is in some ways the nexus of (1) inevitable collapse of huge complex organizations, (2) the corrupting power of Big Money, and (3) a Cabal that wants to use US military power for their own purposes.”
So system failure with the cronies and the Brzezinski crowd making hay while the sun shines. For them. Correct?
Right now, low price for oil is putting a lot of pressure on Russia’s economy and it is starting to have a negative effect on the population. Since increasing production will lower income, so that is not much of a choice. Now it is just a matter of when some important people are getting tired of getting poorer.
Walrus,
Say hi to Ambassador Downer for us. His contribution to Russia Collusion was just fab. As one of the 5eyes is just what we Americans have come to expect from our noble allies. As to NATO, member state Turkey wants to join the BRICS . Seems fitting.
“runaway inflation “:
https://www.ft.com/content/f324cb00-5803-400f-87a3-944df7caed9f
Walrus, I too worry about nuclear war.
There was a book and film that came out in the 1950s
about the potential effects of such,
even down there in Australia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Beach_%28novel%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Beach_%281959_film%29
Full movie:
https://youtu.be/dNNsahI49IE
Something for the warmongers who feel it necessary to twist the bear’s tail
to think about.
If anybody has doubts about the longstanding effects of radiation, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_testing_at_Bikini_Atoll
what a great flick! & along w/ Dr Strangelove, Fail-Safe & The Bedford Incident made a real impact upon global public opinion around the time the NTBT was being ratified. Fred Astaire as atomic scientist dealt w/ the angst thusly;
https://youtu.be/X2KkbHxo6po
Yes, it was certainly interesting to see Fred Astaire,
who made immortal impressions as a dancer, notably with Ginger Rogers
https://g.co/kgs/usD8kGh
playing a non-dancing role.
Note also the other participants:
Gregory Peck (playing a U.S. leader as he so often did), Ava Gardner,
Anthony Perkins.
And note the Australian scenes and music.
And let me contrast that flick to the disgusting swine that are leading us into World War III.
& when WWIII don’t break out, that disgusting swine thang don’t fly neither.
the fictional Bedford Incident & the SU’s very real ’83 False Alarm / Petrov Inaction demonstrate nuclear tragedy is more likely to be unintended & accidental than purposeful state act. what ought the world do about Russia’s deep-seated geo-cultural paranoia – surrender at every turn of expression by patriots like Vlad? bad enough turned forever upon its own people.
If you can work the English subtitles.features or speak Russian fluently then try to enjoy this video taped today.
————————
To whom the war… V. Baranets, K. Sivkov, O. Falichev, V. Fatigarov (05.09.2024)
https://youtu.be/2xxm6etmb6k
A special military operation has been going on for more than two and a half years. What is happening has grown into a real war. The enemy has invaded our land, carries out attacks on both military and civilian targets. However, the authorities stubbornly do not want to call what is happening a war. And some of its representatives live as if nothing terrible is happening. While the rest of the country is really at war. Experts of “Points of View” believe that the situation needs to be changed.
A wrote this poem to sum it all up.
My joints creek
But they’re still smokable
My mind does leak
But that is understandable
I wear leopard print underwear
To go with my fake tan
I leave the rest bare
Just call me tarzan
When I get up
In the crack of dawn
I have a coffee in a cup
On my front lawn
Jane comes by with a smile
Swings in from a tree
Hangs around for a while
This is the way life should be.
Annnd, right on time, here’s the perfect serendipitous metaphoric news…
The United States – the largest passenger built in the USA, which broke the record for fastest crossing of the Atlantic Ocean in 1952 – is going to be either scrapped, or sunk in Florida to make an artificial reef. Apparently, the ship’s owners are a few years behind in paying the rent…
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/a-record-breaking-passenger-ship-is-set-to-become-the-world-s-largest-artificial-reef/ar-AA1q2tw0?ocid=msedgntp&pc=U531&cvid=44c3afb7eea445398ecdb61f52e36335&ei=17
“I know the rent is in arrears
The dog has not been fed in years
It’s even worse than it appears
But it’s alright…”
– Grateful Dead, “Touch of Grey”
https://youtu.be/voLdRQ-19dc
Thx!
And yeah, Eyes of the World is a good reminder to, uh, “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”!
ha! or at least be aware it just might exist out there somewhere, sometimes. I feel a part of the swell for Harris is simply bummer fatigue. seriously, how long can you stand hearing about how nasty everyone is, & how OUR nation is the real shithole (guess all those props at Ft Myers failed the job). sure, there’s always a fire on the mountain burning down the house, but occasionally, if we try a little tenderness maybe we can see clearly now.
https://youtu.be/MrHxhQPOO2c
Bonus Ha – I’ve been practicing to sing that in a few weeks at my prayer group/spiritual community! No way I can get those high notes in the bridge, I’ll have to drop it down an octave.
“… todays self absorbed, badly educated and unmotivated youth.”
as ever, Debbie Downer selecting news from cartoon sources satisfying a bias for badness. everything must be consistent w/ the central narrative, or certainty may weaken. thank God I’ve spent a lot of time around youth over the past half century; family, schools, work, sport, entertainment, church, obscure hobbies … from purely fun to deadly serious. to save time (or at least not waste my own any further), I can report from the front, w/ certainty as strong as the popular doom here ’bouts : wrong. quite wrong.
JBS PETITION END ALL U.S. FOREIGN AID TO #UKRAINE https://liberty-pac.blogspot.com/2024/08/petition-end-all-us-foreign-aid-to.html?m=1
Deep State Provoking War Worldwide | by Pastor Chuck Baldwin https://chuckbaldwinlive.com/Articles/tabid/109/ID/4627/Deep-State-Provoking-War-Worldwide.aspx
On “agency”, which I understand to be the right of “We the People” to have a say in their future, I don’t believe the Ukrainians have agency at all.
Else when they voted overwhelmingly for peace in 2019 they’d have got it.
EO,
Remember when the American colonists fought to break away from you red coats? The going got rough for the colonists, very rough, but they resisted the urge to surrender to your king.
One of the colonist leaders said, ” “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
Eric – the Donbass Federalists, as they were in the early days, had it worse than those American colonists. They had to fight for their very survival. Would you deny them the right to do so?
Do you really think that after taking heavy casualties and making such sacrifices those Donbass Federalists who, as the LDNR forces, took the brunt of the fighting after ’22 and who may still be taking the brunt of the fighting, should now surrender? Do you really think they should now meekly submit to rule by a Kiev government that regards them as Untermenschen and would like to see them dead or gone? Just because someone sitting thousands of miles away in the States thinks they should?
As unlikely as if those American colonists, when it was all over, had said that on reflection they’d decided they rather live under King George’s rule after all. Let’s be realistic. For those Donbass fighters there’s no going back to before 2014. Ever.
Eric, the link between Ukraine and Israel is our giving them tacit permission to both of them to hate and then supplying them the weapons to actualise their bloody fantasies.
Strangely Ukraine has long standing antisemitic tendencies, like most of Eastern Europe; they even contributed to the SS didn’t they? Hardly friends of Israel.
Walrus,
You’re a real corker, that’s for sure. Hamas isn’t getting massive funding from the UN (includes from the US) – funding that used to dig assault tunnels and purchase weapons? They aren’t actively getting permission to hate from Iran and the Muslim brotherhood as well as antisemite miscreants worldwide?
Is the US helping arm Israel? Sure. Why wouldn’t we, especially given their neighbors. We also help protect your country. You just want to see Israel destroyed. It’s obvious. You shouldn’t try to hide it.
Like I said, there are psychological issues involved in antisemitism that prevent rational introspection on the hater’s part.
How does Israel protect the US? First time I heard someone make this bold claim. As for Jews in the US, I had this discussion with Col Lang years ago regarding what prominent Jews in the US think about US nationalism.
They despise it because it reminds them of Hitler. Jews by and large vote for a specific party that constantly undermines US nationalism. There are more Morons in the US military than Jews despite Jews in the US being far larger in numbers.
Eric, on what planet are you? Israel is failing. It is losing its legitimacy. This trend needs to be reversed else it becomes a failed pariah state. Saying so does not mean I “hate Israel” quite the reverse. However i refuse to cheerlead for genocide like you do.
Walrus,
“A failed pariah state”, “losing legitimacy” are made up crap circulating in your head. You are a sucker of the first order.
Only cowards are beaten by propaganda. FYI, Israel will finish the job this time and everyone will be onto the next moral posturing cause, somewhere else in the world, in six months, including you.
The Palestinians attack Israel so that Israel will kill them back and that way they can be on the front page and idiot influencers will create propaganda. Those belligerent morons like their people to be killed. Iran and Hamas seek that. The best thing that could happen is that their military wing is so thoroughly demolished that aren’t enough left to commit terrorism such that the surviving every day Akhmed and Sara of this action won’t be killed in the future.
“FYI, Israel will finish the job this time ” yes Eric, that is what is planned – a final solution. Ironic isn’t it?
We have laws against what Israel seems to be doing.
Yes they sure did, Walrus. Their reputation for sadism as concentration camp guards and torturers is well known — legendary in fact. I read numerous accounts in my youth from witnesses.
It’s obvious to you as it’s obvious to me — America is sick sick sick. And it’s not alone. It’s also lost its sovereignty.
@Walrus: “Strangely Ukraine has long standing antisemitic tendencies, like most of Eastern Europe; they even contributed to the SS didn’t they?”
Not so strangely, Russia also has long standing antisemitic tendencies. And they also contributed to the SS:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XV_SS_Cossack_Cavalry_Corps
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_SS_Cossack_Cavalry_Division
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/29th_Waffen_Grenadier_Division_of_the_SS_RONA_(1st_Russian)
Plus the mixed Russians, Byelorussians, Ukrainians, & Tatars of the
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30th_Waffen_Grenadier_Division_of_the_SS
and the
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/36th_Waffen_Grenadier_Division_of_the_SS
I found this excerpt in Mark Twain’s “Concerning the Jews.” Available on Amazon Kindle for $1.99 or free here:
https://archive.org/details/concerningthejew014108mbp
He was not by any means antisemitic, but he also wasn’t stupid. Here he stresses that antisemitism absolutely did not originate with the Christians and their ideas surrounding the Crucifixion. It was going on long before that. And guess what? Reasons abounded then as now.
———————-
From Mark Twain: Concerning the Jews.
Point No. 2.
“Can fanaticism alone account for this?”
Years ago I used to think that it was responsible for nearly all of it, but latterly I have come to think that this was an error. Indeed, it is now my conviction that it is responsible for hardly any of it. In this connection I call to mind Genesis, chapter xlvii. We have all thoughtfully-or unthoughtfully-read the pathetic story of the years of plenty and the years of famine in Egypt, and how Joseph, with that opportunity, made a corner in broken hearts, and the crusts of the poor, and human liberty—a corner whereby he took a nation’s money all away, to the last penny; took a nation’s livestock all away, to the last hoof; took a nation’s land away, to the last acre; then took the nation itself, buying it for bread, man by man, woman by woman, child by child, till all were slaves; a corner which took everything, left nothing; a corner so stupendous that, by comparison with it, the most gigantic corners in subsequent history are but baby things, for it dealt in hundreds of millions of bushels, and its profits were reckonable by hundreds of millions of dollars, and it was a disaster so crushing that its effects have not wholly disappeared from Egypt to-day, more than three thousand years after the event.
Is it presumable that the eye of Egypt was upon Joseph the foreign Jew all this time?
I think it likely. Was it friendly? We must doubt it. Was Joseph establishing a character for his race which would survive long in Egypt? and in time would his name come to be familiarly used to express that character
—like Shylock’s? It is hardly to be doubted.
Let us remember that this was centuries before the crucifixion. I wish to come down eighteen hundred years later and refer to a remark made by one of the Latin historians. I read it in a translation many years ago, and it comes back to me now with force. It was alluding to a time when people were still living who could have seen the Savior in the flesh.
Christianity was so new that the people of Rome had hardly heard of it, and had but confused notions of what it was.
The substance of the remark was this: Some Christians were persecuted in Rome through error, they being “mistaken for Jews.” The meaning seems plain. These pagans had nothing against Christians, but they were quite ready to persecute Jews. For some reason or other they hated a Jew before they even knew what a Christian was. May I not assume, then, that the persecution of Jews is a thing which antedates Christianity and was not born of Christianity? I think so.
What was the origin of the feeling? When I was a boy, in the back settlements of the Mississippi Valley, where a gracious and beautiful Sunday-school simplicity and unpracti-cality prevailed, the “Yankee” (citizen of the New England States) was hated with a splendid energy. But religion had nothing to do with it. In a trade, the Yankee was held to be about five times the match of the Westerner.
His shrewdness, his insight, his judgment, his knowledge, his enterprise, and his formidable cleverness in applying these forces
were frankly confessed, and most competently cursed.
In the cotton States, after the war, the simple and ignorant negroes made the crops for the white planter on shares. The Jew came down in force, set up shop on the plantation, supplied all the negro’s wants on credit, and at the end of the season was proprietor of the negro’s share of the present crop and of part of his share of the next one. Before long, the whites detested the Jew, and it is doubtful if the negro loved him.
The Jew is being legislated out of Russia. The reason is not concealed. The movement was instituted because the Christian peasant and villager stood no chance against his commercial abilities. He was always ready to lend money on a crop, and sell vodka and other necessaries of life on credit while the crop was growing. When settlement day came he owned the crop; and next year or year after he owned the farm, like Joseph.
In the dull and ignorant England of John’s time everybody got into debt to the Jew.
He gathered all lucrative enterprises into his hands; he was the king of commerce; he wasready to be helpful in all profitable ways; he even financed crusades for the rescue of the Sepulchre. To wipe out his account with the nation and restore business to its natural and incompetent channels he had to be banished from the realm.
For the like reasons Spain had to banish him four hundred years ago, and Austria about a couple of centuries later. In all the ages Christian Europe has been obliged to curtail his activities. If he entered upon a mechanical trade, the Christian had to retire from it. If he set up as a doctor, he was the best one, and he took the business. If he exploited agriculture, the other farmers had to get at something else. Since there was no way to successfully compete with him in any voca-tion, the law had to step in and save the Christian from the poor-house.
American woman shot dead at anti-settler protest in West Bank
Witnesses say Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, 26, was fired at by Israel Defense Forces soldiers positioned in a nearby field.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/sep/06/israel-gaza-west-bank-us-citizen-killed
The EU bloc is illegal. UN Charter: The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members.
Things look really bad for the European economy,
due in large part to the cutoff of (relatively) low-cost energy from Russia:
“Europe’s new normal:
High energy bills, fading industry and one chance to fix it
German manufacturers are being strangled.
The EU is feeling the pinch.
Mario Draghi on Monday warned the EU may be staring at ‘slow agony.’
”
https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-energy-bills-germany-brussels-pipeline-prices/
English Outsider discussed some of Europe’s economic issues above,
https://turcopolier.com/its-over-pogo-was-right-by-walrus/#comment-242703
https://turcopolier.com/its-over-pogo-was-right-by-walrus/#comment-242755
Be interesting to see what he makes of the Politico article.
Keith Harbaugh –
Gossip – it’s only that but it’s all there is – has it that Draghi is very competent. If all he can do to get Europe out of the hole is to dig the hole deeper then it doesn’t look that good.
“Mario Draghi’s plan to fix a broken Europe already looks impossible
The Draghi report is full of good intentions to mend a continent losing its way. But while the vision is bold, the politics are practically impossible.
https://www.politico.eu/article/mario-draghi-report-europe-finances-invest-energy-work/
Also a financial crisis narrowly averted in the UK end of July but we’re getting out of that by digging our own hole deeper too.
Keith,
“The green transition is making people poorer. ” Took Politico long enough to come to that conclusion. But the same elderly entrenched politicians in Europe that created the mess but now that they promise to fix things. Conveniently this comes out after the EU elections and German elections in Saxony and Thuringia.