Yves here. Alexander Mercouris covered much of the ground in this post in his latest talk, with more detail about the feelers that resulted from Lavrov having customary informal talks at a UN meeting. They went absolutely nowhere, confirming the Biden Administration lack of interest in them. It also reflects the continuing denial that Russia will in due course be able to impose its will on Ukraine and the West might want to try to influence that. But the US and NATO seem deeply committed to being obstructionist, even if the results continue to amount to cutting off their nose to spite their face.
Again, given the degree of Western denial and the Russian control of the tempo, it would seen the best course for Russia to continue grinding and avoid the big task of attacking major cities. There are presumably enough important targets such as ones at transportation hubsw hich at the biggest would amount to secondary population centers, to enable Russia to keep attriting Ukraine forces until the military or government collapses. That may take awhile but seems the soundest course. The question is if the Russian public can be as patient as Putin.
By Andrew Korybko, a Moscow-based American political analyst who specializes in the global systemic transition to multipolarity in the New Cold War. He has a PhD from MGIMO, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Originally published at his website
He signaled that he won’t let himself be duped a third time after falling for Merkel and Zelensky’s tricks. A Korean-like “land-for-peace” armistice deal does entail some benefits for Russia, but the Kremlin isn’t interested in any agreement that only pauses the conflict. It would have to also achieve Russia’s three stated goals.
A lot of Russian-friendly folks across the world were taken aback by President Putin’s candid admission in a recent interview that he was naïve about the West up until recently. He acknowledged his mistake in thinking that they no longer considered Russia a rival after the USSR’s dissolution brought about the end of communism in his country. Nowadays he’s convinced that the West was plotting to Balkanize Russia all along after they dropped their friendly charade throughout the course of the ongoing special operation.
To be sure, President Putin already signaled as much a year back after former German Chancellor Angela Merkel boasted about how she duped him with the Minsk Accords, which she said her country never had any intention of honoring and only agreed to for the purpose of buying Ukraine valuable time to rearm. This revelation was followed several months later in March by Russian National Security chief Nikolai Patrushev casually mentioning in an interview that the US had actually controlled her for years.
These reminders make one wonder why President Putin returned to the subject in his recent interview, which was aired shortly after his annual Q&A session where he said that he’d warn his past self from 2000 “against naivety and excessive trust in our so-called partners.” This coincided with the Ukrainian Conflict winding down after the failed counteroffensive, of which there was no Plan B, thus explaining the popularityof former NATO Supreme Commander Admiral James Stavridis’ proposal from November.
His suggestion for a Korean-like “land-for-peace” armistice deal, which was initially floated by Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy over the summer and then taken up earlier this month by Senator JD Vance, has since attracted the attention of the Financial Times’ chief foreign affairs columnist. Gideon Rachman quoted an unnamed former US official who explicitly said that “We have to flip the narrative and say that Putin has failed” in order to manufacture the pretext for freezing the conflict.
That columnist then referenced the abovementioned proposal without attribution to either of those figures who’ve publicly embraced it as “one alternative to a formal agreement”, which he justified by spinning Ukraine’s defeat as a victory over Russia with several misleading arguments. After being duped by Merkel with Minsk and by Zelensky during the spring 2022 peace talks that ultimately fell through due to Western pressure, however, President Putin is unlikely to agree to any simple armistice deal.
He already declared during the previously cited Q&A session last week that his country will achieve its stated goals of demilitarizing Ukraine, denazifying it, and ensuring its neutrality through military means if diplomatic ones don’t suffice. This was followed a few days later by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov recalling how the American think tank experts who he met with in New York during his trip in April admitted that the US only wanted to pause the conflict to rearm Ukraine and then resume hostilities.
By candidly admitting that he used to be naïve about the West’s intentions towards Russia, President Putin was therefore signaling that he won’t let himself be duped a third time after falling for Merkel and Zelensky’s tricks as was earlier explained. That said, a Korean-like “land-for-peace” armistice deal does entail some benefits for Russia, but the Kremlin isn’t interested in any agreement that only pauses the conflict like the American think tank experts who Lavrov spoke with earlier this year suggested.
This proposal could form the basis for resuming peace talks, but only with a view towards advancing Russia’s stated goals in the conflict through diplomatic means that would result in a legally binding agreement that sustainably ensures its security, the details of which can only be speculated. Even so, it’s likely that Ukraine wouldn’t be allowed to formally join NATO and a mechanism would be devised for monitoring strict limitations on its armed forces, military-industrial complex, and foreign arms transfers.
The West doesn’t yet seem ready for such significant security concessions, which would be very difficult for even its most masterful perception managers to spin as anything other than a defeat for their side, so the chances of that happening absent some game-changing developments are nil for now. The most realistic way for bringing about that scenario is for Russia to achieve a military breakthrough by sometime early next year, though Zelensky wants to thwart that by fortifying the entire front.
If his increasingly mutinous and rapidly depleting armed forces fail to prevent that from happening, then the “government of national unity” that an Atlantic Council expert just demanded that he assemble in a piece earlier this week for Politico could become a fait accompli. The purpose of doing so would be to give Zelensky a “face-saving” exit from the political scene and manufacture the pretext for reversing Kiev’s ban on peace talks with Russia out of desperation to stop its advance by capitulating to its terms.
The worst that could transpire if that doesn’t unfold is that NATO launches a conventional intervention into Ukraine aimed at drawing a “red line” as far east as possible for stopping the Russian steamroller. The risks of a larger war by miscalculation would briefly spike and the inevitable post-conflict military-strategic reality would be equally more challenging for NATO and Russia than if Kiev capitulated. Nevertheless, that might be a gamble that President Putin is willing to take after finally losing his naivety.
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Nope. Not buying it.
In chess there’s the Sacrifice. In judo, kuzushi.
This guy was in the room with Kissinger while they were asset-stripping St Petersburg.
He knows the game.
This sounds interesting, but I don’t know what your point is.
Kuzushi, to break your opponent’s balance. Well done, Vladimir Vladimirosovich!
kgw
That Putin’s admission of naivety is suspect?
And even further to this, as the guy who was more or less handpicked by West to replace Yeltsin to continue the stripping you’d think he’d have some awareness – doubly so considering that he opted to take over the looting eventually and shut the West out on it.
He’s a frustrating figure in that it’s hard to take the notions of him being dumb/stupid/evil whatever as typically depicted in Western media but on the other hand I have a hard time buying the notion he’s a sophisticated and cunning operator as well.
If anything, he’s the beneficiary of having opponents that seemingly cannot come to terms with the fact that the world is changing and they are going to cling onto the idea that they must retain their status as the unilateral force that runs the affairs of the planet.
Its a tale repeated through history but once a level of power is obtained, ceding it back results in calamity. The USA likey saw Russia as a defeated force and cannot stand the fact that its managed to still remain a relevant power in global politics, particularly it’s relationship to the EU.
Putin was handpicked by Yeltsin’s “family”, by suggestion of Chubais and/or Sobchak who knew him from the St. Petersburg. Yeltsin, who was in a bad health, was about to retire and needed first and foremost a successor he could trust not to prosecute him or or his inner circle (as he was already very unpopular).
Maybe the Russians here or those readers that do business in Russia can comment with better knowledge, but in my understanding the Russian negotiating culture is generally a zero-sum game where personal relations matter a lot. Thus Putin stating that he was fooled both in negotiations and in personal relations is a much bigger thing than it sounds.
It could actually be worth pointing out that in Russia negotiations are not linear nor is the aim a win-win result. Russians don’t, in general, do bargaining. There’s a proposal and it’s either accepted or rejected. If rejected, then either negotiations end or a different proposal is made. There may be a counter-proposal that has little relation to the original proposal.
I guess I’m trying to say here, that in the Russian context Putin is not saying that the devilish westerners double crossed him, but that he was a naif fool who allowed himself to be fooled by the other team – which was their job, since one side always wins and the other loses. The blame can’t be on the side that won.
And that’s why personal relations matter a lot. They’re supposed to bring the element of trust to the negotiating table.
My understanding of Putin selection to become the PM of Russia in 1999 was that a group of senior officers in the Russian army threatened Yeltsin with overthrowing him in a coup and restore the dignity of Russia unless he appointed Putin to the post to start clean up the mess. At that time , if I remember correctly he was the mayor of St. Petersburg and reportedly incorruptible. Scot Ritter alludes to this in one his programs that Western intelligence corroborated this about Putin.
Yeltsin Clinton talked in March 24th 1999 3.5 hours before the bombing of Belgrade revealed Yeltsin “inadmissible steps to aim against your decision ” 6 months later the telefon conversation September 8th 1999 initiated by Yeltsin 1. New prime Minister Putin 2. New war in Dagestan Chechnya and Clinton said “Usama bin Laden group ”
Falseflag Moscow 9.9.1999
Yeltsin resigned in the end of 1999
Putin gained in popularity with the war in Chechnya
When Bush 43 and Jeff Bush got involved in vote manipulation in Florida, and a catalyzing event happened in September 11th 2001, Putin help the United States to invade Afghanistan and the 7 countries in 5 years plan according to Wesley Clark carried out.
August 31st 2022 the Afghanistan War ended like Saigon April 30th 1975.
And Hamas attacked Israel October 7th 2023 22 years after NATO attacked Afghanistan.
Uff August 31st 2021 Afghanistan war ended
So the attack in Ashkelon is 21 years after the NATO attack of Afghanistan, when Putin has his 49th birthday
The Hamas attack was 71th birthday of Putin. Was that a happy birthday to Putin like Zelensky and Nikki Haley said or that was a happy birthday of Bush CIA clan that planned and executed the falseflag operation in New York city in 2001 with only two decoys 767 and 3 buildings rigged with explosive like Nano thermate ?
Putin’s admission of naivety ? It’s more like a Russian admission of Naivety in the 90s that ended with Boris Yeltsin resignation in the end of the last millennium. Read the book of David Satter Darkness at dawn or so about Russian state of affairs before the Belgrade bombing of Bill Clinton after the Monica Lewinsky trial. Also Extreme prejudice of Susan Lindauer.
https://www.businessinsider.com/how-the-1999-russian-apartment-bombings-led-to-putins-rise-to-power-2018-3?r=US&IR=T
As analogy, the Vietnam War was understood by the American leadership to be ‘unwinnable’ by the mid-1960s, but no American politician was willing to ‘lose’ Vietnam (an election), so a bit over three million Vietnamese were slaughtered to keep the war going.
Serially poking Russia in the eye with a stick is a child’s game. The strategic conundrum that Biden / US have created is that the Russian leadership has to know by now (point of article) that the US will never stop doing so until it is made to.
The political leadership in Ukraine has already agreed to Russian terms twice, Minsk II and the agreement of early 2022 that Boris Yeltsin, on US orders, rushed to Kiev to crush. This makes the US disinterest in negotiating an end to hostilities potentially world-ending.
Americans should be asking themselves what they would do if they were in Russia’s position vis a vis US hostilities. The idea to end the threat would leap to the fore soon enough.
The Biden administration may really believe that the Russians are US style imperialists that must be stopped. But where is the evidence?
It was the Americans who ‘invaded’ Ukraine in 2014 to launch a war against Russia.
Again, the Russians have twice agreed to terms with Ukraine, only to be thwarted by the US. This is evidence that the Russians want what they say they want— an end to US military operations against Russia being launched through proxies.
So, there is a hypothesis— that the Russians only want what they say they want from the US, that can be tested. Agree to terms that end the threat to Russia, at which point the Russians will either do what they say they will do or they won’t.
The current dynamic has it that Biden, or any other US leader in the official pipeline, can seek to benefit (e.g. be re-elected) from launching wars while others pay the price in blood.
This is end-of-empire political dysfunction in the nuclear age.
Yeltsin? Full of mischief long after his death? Or another Boris?
Boris Johnson, presumably. However, buffoon Borises are interchangeable, for all intents and purposes.
I was going to say the only difference is one’s still drinking.
Badenov, I had thought. Oops!
Johnson is the Boris of interest. Thanks for the catch.
“….the US will never stop doing so until it is made to.”
Reminds me of the end of a hockey game I watched years ago. There was a line brawl and each member of the opposing teams paired up for some fisticuffs except for one big, burly defenseman on the home team who tried to skate away from it all. His would-be sparring partner kept skating after him, poking him with his stick, trying to get him to fight. Finally the defenseman had enough, turned around and knocked the other guy to the ice with one punch to the face. When the opponent was lying prone, he leaned down and punched him in the face again, stood up, gave the TKO sign to the crowd, and skated off the ice.
If the West will not stop instigating conflict, I suspect something similar will happen to them eventually.
This whole mess is primarily an internal Russian dysfunction issue, not so much a US-vs-Russia one.
The only reason the US was able to get away with so much all these years is that the internal Russian problems were been resolved.
And they still have not been – all those millions of shells and thousands of tanks and SPGs would have never made it past the Polish border had the silent internal Russian civil war been won decisively by the patriotic factions against the treasonous pro-Western ones.
Putin is outright lying about being duped. Or if he is not, then things are even worse than they would be if he was lying.
Because there are two options here:
1) He and the whole Russian leadership sincerely believed that the West was honest. In which case Russia has been governed by total idiots and incompetents who knew nothing about the history of their own country even though they came from the tradition of the old KGB and were born in a country where history matters enormously and everyone knows it and goes back to it repeatedly.
2) They knew they were being lied to but carried on with the charade instead of taking decisive actions at the time (had they done so, hundreds of thousands would not be dead now and Ukraine would not have been so thoroughly Banderized by a decade of incessant propaganda.
Which one do you think it is?
Obviously it is 2).
So then the question becomes why they chose that path of non-action. The answer is that the oligarchs and pro-Western liberal class inside Russia were (and still are) way too strong and would not allow decisive measures that would cause an irreversible break with the West to be taken.
This continues to this day — it is why no kinetic action has been taken against Western interference into Ukraine, even after multiple direct NATO attacks against Russia, including on official even according to the West Russian territory.
When that internal war is won, then you will see a very quick resolution of the war in Ukraine too, but I don’t see Putin as having taken a clear side in it, he is still in the balancer role, despite the hardened rhetoric recently.
I don’t know where these fantastic claims come from. This is an extreme version of hindsight bias, because the war has gone very much Russia’s way, they should have launched it earlier. Putin benefitted greatly from being better prepared than he and his own officials ever imagined, the hubris and miscalculation of the West, and a phenomenon I call “What looks like bad luck can wind up being good luck.”
In fact, Putin’s own remarks of regret reflect that same bias. Alexander Mercouris and I have been discussing by e-mail the notion that Russia is getting dangerously high on its success.
1. Given US sanctions v. Iran, Russia had every reason to expect very severe sanctions from the US and Europeans. The one part that was a surprise was the additional seizure of estimated at $300 billion in central bank assets (the actual number is believed to be lower). Experts, including Russia-friendlies, expected the GDP to fall by 20-25%. The big reason it didn’t was Russia was able to quickly shift trade to countries that did not participate in the sanction.
Absolutely critical to this was China not supporting the sanctions. That gave cover for other fence-sitters to do so.
That in turn was highly unlikely any time before Feb 2022. Recall China had been far more friendly to the US before the Trump Administration came in and slapped on tariffs. As I recall, however, Trump didn’t escalate on the Taiwan front, his big beef was the trade imbalance.
Then when the Biden Administration came in, they invited China to a summit in Alaska in March 2021. The Biden team was shockingly and frontally rude. Biden also stepped up the Taiwan hostilities.
At the beginning of February 2022, Xi and Putin issued a 5000 word statement declaring China and Russia to have a friendship that was tighter than an alliance, and spelled out cooperation efforts over a sprawling set of activities.
Had China-Russia relations not gotten a very solid setting, China would have been expected to support the US-EU sanctions, not just out of deference to its super important trade partner, the US, but also the analogy of Taiwan as a potential breakaway state to the Donbass as an actual breakaway state.
Even the Russia economic officials were surprised, and I might even say stunned, as to how quickly the economy rebounded.
2. In terms of world opinion, Russia got a lot of props for the lengths to which it went not to have this war, Minsk and Minsk II. The fact that Poroshenko, Hollande and Merkel admitted gleefully to having dealt with Putin in bad faith went down badly in the rest of the world. I think Putin had called the “Collective West” the “Empire of Lies” before that; this proved his depiction was not hyperbole.
Recall Merkel then was the de facto leader of Europe, even though Germany would still have to get France on board. Merkel and Putin had what looked like a cordial relationship. They exchanged Christmas and I think even birthday presents.
3. Putin was concerned about the reaction of ordinary Russians to killing Ukrainians. As you surely must know, many Russians have family members in Ukraine and some have in-laws that are not ethnic Russians. I understand early in the war there was indeed controversy about sending in Russian-backed forces to kill Ukrainians. And this was not among the elites, this was across society. Many did as Putin posited (and I have heard this from Americans with long tenures in Russia and Russian relatives) indeed thought of Ukrainians as brother Slavs.
4. Putin had no way of anticipating how the war would significantly reduce the power of the European-leaning middle class, which as I am sure you know he had to keep placating as President. Some left as a result of the sanctions since the economic weight of gravity of their life was in Europe. But others were shocked at the intensity of demonization of all things Russian and came to realize the Europeans really did despise them and hold them in contempt.
5. It was not clear when the SMO started if the US would attempt to widen the war. That is another why Putin went in so undermanned, to signal he had limited aims. Russia got extremely lucky that the US and NATO did not capitalize on the period after the negotiations failed and before Russia had partially mobilized, which entailed some retraining of reservists. Russia was overextended; it made the sound decision to pull back from Kherson and Kharviv. If you were following the maps every day, Ukraine was able to push into many points of the line of contact and Russia, following its doctrine, would fall back. During this period, the ground effort was overly dependent on Donbass militias, the Chechens, and Wagner. There was still a lot of regular Russian military involvement, but not so much on the infantry level.
Because the West saw the pullbacks = serious Russian weakness, they figured they could just keep supplying Ukraine and let Ukraine proceed to its glorious victory.
And the West did have the option of beefing up the effort. Douglas Macgregor repeatedly talked about the possibility of the US organizing a coalition of the willing, with the US providing the biggest # of troops, followed by Poland and Romania. He estimated they could field 100,000 pretty pronto based on men in theater.
If you think the US would back down any time soon after sending in US soldiers in to die, I have a bridge I’d like to sell you.
I could go on with more factoids but that should do to make the case.
I think these are good points, especially about Putin also regretting a naivety that was a necessity. In particular, if Trump hadn’t interrupted the neocon succession, the war would have launched in 2018, and the west’s real weapon, financial isolation, would have been much more effective. I believe the example of Russia’s spin-up of a domestic cheese industry in response to the airliner incident sanctions was covered well here. It showed an ability to turn to on import substitution very rapidly. I imagine parallel efforts were underway in many other industries. As much as Minsk bought NATO time to arm and nazify Ukraine, it bought Russia time to build economic fortifications.
Whoa. the subterranean filaments of communication between superpowers. The US is the old superpower that is getting very tippy on the tightrope of international prosperity because it has impoverished its own country shamelessly. Russia is pretty healthy and has stepped up to create floodgates which are effectively emergency capital controls between a new exploding East and an established, almost clueless, West. Even the Russians don’t want the economic engine of the West to sputter out too fast. And nobody is plopping nukes? Logically. Commendable. So for now, since we can all claim national interests, we will control trade and therefore capital. And maybe nobody understands this new cause for war very clearly because it appears to be an actual cause for peace and as such Israel has one last chance to eradicate Palestinians from Gaza and claim the gas field for Israel. Which is why Gaza is so incomprehensible. That s what it looks like from my very foggy and crude resolution of “Why?” And this view also brings perspective to the financial war profiteers’ one last assault on the dollar – they might never get another chance like this to usurp the value of an entire nation. Just my (admittedly reactionary) suspicion.
Actually, my Russian friend tells me that Kruschev’s secret speech and the massive subsequent demonization of Stalin and the whole Soviet period has huge segments of their population still denying their history. He feels that Putin has had a strong desire to run with the European Big Boys, and is still too close to his oligarch friends. Very small sample, of course, but I can see from reading RT and Pravda, etc. that the anti-Stalinist lies still hang on. I was actually quite shocked when I began to notice it. Self-delusion in political leaders seems to almost be a requirement in our “democratic” systems, where power is most decidedly *not* in the hands of the public. As my friend notes “he doesn’t understand how real people live.”
Khrushchev is responsible for a lot of the disasters that followed, that is correct.
Including the current Ukraine mess – it was Khrushchev who amnestied the Banderites instead of keeping them in the GULAGs to rot until they die. Then they returned to Ukraine and in a couple decades were in key positions.
And played a very important role in breaking up the USSR. That part of the history is entirely lost to the average know-nothing Westerner, and even to a lot of people who are much more educated than that.
Can’t help thinking that though Ukraine continues to pose significant challenges, Russia is already looking beyond Ukraine (strategically, not territorially). It will continue to be the case that no matter how the UKR endgame plays out within the country, Russia’s larger problem is that the West keeps coming at it–e.g., see Rand (2019), “Unbalancing Russia” (everywhere & in every conceivable way).
It may be that the negotiations that RF has always declared itself ‘open’ to will now only be with the US, & along the lines of the December 2021 “Not-Ultimatums”.
*But*–as Russia’s position continues to strengthen & the West’s to weaken–and RF draws close to the fully trained & equipped complement of 1.5 million combat ready soldiers–Russia may insist on broadening the scope of those negotiations from a new ‘European security architecture’ to a new global security architecture–or else Russia will resort to a military-technical solution, beginning with the destruction of the Aegis Ashore bases in Poland and Romania. A new Cuban missile crisis, as it were.
The scope might be a new Yalta, involving China & perhaps the whole BRICS. Or it might be specific to the Russian world–beginning with the withdrawal of all foreign (or specifically US) troops from any bases from countries bordering Russia or even within 1500 kms of Russia’s borders.
Or we push you out, now.
???!!!
That is the announced Russian target–total force 2.5 million. Target for deployable: 1.5 million. Currently at 1.15 million (not all in SMO, of course).
Trying to find Putin’s reflections on what makes his political peers in the West tick, to see if it adds perspective to the over-simple ‘clown world’ impression I get from watching so many years of UK prime ministers parade through Downing Street.
I can’t access the RT “recent interview” link in para.2, and the “excessive trust” link para.4 clicks through to a list of articles. Suggestions?
Here’s the RT link in archive form, which you’ll be able to connect to from the UK and the EU (unlike the RT original) —
https://archive.ph/6PDSr
begob: to see if it adds perspective to the over-simple ‘clown world’ impression I get from watching so many years of UK prime ministers parade through Downing Street.
Not particularly. In any case, as you note, UK prime ministers come and go, and don’t necessarily have much to do with formulating actual policy re. Russia, which more gets taken care of by Whitehall and the spook services.
Thanks – no insight in the article for my query, but it does have a long anti-Putin comment from a Soviet supporter.
A Russian friend’s son was injured by a drone in Ukraine and is home recuperating for a couple months. He was conscripted into the army last year. He was far from enthusiastic about serving when he joined, but apparently his time in the military has wrought quite a change. He is enthusiastic about the Russian successes, eager to go back and join his unit, and believes that his time in the army has given his life meaning. My friend thinks there might be some ptsd involved as he is a bit “overly excited” about his battle experiences, but is glad to see him newly confident and purposeful. We’ve had some discussions about what it will mean when the SMO is over and the warriors return to society. This will have an impact, for better or worse.
I think I would be justified in claiming that many of the US and UK politicians who had fought in WWII and were in power in the immediate post war years were streets ahead of the current crop. Years of proving their competence in a field where the penalty for stupidity was often death, meant that they knew both the reality of war, wanted to avoid it again, and knew how to work effectively. They knew better than to ‘make their own reality’. So the ‘warriors return’ may be in many ways ‘good’. Not that I’m saying the sacrifice of such large numbers of lives is worth it. I hope that in ten years or so the surviving politicians who pushed this unnecessary conflict will be in the dock, somewhere.
They did manage to develop an irrational fear of Soviet Union, though. Even if the military intelligence in the west was absolutely sure that Soviet Union was neither willing or capable of threatening western Europe until 1960’s, the political class was already high on their own supply.
As a result, the comprehensive European security was left unsolved. Which is why there’s yet another war in Europe.
Looking back, were they really afraid of USSR tanks? Or was it that their factory workers might get ideas?
And in the US, the military lied to itself and Congress to justify their shopping list.
I’m tempted to say the latter. And that is why the Marshall Plan was such a massive stroke of genius.
Absolutely.
And all the millions spent against communist parties in France, Greece & Italy esp did no harm either .
Operation Gladio as well.
The message was confused, as you had situations like when Eisenhower (who visited Moscow as a general no less) tried to publicly reach out after Stalin died only for Dulles to release a far more sour message the next day.
And the military was constantly making massive baseless claims about soviet capabilities that were not really questioned until McNamara.
For some reason we keep expecting too much from one man, when they are surrounded by people and organizations that disagree with him.
“Conscripted into the army” is not a correct description. Russia did not use conscripts in the SMO. It called up reservists, as in men who had served previously. We do that all the time, witness Iraq and Afghanistan.
Yves, it is true that Russia has said that they did not conscript men directly into the SMO, but Russia has long had a one-year mandatory service conscription system. Once conscripted, some of these young men have found their way into assignments in Ukraine. It would not be appropriate for me to add further details in this particular case.
It maybe incorrect, but some claim that 450 K approx, have volunteered into the armed forces of Russia. If true, as a bare minimum, it suggests a high degree of support for the SMO.
You could say it took two decades for Putin to fully realize he was dealing with dishonourable people, er, officials, in the West. He was always going on about “partners” until the SMO was fully underway and initial peace talks were then scuttled by “NATO”, utilizing the shambolic figure of fatso shaggy Boris Johnson to travel to Kiev to bolster Zelensky’s fortitude.
With the advent of the Israel/Palestinian conflict, and the stalled-out time-clock in Biden’s head indicating it’s perpetually 1991, US swagger now seems hollow to many nations outside the collective West. The RF isn’t going to let up in Ukraine whether or not some random “top US official” calls for ceasefire negotiations. The video clip on Simplicius’ latest explicitly shows Putin saying let them negotiate, but that the RF is going to take back what it considers theirs in Ukraine, period.
Unfortunately for all concerned, nobody in Washington apparently listens to what Putin says. “Pshaw! We’re the United States of America! Who cares what the murderous dictator Putin is saying? The US sets the agenda.” Well, not any more. Even the Houthis are causing quite a spot of bother in the Red Sea. And so one suspects that the RF will continue to beat the Ukraine military to death until UKR is forced to capitulate no matter what Biden or Austin believes.The RF no longer cares what those idiots believe, what the EU believes or the deep anti-Russian and frankly hostile civilian populations of the EU believe — the job of neutering UKR will be done regardless. The illusions of the West will not matter in the least.
Oh, and Russia still supplies some natural gas to Europe. If the Europeans get even more stroppy, which seems likely as they regard themselves as the world’s arbiter of sophistication and good taste, it’s a simple matter to cut them off and let them squawk. Who in Russia cares any more? The Europeans have proven to be dolts and thieves of Russian property. Putin can now say : “You don’t like us? Here, have some more genetically similar Ukrainian refugees, and the very best of luck to you in all your future endeavours.”
Here on NC I’ve read that we don’t have enough $2M anti-drone missiles to use against the $2K Houthi/Iranian drones.
This in a nutshell exposes the inherent weakness of DOD using the the for-profit business model of the MIC sector, which is always to use sexy, expensive, leading edge stuff. Maybe the stuff even works in battlefield conditions. Maybe not. But it’s profitable. The high tech “wow” that we’ve always relied upon to cow the world is losing cred, and one wonders: are voters and Congress paying attention?
Biden could have kept those ships in the Red Sea and let a “Gulf of Tonkin” incident put us on a war footing and a justify a big defense buildup. Then we could procure those $2M missiles in quantity! Instead, withdrawing those ships seems quite significant, imho.
With 2024 elections looming and the U.S. thoroughly divided, going to a “war footing” seems highly improbable under this Administration. I suspect if Trump was President, his instinct would be to let a ship sink and then whack the Houthi’s — damn the consequences (which could be pretty consequential).
In a second Trump term, he wouldn’t face another election, so the possibility of losing a war and an election would no longer inhibit him. Thus the huge danger of a second Trump term, imho.
Here on NC I’ve read that we don’t have enough $2M anti-drone missiles to use against the $2K Houthi/Iranian drones.
This in a nutshell exposes the inherent weakness of DOD using the the for-profit business model of the MIC sector, which is always to use sexy, expensive, leading edge stuff. Maybe the stuff even works in battlefield conditions. Maybe not. But it’s profitable. The high tech “wow” that we’ve always relied upon to cow the world is losing cred, and one wonders: are voters and Congress paying attention?
Biden could have kept those ships in the Red Sea and let a “Gulf of Tonkin” incident put us on a war footing and a justify a big defense buildup. Then we could procure those $2M missiles in quantity! Instead, withdrawing those ships seems quite significant, imho.
With 2024 elections looming and the U.S. thoroughly divided, going to a “war footing” seems highly improbable under this Administration. I suspect if Trump was President, his instinct would be to let a ship sink and then whack the Houthi’s — damn the consequences (which could be pretty consequential).
In a second Trump term, he wouldn’t face another election, so the possibility of losing a war and an election would no longer inhibit him. This is the biggest danger of a second Trump term, imho.
“This proposal could form the basis for resuming peace talks, but only with a view towards advancing Russia’s stated goals in the conflict through diplomatic means that would result in a legally binding agreement that sustainably ensures its security, the details of which can only be speculated”
Que?
Which begs the question as to why details need to be ‘guessed at’ given the availability of this two year old document – one of two documents, one to the USA and one to NATO – submitted on 17th December 2021:
https://mid.ru/ru/foreign_policy/rso/nato/1790818/?lang=en
……”Even so, it’s likely that Ukraine wouldn’t be allowed to formally join NATO”
‘Likely’?
Given the RF stance on this since the 2007 Munich Security Conference perhaps that should be put down to a classic understatement rather than ‘no shit Sherlock’?
The very obvious option from the context set out – which is screaming to be heard explicitly – is that the Russians, having frequently, consistently and publicly drawn attention to there being no grown ups who are agreement capable to talk to*, do not enter into any negotiations whatsoever until complete capitulation of both the monkey and the organ grinder. Particularly when across all the key metrics – military, industrially, economically, diplomatically and Geo-politically – they are handing the Garden its arse on behalf of the Jungle.
* The most recent blatant clue is contained in this articles own observation:
“This was followed a few days later by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov recalling how the American think tank experts who he met with in New York during his trip in April admitted that the US only wanted to pause the conflict to rearm Ukraine and then resume hostilities.”
I like that “handing the Garden it’s arse on behalf of the jungle”. How poetic.
I thought that all members of Nato would have to agree to such a move and that that would be unlikely (Turkey, for instance, would likely not agree). I’m missing something, no doubt.
I would really like to know with what NATO would be launching this conventional intervention, and how exactly they would support such an intervention given the distances involved. Even the nutters in State must realise this is just not practicable.
You are giving “the nutters in State” too much credit for living in the real world. To these ideologues, their idee fixe is that they are Crusaders in the ‘Army of the Right and the Just.’ Such people have no limits to what they do in service to the Cause.
These fools are dangerous. They are perfectly capable of injecting “disguised” NATO and American troops into the Ukraine battle lines, with or without EU approval. It would start out small, say, “defense troops” for critical military infrastructure in the Ukraine. Next would come “battlefield advisors,” in company sized detachments. Other support troops to free up Ukrainian rear echelon troops for the front would be ongoing from the start of “Operation Slavic Freedom.”
As for “support,” these True Believers go with the mantra from the film “Field of Dreams:” Start it (the wider war) and they will come (to your aid.)
I agree with your premises, but not so much with your conclusion of a Viet- like slow , incremental fall into direct aggression.
No, can’t prove it.
Except to say Ukraine is a monumentally more dangerous field to directly fight in.
Truth is , I doubt the US Army could even begin a convincing intervention.
High speed paper airplanes, with bird poop munitions, maid by school children.
Aren’t there already unofficial Polish and German troops in Ukraine? Along with some Brits and Yanks? I don’t know who could do a “conventional” intervention on the ground and maintain their logistics chain. We probably could send American bombers and jets on Ukraine milk runs, since most of US power is based on our Air Force, but that would quickly lead to missile attacks on the bases those planes took off from.
At this point the best we can be hoping for is that Putin, after bulking up this highly effective military, isn’t succeeded in a few years by some murderous Madeleine Albright type (“What’s the point of having this superb military you’re always talking about, if we can’t use it?”).
It would be up to each individual member to decide what it wants to do, even in case anoter NATO member has been attacked (Article 5 is not about mandatory support)
The only thing about the outcome of this conflict about which I am certain is the mendacity of the West in declaring it a “victory” regardless of how objectively humiliating the failure which actually occurs. Followed by the inevitable “memory holing” and distraction via yet another foreign misadventure …
Russia ends up ingesting all of Ukraine it can stomach, but the US and its’ coalition partners crow “See! We kept them out of Paris!”.
Yep, It is going to be embarrassing.
I’d say that Putin has just announced that playtime is over and an adult is taking charge. Once he used to refer to western countries as ‘partners’ but has not done that for a very long time. And why should he? Even as the Ukraine falls apart, the west is still insisting that the basis of negotiations be Zelensky’s 10-point plan – otherwise know as Russia’s surrender document. Or they make plans to freeze the conflict as if Russia had no say in the matter. Those western countries are simply not serious and too many of them are WEF muppets that are really B grade people. So Russia is going to have to do it the old fashioned way – with a decisive military victory. No need for huge attacks as they only run up Russian casualties but if they keep the pressure on, it is only a matter of time until the Ukraine collapses. Sure the west may do something stupid like drop a NATO force in Odessa but there would be no way to re-supply such a force and NATO is not up to a stand-up fight with Russia, even if they had the ammo – which they don’t. Russia gave the west every possible chance and all that happened was that they continued their efforts to destroy & break up Russia and trying to kill as many Russians as possible. And when this war is over, the west is going to have a crisis of identity as reality slaps them up the side of the head. When this happens, I would expect a lot of western countries to bring in really repressive laws to keep their own citizens locked down because of having the deal with the mess that this war left them in.
Ritter is often overly dramatic in his estimates of what is going on, one of the things I like most about him, but I do hope that his early estimate about Ukraine having to sign a document of total surrender on a Russian warship in Odessa harbor pans out.
I would like to see that covered in the MSM on a split screen with
HirohitoBiden saying that “Russia has already lost” from his speech a few months ago. Our neocons have lost so many of the wars they have manufactured that it just has to be getting near time that they are given their due in acknowledgement for their efforts.I like Ritter, too. And yes he does have a tendency to become … “passionate” …?
But, he still has a desire to try for the truth. “Honest” passion is a rarity in our world.
And anyway, he’s entertaining….
When this war is over, the west will move on to stirring up trouble in Georgia and Armenia. Even before that, we may give the Likudniks the okay to bomb Iran (could very well be Trump doing that in 2025). If direct military engagement fails, try another “color revolution” or two, then find another proxy to start hostilities again. Have we ever deviated from that approach since 1991?
Or they may be so far up their own asses that they won’t hear it and declare “best 2 out of 3?” in Palestine and Taiwan
I’d be interested if one of our Russian speakers has heard or read Putin’s remarks, and whether he actually said he was “naive:” few politicians would admit to being “naive”in English, and analogues in other languages I’m familiar with have somewhat different meanings.
In any case, I wouldn’t read too much into these remarks. Putin is running for re-election, and he’s also concerned to establish his legacy and defend his actions over the last few years. When any politician in any country is asked “why did you let this happen” the invariable reply is “we were deceived by the other side.” Putin was in the room for Minsk II (and I think Minsk I) and would be well aware that there were no commitments of any kind by the West, and nothing signed by them: indeed, as a lawyer, he would realise that the documents signed were not legal texts but just lists of good ideas for potentially resolving the crisis. (I went into all this in some detail in an article which Yves was subsequently gracious enough incorporate in an article of her own on the difficulties of any negotiated settlement.) A joint Russian-French-German declaration the same day pledged each nation to encourage the signatories to work on the list. Recriminations between the three external parties began almost at once, so in a sense there’s nothing new here. But the damage is done, and now Western duplicity over Minsk is part of the Russian discourse, just as Russian duplicity over Minsk has been part of the western discourse for some time, and just as if we needed any more complications.
Politics being what it is, I assume we can now expect all Russian politicians will now run with this idea of betrayal, which is going to make some future treaty or understanding (which will have to happen) extremely complicated, since the first to advocate talks with the West will be accused of treason. I don’t think Putin was naive, and I don’t think he thinks he was. He was trying to negotiate with a West which was divided, obsessed with its internal quarrels and domestic politics, largely uninterested in, and contemptuous of Russia, and fixated on Afghanistan and other faraway crises. If anything it was the West that was naive in not realising just how serious the Russians were abut their security concerns: but that’s all too late now.
Well said, Aurelien. But I’m not entirely convinced. Alexander Mercouris believes that Putin genuinely worked on establishing a good relationship with Merkel, and is likely disappointed that didn’t work out. In the end, Merkel wasn’t strong enough to resist the hawkish bent of the U.S. and so Merkel turned against Putin. So perhaps we should give Putin a bit of credit for authenticity here?
Oh, I’m inclined to agree. We don’t know what was said between the three leaders in the margins, and it’s quite possible that Putin went away feeling reassured. Certainly, there’s no doubt that both Hollande and Merkel were keen for the fighting to stop, because they both believed (as did western capitals generally at the time) that the separatists were Russian-controlled, and this was the first step in a takeover of Ukraine. So from that point of view, the sooner the fighting stopped and the situation stabilised, the better. After that, you get into the blame game, and the official western view quite quickly became that Putin had not been serious, and that Moscow still intended to take over the whole of the country. Then, rearming and retraining the UA was seen as a stabilising, deterrent move, as Merkel said not long ago. In fact, the truth scarcely matters, and it wouldn’t surprise me to discover that Putin feels genuinely let down, just as Merkel and Hollande claim to be. One of the problems, of course, is that whatever may have been discussed informally between the three about the future of Ukraine, nothing beyond the immediate future after the cease-fire was ever put in writing.
The proof is in the pudding.
After Minsk II the west kept training and rearming Ukraine, which legislatively was sliding towards Russohobia and ethnonationalism.
They changed the constitution in 2019 claiming the want to join NATO, passed legislation in 2021 forcing government to reclaim control on ALL Ukrainian territories outside its control by ANY means necessary, and ammased their military in Donbas in April/May 2021 and then in February 2022 have started a shelling campaign against Donbas, having a force double or triple what Donbas militia had – Children were put on busess and sent to Russia in preparation of a potential invasion by Ukraine AFU.
Obviously no peep from the west, and obiously the rights of the ethnic Russians in Ukraine were worth less than dried dog poo in the eyes of the west.
It is this constant push east and constant dismissal of Russian concerns, security wise and human rights wise (see how ethnic Russians are treated in the Baltic states, breaching all the minority protection laws on the books, with not a wisper from the EU) that tips the scale in favor of Russia as an honest player (they haven’t done much btw 201 and 2022 to strengthen Donbas) and reveals the West’s duplicity.
“the official western view quite quickly became that Putin had not been serious, and that Moscow still intended to take over the whole of the country. Then, rearming and retraining the UA was seen as a stabilising, deterrent move, as Merkel said not long ago. In fact, the truth scarcely matters” [Aurelien]
This seems like a case of Western threat exaggeration and failed deterrence. Arming and training the Ukrainian evidently did not deter the Russians. The truth matters regarding Russia’s intentions. If Russia was planning a military attack all along, then the Western approach might be justified. If Russia was not, then the West aggravated the situation by threat exaggeration, which seems to be a continuing and central problem.
Whenever I hear claims that “Putin” always wanted to take over all of Ukraine all along, I then ask, if that were true, then why did he restrain the militias in the first two Donbas wars? They were winning, and had they kept going, they could have taken much more territory (not all of Ukraine, obviously, but they could definitely have pushed and taken territory beyond the Donbas itself-quite likely the bulk, if not all of the neighboring oblasts). At that time, the Russian military was weaker, but the Ukrainian military was much, much weaker than it eventually became, especially given the many defections to the militias, and lack of materiel.
We might also interpret ‘naive’ being a deeper reference to an idealistic belief not in the power of a treaty, but in the power of neoliberal free-trade orthodoxy and economic interdependency to overwhelm the old-guard’s ‘great game’ imperialism. I mean, who could realistically posit that Germany would cut off its energy and raw material supplies and access to a vast market? Of course naive is a sympathetic view, since, just as Minsk bought time for the NATO to arm and renazify Ukraine, it bought time for Russia to build fortifications against the West’s true arsenal of financial weapons. The rapid spin-up of a Russian domestic cheese industry in response to MH17 sanctions was covered here. It demonstrated a coordinated implementation of import substitution that was probably undertaken in parallel across the economy. Whether Putin’s putative naiveté is hindsight bias, as Yves notes, it certainly makes a virtue of necessity in that Russia would not have fared so well in 2015, or 2018, against the economic warfare the West has unleashed.
Yes, Putin used the actual word and it’s pronounced similarly to English. He was asked by a reporter if he was naive in the 00s and his answer was, “”Yes, definitely, naivety was present then.” Note that this wasn’t a question about the Minsk agreements, in fact it could be said he was no longer so naive by the time he made his famous Munich Security Conference speech in 2007.
https://www.rbc.ru/politics/17/12/2023/657e9e179a79470559a15bf3
This is a very good point. I share the view that Putin’s admission of being duped is somewhat farfetched. He obviously battled hard to have Minsk agreements respected by the other side, but I surmise he understood from the beginning what were the real intentions of the Western puppetmasters.
But, in 2014 and the following years, Russia was much less stronger on many respects. Not only regarding military power, but also in its capacity to resist and overcome sanctions. The first rounds of sanctions imposed by the West after Crimea takeover has certainly be a very good training for Russia to become self-sufficient and resilient. If we look at the export figures, Russia went for example as a net food importer in the 2000 to the biggest food exporter worldwide for many categories.
So, I think Russia needed those 8 years to be able to resist successfully to the 10,000+ sanctions imposed after the beginning of the SMO. By playing naive, Poutine bought this crucial time to ensure Russia could safely its SMO in 2022. That said, I still think Poutine would have by far preferred to have Minsk agreements implemented in the meantime and dispense with SMO.
But the way things unfolded is certainly better for Russia in the long run, and also for the whole world.
In any case, (whether he really believes or not he was naive) his remarks indicate the red lines for Russia on any possible future negotiation and, to be sure, nobody in the West seems ready to negotiate on such terms: Ukraine demilitarization etc. This is bad news for Ukraine condemned to act as a mere punching-ball for Russia military training (with Russian losses included of course) until K.O. (or internal division) and who knows what will come thereafter.
Whatever the result the West will have shown how little it cares about the future of Ukraine except if it can be kept functioning as a punching ball and for how longer. This might have undesired consequences on the political outcomes to come in Ukraine. I also wonder how will this be seen in countries like Georgia or Armenia which have apparently been selected as next peons in the same game.
I think a lot of this goes back to the (to me at least) strange cultural phenomena in Russia that some here call “insecurity”, although I am not sure that is the best word for it. Russia has always, for one reason or other, seen European culture and achievements as superior to it’s own. This goes all the way back at least to Peter the Great, who was Educated in Great Britain, I believe, and who moved his capital/court closer to the rest of Europe, and sought to “Europeanize” (for lack of a better word) Russia. Now Peter did do a lot to modernize Russia, but he, and it seems many others, equated modernization/strengthening with European culture. You can see more evidence of this phenomenon in the Russian obsession with French culture even as they were being invaded during the Napoleonic wars. I am so glad that, FINALLY, it seems, Russians are beginning to see their own culture as one of the great historical cultures of humanity (as far as I’m concerned it outstrips any in Europe, save possibly the Turkish, Greek, and Italian-to which I would say it equals, and it certainly outstrips that of the US/UK). I am incredibly happy for them, and I hope this trend continues.
I wish I could believe that. I also deplore the tendency of which you speak, but I don’t see it being reversed just yet. Denouncing Western culture and Western values all day long, as some here do, is not enough – in fact, I’d argue it is counterproductive. Much of our cultural policy is now built on spiting the West, but doing so just gives it power over us in another way. Our political religious conservatism is functionally indistinguishable from that of the Americans, despite the differences in underlying religious traditions – some liberation from Western culture that is! Fortunately there are other policies and public trends that focus on the promotion of both Russian national and various regional or ethnic minority cultures and histories. Such tendencies, I think, are much more promising and may yet enable the mass rediscovery of actual Russian culture.
As for Peter – he grew up in Russia, of course. He just spent a lot of time in the “German” (i.e. European) colony near Moscow (Nemetskaya sloboda). He only went to visit Britain, Holland and the Holy Roman Empire when he was in power and of age. I do agree that this Occidentalism originates with him. Before him, our rulers had no problems with inviting Europeans to work for them – that is how the Nemetskaya sloboda came to be. Many reforms, especially in the military sphere, were based on borrowed European ideas. Peter pushed it much further into a fashion for all things European, whether they made sense or not. I agree, again, that this did tremendous harm, not least because many of the ideas he brought over were actually quite bad. European-style absolutism, then at the peak of its hyper-regulatory administrative obsessions, was even more repressive than old-school organically-evolved Muscovite despotism. The same goes for the bulk of ideologies we borrowed without sufficient thought from the West since then – and are continuing to borrow today.
One way to interpret “naïvety” in this context is: in Western PMC culture, victimhood is power. This utterance was directed outward; other communications by Putin et al meant for inside Russia would probably not involve victimhood.
Whyever not? Victimhood is very popular here as well, it’s just deployed in somewhat different ways. National victimhood and being deceived by the wicked West are both common lines, certainly among online commenters and politicians. It helps that there is plenty of material to draw upon.
“We have to flip the narrative and say that Putin has failed.” So we can get the US public to accept a ‘peace’ agreement in Ukraine.
I have no idea what is real anymore. Or what is truth. Does it matter? Everyone picks a piece of the narrative that makes sense and enables one to get up every morning and make it through the day.
I listened to this talk by Jeffrey Sachs yesterday, while I was preparing a Solstice Eve dinner. Not much information on when or where he is presenting, but perhaps in Germany or Austria? Sachs gives a lot of historical context to the Ukraine conflict (as far back as the Cuban missile crisis,) along with an unflattering and scary portrait of the current class of US leaders (including some ‘deep state’ stuff), and of the current status of the US as a country.
Is it all true? If I fit these pieces into my puzzle map of my world view, a scary, gloomy image emerges. I keep searching for information that allows me to ‘flip the narrative.’
I don’t think anyone could sensibly believe that Putin didn’t go out of his way both personally and professionally to encourage Angela Merkel to be more responsive. And Germany used to have a lot of trade with Russia which they decided to throw away.
If Merkel really believes that she was some kind of strategic genius (or advised by some) in not cooperating in European security agreements with Russia, she can take full responsibility for what has happened since including the state of Germany’s economy. Except that’s not true, she genuinely got on well with Putin at times. If she wants to deceive herself about that, so be it.
I wonder… who was putin addressing with multiple mea culpa’s? Domestic, west, or row? Certainly not the west?
Perhaps he’s thinking of row, to reinforce why he can’t negotiate at all… and, it seems to me, he doesn’t need to, but knows row wants this over soonest, so he repeats why they must wait a bit more.
Imo domestic is quite patient, even stoic, especially if it sees Russia is continuing towards liberating odeassa and Kharkov, something the public seems quite interested in. And why not be patient? Economy is humming nicely even as eu sinks, worsening with Israel’s war on Gaza.
Otoh, I read yesterday a plane flew from Russia to dc. If so, I wander what that was about. ME or Ukraine?
There are many Russian government publications translated into English. Karl Sanchez lives in Oregon and has posted for years on MoonofAlabama as Karlof1 and in the last few months started a substack
karlof1’s Geopolitical Gymnasium
Here is Lavrov speaking in Morocco yesterday
“Lavrov in Marrakech for the Russian-Arab Cooperation Forum: Remarks and Presser
KARL SANCHEZ DEC 20, 2023”
he begins by talking about positive trends in Russian-Arab cooperation and then
“This positive trend needs to be supported. Especially now, when it has become obvious that some external forces are not averse to using the latest aggravation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in their own interests, to ignite the fire of regional enmity in the development of the numerous past adventures unleashed by the United States and its allies in the Middle East over the past twenty years. Their result is undermined statehood, hundreds of thousands of victims, huge flows of refugees, and a sharp aggravation of socio-economic problems. The goal is clear – to weaken the countries that pursue an independent foreign policy.
We are familiar with this handwriting from the events in Ukraine. In an effort to inflict what has been declared a “strategic defeat” on Russia, or, as they have recently begun to say in Washington, “to prevent Putin from winning in Ukraine,” the United States and its European allies continue to sponsor the criminal Kiev regime and pump it with deadly weapons. It is no secret that Vladimir Zelensky and his entourage are under direct external control. The “collective West” still assigns Ukraine the role of a tool in the big game, a supplier of “cannon fodder” to serve the interests of the United States and other NATO members.
The crisis in Ukraine and the situation in the Middle East, as well as the “watershed” in the approaches to these crises between the Western minority and the world majority, indicate that the world is at a fateful fork in the road. In essence, the question is whether it will be possible to form a truly just and democratic world order based on the central role of the UN, on the Charter principle of the sovereign equality of states and on a verified balance of interests of all countries, or whether the United States and a group of former colonial metropolises will continue to impose their “rules” and their selfish agenda on the international community.
We are convinced that it is impossible to turn back the course of history. New centers of globally significant decision-making have come to the forefront of the world stage. Among them, Arab countries are playing an increasingly important role. The sooner all our Western “colleagues” realize this truth, the better it is for them. Today, when the world continues to storm, as I said, it is important to go back to basics. First of all, I would like to refer to the principles of the UN Charter that define the norms of interstate communication, including the sovereign equality of states and non-interference in their internal affairs. The principles of the UN Charter must be respected and observed, not selectively, but in their natural, inseparable interconnection and completeness.”
https://karlof1.substack.com/p/lavrov-in-marrakech-for-the-russian
***
I am struck with the coherence and insight of these article.
Here are recent posts
“Seasons Greetings: Maria Zakharova’s Briefing Selections” KARL SANCHEZ DEC 20, 2023
“Meeting of Russia’s Board of the Ministry of Defense” KARL SANCHEZ DEC 19, 2023
“Can the US-led Joint Patrols Defuse the Red Sea Alert?: Global Times Editorial” KARL SANCHEZ DEC 19, 2023
Thanks donmidwest! I’ve subscribed.
Putin is bluffing. Russian army cannot go for a large scale offensive much in the same way Ukrainian army couldn’t. The last significant movements of the front lines where when the Russians pulled out of Kharkiv region and out of Kherson. That was a while ago. That aside, even if the Russians can move the front, what will happen then? Ukrainians do not want to live in Russia. That is more true the further to the west you go. If Putin captures all of Ukraine, he will have to send half of the population to Gulag, and to industrialize the country. That was possible in the 1930s but is not possible now. Putin knows that of course. The bluff is to make an impression that the longer the west delays the negotiations the more of the Ukrainian territory will be captured to become a part of Russia. That was his speech was about. In fact, what he really wants is to legalize what he has already captured and to get rid of the sanctions. As much as Putin puffs himself up now, he cannot swallow Ukraine as a whole.
Thanks for the special insight operation ;)
Sorry to burst the bubble and rain on the parade but vast swathes of the population of particularly Western Ukraine have already voted with their feet and decamped in their millions across the rest of Europe.
Where, as Andrew Korybko implicitly lays out here……
https://korybko.substack.com/p/will-the-eu-deport-ukrainian-draft?
…..the choice is either immediately being drafted into the meat grinder with no training and no munitions to fight with – because the only thing the Collective West under its oligarchy can produce is fiat printed money – regardless of their age or physical condition (which is an immediate death sentence) or fleeing to a Europe whose rapidly increasing economic collapse will sooner of later make it indistinguishable from a Gulag anyway.
The Russians have barely used their military capacity in this police action and don’t need to. War is not about taking territory it is about degrading the capacity of the other side to the point where they can no longer fight and must accept terms. As matters stand Ukraine is running out of the necessary human resources to sustain a conflict and its Western backers are rapidly running out of the necessary munitions to continue this vanity project. Mainly as a result of the economic, social and political operating system paradigm the West insists on being the only acceptable way of doing anything which they are vaingloriously attempting to impose on the majority of the planet’s populations like it or not.
As Andrei Martyanov might observe, the butthurt evident from this kind of wishful thinking comment is palpable.
vast swathes of the population of particularly Western Ukraine have already voted with their feet and decamped in their millions across the rest of Europe.
Nakba anyone? Where are all the nakba people hiding?
A while back I watched a clip of Poutin saying Russia would not go where it is not wanted. I believe he still thinks that way as his recent musings on the ethnic minorities in Western Ukraine indicate.
Wake up guys !!
Naive Putin … and disgruntled Merkel ?
Merkel pi**ed off that Putin, knowing well that she was scared of dogs since childhood, intentionally lets a dog loose in the meeting room.
That time Putin brought his dog to a meeting to scare Angela Merkel
Business Insider
Jul 7, 2017,
“As the dog approached and sniffed her, Merkel froze, visibly frightened. She’d been bitten once, in 1995, and her fear of dogs couldn’t have escaped Putin, who sat back and enjoyed the moment, legs spread wide. ‘I’m sure it will behave itself,’ he said. Merkel had the presence of mind to reply, in Russian, ‘It doesn’t eat journalists, after all.’ …”
“Later, Merkel interpreted Putin’s behavior. ‘I understand why he has to do this — to prove he’s a man,’ she told a group of reporters. ‘He’s afraid of his own weakness. Russia has nothing, no successful politics or economy. All they have is this.'”
https://www.businessinsider.com/putin-merkel-meeting-dog-2017-7?r=US&IR=T
“He’s afraid of his own weakness. Russia has nothing, no successful politics or economy. All they have is this.”
Lol. Boy, did Merkel get that one wrong.
With the west now cutting military loans (how Ukraine will ever pay them is still not explained) and Ukraine reported wanting to recall overseas nationals, the war is all but over at last and once there is talk of a war being over, the side that is on the back foot will quickly lose its incentive to continue the slaughter.
No side can ‘win’ this war but NATO must be stopped.
This is not the last war, with MBDA Lockheed, BAe Douglass and others already building new arms factories, they are already planning more wars around the world
Israel is burning through its stockpiles, the US is rattling over Peru and Venezuela, China. without a large increase in arms supplies, the west can’t keep this up