Category: RUSSIA DESK - The Greanville Post

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.

Andrei Raevski
THE SAKER

Regular readers of the blog know that I separate our poor and long-suffering planet into two basic parts: Zone A, aka the AngloZionist Empire, aka the World Hegemony aka the “Axis of Kindness” and what I call Zone B, or the Free World. Very approximately, we need to separate the ruling elites and the people they rule over separately. Here is, very roughly, what we get:

	Zone A	Zone B
Ruling elites	Hate Russia/Putin	Some fear the Hegemony, but others don’t
People	Mostly indifferent or hostile	Mostly support Russia/Putin

Next, I propose to make a simple thought experiment. Let’s assume that Russia loses the war against NATO. We do *not* need to spell out how exactly such a defeat could/would happen, we simply assume that Russia is unable to achieve her goals of denazification and demilitarization of the Ukraine (and, really, all of NATO), that NATO forces are successful in defeating the Russian military machine (again, it does not matter how, with or without amazing Wunderwaffen) and that Russia very clearly loses.

We don’t even need to define what “defeat” would mean? Maybe we can imagine that Russia gets to keep Crimea, but loses all her recently liberated regions from the former Ukraine, or maybe NATO manages to even occupy Crimea. I don’t see NATO tanks in downtown Moscow, but we can even imagine a purely psychological defeat in which both sides believe that Russia has lost and NATO won.

Again, details, no matter how improbable and far removed from reality, do not matter. What matters is only this: once all the four groups above realize that NATO has defeated Russia, how would they react?

For the leaders of the Hegemony, this would be a dream come true. In fact, the Neocons running the Hegemony will most likely decide that they need to “finish the job” which they did not finish in the 90s, and that Russia needs to be broken up into several parts. This would be the West’s latest “final solution” for the “Russian problem”.

For the leaders of the Free World (sic), a Russian defeat would signal that there are no alternatives to the Hegemony and that like it or not, the AngloZionists will rule the planet. Like the Borg in Star Trek like to proclaim: “We are the Hegemony. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated“.

For most people in the [real] Free world, a Russian defeat would be a crushing disappointment for the simple reason that most people would see the AngloZionist plan for what it is: get Russia first, then take on and bring down China and then, eventually, Iran and any other nation daring to disobey the rulers of the Hegemony.

Clearly, this is not about the Ukraine, this is about the future of mankind as a whole.

But what about the people in Zone A who currently already live under the AngloZionist yoke?

[Quick reminder: I have decided, for various reasons, not to discuss internal US politics on the Saker blog and I will try hard to stick to this rule. Still, I will state the obvious: we all now know the outcome of the latest elections in the USA and the adults in the room understand what happened, no need to list various truisms here. If there is anybody reading this who would sincerely believe that some variation of the Neocon Uniparty in power will change things for the better or even slow down the inevitable collapse I would recommend that this person stop reading here. Now for the rest of us:]

I think that the initial reaction of most people in Zone A will be a mix of relief (“Of course I knew that the West would win!“) and indifference (transgender issues are SO much more important!): their valiant “finest fighting force in the history of the world” kicked some russkie commie ass which most definitely deserved some ass-kicking. Some of the most sanguine defenders of “western civilization” will even drop by our comments section and gloat “ha! ha! told you! your Putin and his clueless generals got their asses kicked by the most bestest US and NATO generals!“. And for a while, they will feel really good. Vindicated: finally the dumbshit, stupid Russians will pay the price for electing and supporting such a weak, indecisive, naive, corrupt, incompetent (and possibly even dying of cancer) leader!

And if only the Kremlin had had the wisdom to listen to its “western friends”!

But no, the Kremlin did not, and now there is going to be hell to pay. Of course, if Russia’s “western friends” had been in charge, they would have executed a lightening fast blitzkrieg a long time ago, smashed Banderastan into smithereens (à la Fallujah if you wish) and quickly and decisively defeated NATO. But those clueless idiots in the Kremlin did not listen, and so they deserve what is coming next.

Okay, fair enough.

But what about the regular people in Zone A? The ones whose “side” supposedly “won”?

Once the initial bliss and celebrations are over, what will happen to them next?

Anybody wants to take a guess? If so, please post your thoughts in the comments section below.

My personal take is that after the defeat of Russia, the defeat of China (by whatever means) would be next. Once that happens, all of the following will become decapitated and irrelevant: BRICS, SCO, CSTO. The next country on the Hegemony’s kill list is Iran which, having lost the backing of both Russia and China will not be able to successfully challenge the Hegemony. That, in turn will have major consequences for the entire Middle-East. Wannabe Pasha Erdogan would be very quickly brought to heel. Ditto for MBS.

The Israelis will feel like they “fixed the universe” well enough and that their Moshiach must be next 🙂

With Russia and China out of the way, Central Asia would be frankly easy picking for the Hegemony. In fact, all the Russian limitrophes would quickly be absorbed into the Hegemony.

The same goes for Pakistan and India, who would quickly lose most (or even all) of their sovereignty. Afghanistan will be handed over to the (US-baked and run) ISIS. Eventually, both Latin America and Africa will be fully recolonized (to the immense relief and joy of the local comprador class).

Now I submit that anybody with a modicum of information and intelligence will agree that the gang of woke freaks currently running the USA and almost every EU country out there doesn’t give a damn about the people they rule over: they see them only as means of production, in other words, as slaves who need to be given sufficient amounts of (bad) food and immense amounts of (truly demonic) “entertainment” to keep them nice, and happy and, above all, obedient and ignorant. So here comes my question:

With Zone B gone, what hope for a better future, if any, could the slaves of the AngloZionist Hegemony keep in their hearts if our entire planet turns into Zone A?

The current repressive apparatus available to the US ruling class includes 17 “intelligence” agencies, the biggest military aggression budget on the planet, the highest number of prisoners kept in jails, the total informational control provided by Google, Amazon, Netflix, Facebook, Twitter, etc. etc. etc. militarized police forces and other agencies ready to deal with “internal terrorists” (sometimes defined as any MAGA person), and a school and college system designed to create obedient office plankton (white collar) and fast food employees (blue collar) with almost no awareness, nevermind any understanding, of the outside world. EU states are not quite there (yet) but they are catching up fast.

This is not a system which will simply collapse by itself or, even less so, be overthrown by its “deplorables”.

I have mentioned this many times in the past: the US political system is neither viable nor reformable.

The EU political system is basically an extension of the US political system, just with a more strongly pronounced colonial mindset (“fuck the EU” right?).

So will the Hegemony turn our entire planet into a giant and “woke” Disney World run by Neocons?

Not as long as Russia, China, Iran and others are standing firm. But if these “resisting nations” are crushed, then it's show over for the people of Zone A whose slavery will not only last even much longer, but whose living conditions will further rapidly deteriorate

And once the “bread and games” thingie fails, you can bet that violent repression is next.

ANY regime which seriously aims at colonizing the entire planet (which the Hegemony undoubtedly does!) will ALWAYS keep its own population in slave-like conditions, materially, culturally and spiritually. So, to paraphrase Malcolm X, the only hope for the House Negros still remains the Field Negro. Whether the House Negros themselves understand that or not is immaterial.

Let me rephrase this in an even more shocking way: the last and only hope for the people of the USA and the EU would be a total Russian victory against NATO. A NATO defeat will bring down not only NATO itself, but also the EU and that, in turn, would force the US to (finally!) become a normal, civilized, country.

As for the EU, a NATO defeat would mean the end of one thousand years of imperialism.

I get it. For a civilization built upon the assumption of racial superiority (whether officially proclaimed or not) the notion that the only possible salvation could come from “inferior Asiatic barbarians” is shocking and can only be considered as an extreme form of doubleplusbadcrimethink. Such a thought is, quite literally, unthinkable for most.

Yet, as I mentioned above, what the House Negros understand or not is entirely irrelevant. Not only do they have no agency, they want none (Poland anybody?).

Conclusion:

Russia won’t lose this war, most of us understand that. But to those who don’t, I will offer one simple conclusion: a Russian defeat would be a disaster for Russia. And China. And the rest of the planet. But it will also be a true calamity for the oppressed people of the West. They, of all people, should be very careful what they wish for. And the next time they want to hallucinate and gloat about a “strategic Russian retreat/defeat” they should ask themselves a simple question: what might this mean for *me* and *my own* future? Do I really have a reason to rejoice?

Maybe they simply got used to being slaves and the idea of *real* freedom and diversity simply terrifies them?

—Andrei

Andrei Raevski is the founding editor of the Saker network of sites dedicated to geopolitical analyses.

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

Unfortunately, most people take this site for granted.
DONATIONS HAVE ALMOST DRIED UP…
PLEASE send what you can today!
JUST USE THE BUTTON BELOW

Did you sign up yet for our FREE bulletin?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

• Strategic retreat or disaster? The Kherson withdrawal by various observers

Please share this article as widely as you can.

DIVERSE OPINIONS

OPEDS

Andrew Korybko Newsletter

There’s No Denying That The Partial Pullback From Kherson Has Uncomfortable Political Optics

No matter how one tries to spin it, a setback is still a setback and shouldn’t ever be covered up with conspiracy theories like many in the Alt-Media Community are prone to do. Such developments must be directly addressed, albeit properly presented in the grand strategic context of the New Cold War.

The Russian Ministry of Defense’s decision to partially pull back their troops from the right bank of the Dnieper River in the newly reunified region of Kherson undeniably carried with it very uncomfortable political optics. After all, that former part of Ukraine recently voted to join the Russian Federation, yet now its new homeland’s military forces were compelled to pull out of several thousand square kilometers that Moscow officially regards as its own.

Nevertheless, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reaffirmed that the Kherson Region’s constitutional status hasn’t changed, thus meaning that it still remains an official part of Russia despite the fact that Moscow lost control over some of its land. This creates the regrettable situation wherein that newly restored world power’s territory is temporarily occupied by foreign forces fully backed by NATO, whose raison d'être has always been anti-Russian.

The preceding observation is fully factual and shouldn’t be sugarcoated with ridiculous “5D chess” conspiracy theories spewed by those in the Alt-Media Community (AMC) who claim to support Russia. Nobody who sincerely stands in solidarity with the Global Revolutionary Movement’s (GRM) de facto leader should deny this objective reality. Rather, they should place this setback in its appropriate context prior to calmly explaining it to their audience so that they can better understand it all.

There was no way that the Russian Armed Forces could retain control of the right bank of Kherson Region with Kiev’s Damocles’ sword of a terrorist attack against the nearby Kakhovka Dam hanging over their heads. That being the case, the highest priority was understandably to preserve the lives of this newly reunified region’s people and the military forces tasked with protecting them. Accordingly, the former began evacuating last month while the latter just completed their corresponding pullback.

Keeping in mind what Peskov recently confirmed, nobody should doubt the Kremlin’s political commitment to liberating Kherson Region sometime in the future even if it currently lacks the military means to do so and might thus not be able to accomplish this objective for the foreseeable future. Those who predict that Russia will launch a large-scale counteroffensive there over the winter once the ground freezes are likely just indulging in wishful thinking since Kiev will certainly fortify the region.

Furthermore, its adversaries are much better equipped than they were at the start of the special operation eight months ago and after receiving comprehensive strategic support from their Western patrons. The prior predictions about a similar such supposedly impending large-scale counteroffensive in Kharkov Region following Russia’s related pullback two months ago also failed to unfold for precisely the same reason. The military fact is that Russia is now fighting a defensive conflict, not an offensive one.

That’s not necessarily a negative development though since “Russia Will Still Strategically Win Even In The Scenario Of A Military Stalemate In Ukraine”, thus meaning that all it has to do is retain the existing Line of Control (LOC) or at least as much of it as is realistically possible under the circumstances. Those aforesaid circumstances refer to Kiev’s growing military strength as a result of NATO’s comprehensive strategic support, which has turned its troops into forces to be reckoned with.

To be clear, had it not been for that selfsame support, the Armed Forces of Ukraine (UAF) would have collapsed long ago. This means that they’re presently just a Ukrainian-fronted but fully NATO-backed fighting force, hence why it’s misleading to even refer to them as “Ukrainian” since the essence thereof is completely Western at this point. Upon accepting this description as accurate, it can then be concluded that NATO is the one de facto militarily occupying part of Kherson Region, not the “UAF”.

This comparatively cushions the political blow from the latest military development in Russia’s special operation since it’s understandable that Moscow would temporarily experience a serious setback in the face of fighting a coalition of over two dozen countries that have coalesced into the “UAF”. The hitherto false framing of this conflict as supposedly only being between Russia and Ukraine resulted in the political blow to Moscow misleadingly appearing much more powerful than it actually was.

That said, a setback is still a setback and shouldn’t ever be covered up with conspiracy theories like many in the AMC are prone to do. Such developments must be directly addressed, albeit properly presented in the grand strategic context of the New Cold War. Remembering that Russia only has to reach a military stalemate in Ukraine in order to strategically win, the doom-and-gloom scenarios that some have recently embraced due to perceived desperation become discredited.

As the de facto leader of the GRM, Russia’s newfound role in the world is to accelerate the global systemic transition to multipolarity, to which end simply ensuring its geostrategic survival in spite of politically uncomfortable setbacks like the latest one in Kherson Region is all that’s required. This is because that outcome keeps overarching multipolar trends on track, which will in turn result in achieving this grand strategic goal with time due to the rise of China, India, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Turkiye.

Removing Russia from that geopolitical equation would immediately derail everyone else’s rise, after which a dark period of unipolarity would once again descend on the world for the indefinite future, one that in all likelihood might ultimately end up being irreversible. If Russia calculated that it’s better to temporarily leave part of Kherson Region while still retaining the latter’s constitutional status as a constituent part of the country, then it did so for the purpose of ensuring Russia’s long-term survival.

Anyone can argue over whether it was avoidable had different decisions been made in the past, but decisionmakers clearly agreed that this move was necessary in order to prevent much more serious problems in the future had they remained on the right bank of the Dnieper River. Everyone should remember that the goal right now is ensuring Russia’s continued existence, which isn’t under threat in any case despite Western fantasies to the contrary, in order to complete the global systemic transition.

That being the case, the Kremlin appears to have accepted the Kherson Region’s temporary military occupation by NATO as a trade-off for achieving that grand strategic goal. It’ll never rescind its claims to that territory since it’s a constituent subject of the country following the state’s official recognition of September’s referendum, and the constitution explicitly prohibits giving away any Russian land. For the foreseeable future, it’ll thus likely remain occupied just like other disputed territories across the world.

Once again, despite the uncomfortable optics inherent in the aforementioned trade-off, it shouldn’t be forgotten that Russia’s political loss in this particular battle doesn’t mean its strategic loss in the New Cold War. The global systemic transition continues accelerating towards multipolarity exactly as Moscow expected, which thus leads to the zero-sum strategic losses piling up for Washington. So long as one doesn’t lose sight of this view, doom-and-gloom will be averted and morale thus maintained.

Andrew Korybko is a Russo-American geopolitical analyst residing in Moscow.

2. Gonzalo Lira Roundtable #34, with Andrei Martyanov, Brian Berletic

Nov 10, 2022

Streamed Nov. 10, 2022

The Roundtable #34: The Kherson Withdrawal, with Brian Berletic, Andrei Martyanov

The Dive with Jackson Hinkle

RUSSIA WITHDRAWS FROM KHERSON

The Dive with Jackson Hinkle
Nov 10, 2022

4. Pepe Escobar

Sun Tzu Walks Into a Kherson Bar…

November 11, 2022

by Pepe Escobar, posted with the author’s permission and widely cross-posted

Deal or no deal, General Winter is coming to town – ready to entertain his guest of honor Sun Tzu with so many new dishes at their dinner table.

The announcement of the Kherson Retreat may have signaled one of the gloomiest days of the Russian Federation since 1991.

Leaving the right bank of the Dnieper to set up a defense line on the left bank may spell out total military sense. General Armageddon himself, since his first day on the job, had hinted this might have been inevitable.

As it stands in the chessboard, Kherson is in the “wrong” side of the Dnieper. All residents of Kherson Oblast – 115,000 people in total – who wanted to be relocated to safer latitudes have been evacuated from the right bank.

General Armageddon knew that was inevitable for several reasons: no mobilization after the initial SMO plans hit the dust; destruction of strategic bridges across the Dnieper – complete with a three-month methodical Ukrainian pounding of bridges, ferries, pontoons and piers; no second bridgehead to the north of Kherson or to the west (towards Odessa or Nikolaev) to conduct an offensive.

And then, the most important reason: massive weaponization coupled with NATO de facto running the war translated into enormous Western superiority in reconnaissance, communications and command and control.

In the end, the Kherson Retreat may be a relatively minor tactical loss. Yet politically, it’s an unmitigated disaster, a devastating embarrassment.

Kherson is a Russian city. Russians have lost – even if temporarily – the capital of a brand new territory attached to the Federation. Russian public opinion will have tremendous problems absorbing the news.

The list of negatives is considerable. Kiev forces secure their flank and may free up forces to go against Donbass. Weaponizing by the collective West gets a major boost. HIMARS can now potentially strike targets in Crimea.

The optics are horrendous. Russia’s image across the Global South is severely tarnished; after all, this move amounts to abandoning Russian territory – while serial Ukrainian war crimes instantly disappear from the major “narrative”.

At a minimum, the Russians a long time ago should have reinforced their major strategic advantage bridgehead on the west side of the Dnieper so that it could hold – short of a widely forecasted Kakhovka Dam flood. And yet the Russians also ignored the dam bombing threat for months. That spells out terrible planning.

Now Russian forces will have to conquer Kherson all over again. And in parallel stabilize the frontlines; draw definitive borders; and then strive to “demilitarize” Ukrainian offensives for good, either via negotiation or carpet bombing.

It’s quite revealing that an array of NATO intel types, from analysts to retired Generals, are suspicious of General Armageddon’s move: they see it as an elaborate trap, or as a French military analyst put it, “a massive deception operation”. Classic Sun Tzu. That has been duly incorporated as the official Ukrainian narrative.

So, to quote Twin Peaks, that American pop culture subversive classic, “the owls are not what they seem”. If that’s the case, General Armageddon would be looking to severely overstretch Ukrainian supply lines; seduce them into exposure; and then engage in a massive turkey shoot.

So it’s either Sun Tzu; or a deal is in the wings, coinciding with the G20 next week in Bali.

The art of the deal

Well, some sort of deal seems to have been struck between Jake Sullivan and Patrushev.

No one really knows the details, even those with access to flamboyant 5^th Column informants in Kiev. But yes – the deal seems to include Kherson. Russia would keep Donbass but not advance towards Kharkov and Odessa. And NATO expansion would be definitely frozen. A minimalist deal.

That would explain why Patrushev was able to board a plane to Tehran simultaneous to the announcement of the Kherson Retreat, and take care, quite relaxed, of very important strategic partnership business with Ali Shamkhani, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.

The deal may have also been the inbuilt “secret” in Maria Zakharova’s announcement that “we’re ready for negotiations”.

The Russians will leave the Dnieper riverbank in a managed military retreat. That would not be possible without managed military-to-military negotiations.

These back channel negotiations have been going on for weeks. The messenger is Saudi Arabia. The US aim, in the short term, would be towards a sort of Minsk 3 accord – with Istanbul/Riyadh attached.

No one is paying the slightest attention to coke clown Zelensky. Sullivan went to Kiev to present a fait accompli – of sorts.

The Dnieper will be – in thesis – the settled and negotiated frontline.

Kiev would have to swallow a frozen line of contact in Zaporizhye, Donetsk and Lugansk – with Kiev receiving electricity from Zaporozhye, hence cease shelling its infrastructure.

The US would come up with a loan of $50 billion plus part of the confiscated – i.e. stolen – Russian assets to “rebuild” Ukraine. Kiev would receive modern air defense systems.

There’s no doubt Moscow will not go along with any of these provisions.

Note that all this coincides with the outcome of the US elections – where the Dems did not exactly lose.

Meanwhile Russia is accumulating more and more gains in the battle for Bakhmut.

There are no illusions whatsoever in Moscow that this crypto-Minsk 3 would be respected by the “non-agreement capable” Empire.

Jake Sullivan is a 45-year-old lawyer with zero strategic background and “experience” amounting to campaigning for Hillary Clinton. Patrushev can eat him for breakfast, lunch, dinner and late night snack – and vaguely “agree” to anything.

So why are the Americans desperate to offer a deal? Because they may be sensing the next Russian move with the arrival of General Winter should be capable of conclusively winning the war on Moscow’s terms. That would include slamming the Polish border shut via a long arrow move from Belarus downwards. With weaponizing supply lines cut, Kiev’s fate is sealed.

Deal or no deal, General Winter is coming to town – ready to entertain his guest of honor Sun Tzu with so many new dishes at their dinner table.

Pepe Escobar is a world-renowned independent anti-imperialist correspondent.

5. THE DURAN—ALEX CHRISTOFOROU • ALEXANDER MERCOURIS

Kherson, Pavlovka and General Surovikin to bring focus to operation

Nov 12, 2022
Kherson, Pavlovka and General Surovikin to bring focus to operation
The Duran: Episode 1433

6. US TV network CNN gloats on Kherson decision, claims "big defeat" for Russia

Top Russian general announces retreat from key city of Kherson
Nov 10, 2022

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

Unfortunately, most people take this site for granted.
DONATIONS HAVE ALMOST DRIED UP…
PLEASE send what you can today!
JUST USE THE BUTTON BELOW

Did you sign up yet for our FREE bulletin?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

The serial production of the TU-214 has started in Russia

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.

BY DEVANSH MEHTA
SimpleFlying

Russia Starts Production Of 20 Tu-214 Narrowbodies
It will take a few years to produce the jets.

First PUBLISHED APR 10, 2022

The United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) of Russia has started producing a total of 20 medium-range narrowbody Tu-214 jets as part of efforts to maintain Russian aviation at its current capacity despite Western sanctions. Simple Flying previously reported the UAC was considering restarting Tu-214 production for commercial purposes, and now it seems the manufacturer is going ahead with plans to produce at least 20 units.

Yuri Slyusar, Chief Executive Officer of the UAC, told TASS,

“We are to scale up [serial production] shortly. We have already started production of twenty Tu-214 airplanes.”

The United States and other Western allies have imposed hard-hitting sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. While the sanctions are designed to essentially crumple the Russian economy, they also have a lasting impact on the country’s aviation sector. In recent weeks, the Russian government has taken drastic measures to save whatever is left of the industry, and the decision to resume production of the Tupolev Tu-214 is just one of many examples.

Production plans

The UAC expects to produce around ten planes per year, which means it will take around two years to complete the initial production run – without any unexpected delays. New Tu-214s may not have been delivered to commercial airlines for a while now, but Russia has been producing the type in low numbers for governmental use.

A TU-214 on the tarmac.

For those not in the know, the Tu-214 is a narrowbody aircraft part of Tupolev’s Tu-204 family. The type first flew in 1996 and has been used in various military and commercial applications since then. The Tu-214 stands at 46.14 meters in length and can carry a maximum of 210 passengers, putting it in direct competition with the Boeing 757.

Large-scale efforts to protect Russian aviation

The Russian aviation sector has been hit hard by a plethora of Western sanctions. Still, the country’s authorities are leaving no stone unturned to ensure there is impact on the ground. However, that is proving to be extremely difficult as the country’s airlines have become increasingly westernized in the last few decades.

Western-made jets from Boeing and Airbus make the bulk of nearly every Russian airline’s fleet in 2022. Now that both manufacturers have stopped supplying new aircraft (and parts for existing ones) to Russian carriers, the country is looking for home-grown alternatives. To that end, various measures have been announced (some with questionable legality) to prevent Russian aviation from going back decades almost overnight.

Interior view.

In late March, Simple Flying reported Russia’s S7 Airlines was bringing back old IL-96 and IL-86 quad jets aircraft into service. In addition, Yuri Slyusar also said the UAC would be looking to increase production of the long-range IL-96 passenger aircraft and IL-76 transport planes in the near future.

Restarting or expediting production of decades-old aircraft may serve the purpose of populating Russia’s commercial aviation fleet. However, it will still drag the country’s aviation sector back by at least a few decades. Modern commercial aircraft made in the West outperform old Russian designs in efficiency, comfort, and every other aspect. It will be interesting to see how Russia copes with the sanctions going forward.

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

Unfortunately, most people take this site for granted.
DONATIONS HAVE ALMOST DRIED UP…
PLEASE send what you can today!
JUST USE THE BUTTON BELOW

Did you sign up yet for our FREE bulletin?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Washington’s Plan to Break Up Russia

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.

MIKE WHITNEY

First iteration OCTOBER 27, 2022

“The Western goal is to weaken, divide and ultimately destroy our nation. They are openly stating that, since they managed to break up the Soviet Union in 1991, now it’s time to split Russia into many separate regions that will be at each other’s throats.”
—Russian President Vladimir Putin

“Cheney ‘wanted to see the dismantlement not only of the Soviet Union and the Russian empire but of Russia itself, so it could never again be a threat to the rest of the world.’...The West must complete the project that began in 1991 …. Until Moscow’s empire is toppled, though, the region—and the world—will not be safe…” (“Decolonize Russia”, The Atlantic)

Washington’s animus towards Russia has a long history dating back to 1918 when Woodrow Wilson deployed over 7,000 troops to Siberia as part of an Allied effort to roll back the gains of the Bolshevik Revolution. The activities of the American Expeditionary Force, which remained in the country for 18 months, have long vanished from history books in the US, but Russians still point to the incident as yet another example of America’s relentless intervention in the affairs of its neighbors. The fact is, Washington elites have always meddled in Russia’s business despite Moscow’s strong objections. In fact, a great number of western elites not only think that Russia should be split-up into smaller geographical units, but that the Russian people should welcome such an outcome. Western leaders in the Anglosphere are so consumed by hubris and their own blinkered sense of entitlement, they honestly believe that ordinary Russians would like to see their country splintered into bite-sized statelets that remain open to the voracious exploitation of the western oil giants, mining corporations and, of course, the Pentagon. Here’s how Washington’s geopolitical mastermind Zbigniew Brzezinski summed it up an article in Foreign Affairs:

“Given (Russia’s) size and diversity, a decentralized political system and free-market economics would be most likely to unleash the creative potential of the Russian people and Russia’s vast natural resources. A loosely confederated Russia — composed of a European Russia, a Siberian Republic, and a Far Eastern Republic — would also find it easier to cultivate closer economic relations with its neighbors. Each of the confederated entitles would be able to tap its local creative potential, stifled for centuries by Moscow’s heavy bureaucratic hand. In turn, a decentralized Russia would be less susceptible to imperial mobilization.”
—Zbigniew Brzezinski, “A Geostrategy for Eurasia”, Foreign Affairs, 1997

The “loosely confederated Russia”, that Brzezinski imagines, would be a toothless, dependent nation that could not defend its own borders or sovereignty. It would not be able to prevent more powerful countries from invading, occupying and establishing military bases on its soil. Nor would it be able to unify its disparate people beneath a single banner or pursue a positive “unified” vision for the future of the country. A confederal Russia –fragmented into a myriad of smaller parts– would allow the US to maintain its dominant role in the region without threat of challenge or interference. And that appears to be Brzezinski’s real goal as he pointed out in this passage in his magnum opus The Grand Chessboard. Here’s what he said:

“For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasia…and America’s global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained.” (“THE GRAND CHESSBOARD – American Primacy And It’s Geostrategic Imperatives”, Zbigniew Brzezinski, page 30, Basic Books, 1997)

Brzezinski sums up US imperial ambitions succinctly. Washington plans to establish its primacy in the world’s most prosperous and populous region, Eurasia. And–in order to do so– Russia must be decimated and partitioned, its leaders must be toppled and replaced, and its vast resources must be transferred to the iron grip of global transnationals who will use them to perpetuate the flow of wealth from east to west. In other words, Moscow must accept its humble role in the new order as America’s de-facto Gas and Mining Company.

Washington has never really veered from its aim of obliterating the Russian state, in fact, the recently released National Security Strategy (NSS) along with a congressional report titled “Renewed Great Power Competition: Implications for Defense—Issues for Congress”, confirm much of what we have said here, that the US plans to crush any emerging opposition to its expansion into Central Asia in order to become the dominant player in that region. Here’s an excerpt from the congressional report:

The U.S. goal of preventing the emergence of regional hegemons in Eurasia, though long-standing, is not written in stone—it is a policy choice reflecting two judgments: (1) that given the amount of people, resources, and economic activity in Eurasia, a regional hegemon in Eurasia would represent a concentration of power large enough to be able to threaten vital U.S. interests; and (2) that Eurasia is not dependably self-regulating in terms of preventing the emergence of regional hegemons, meaning that the countries of Eurasia cannot be counted on to be able to prevent, though their own actions, the emergence of regional hegemons, and may need assistance from one or more countries outside Eurasia to be able to do this dependably.” (“Renewed Great Power Competition: Implications for Defense—Issues for Congress”, US Congress)

How different is this new iteration of official US foreign policy than the so-called Wolfowitz Doctrine that was delivered prior to the War in Iraq. Here it is:

“Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former Soviet Union or elsewhere, that poses a threat on the order of that posed formerly by the Soviet Union. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power.”

As you can see, there has been no meaningful change in the policy since Wolfowitz articulated his doctrine nearly 2 decades ago. The US foreign policy establishment still resolutely asserts Washington’s right to dominate Central Asia and to regard any competitor in the region as national security threat. This is further underscored by the fact that both Russia and China have been identified in the latest National Security Strategy as “strategic competitors” which is a deep-state euphemism for mortal enemies. Check out this excerpt from an article titled “Partitioning Russia After World War III?”:

The end goal of the US and NATO is to divide and pacify the world’s biggest country, the Russian Federation, and to even establish a blanket of perpetual disorder (somalization) over its vast territory or, at a minimum, over a portion of Russia and the post-Soviet space… The ultimate goal of the US is to prevent any alternatives from emerging in Europe and Eurasia to Euro-Atlantic integration. This is why the destruction of Russia is one of its strategic objectives….

Redrawing Eurasia: Washington’s Maps of a Divided Russia

With the division of the Russian Federation, (the) article claims that any bipolar rivalry between Moscow and Washington would end after World War III. In a stark contradiction, it claims that only when Russia is destroyed will there be a genuine multipolar world, but also implies that the US will be the most dominant global power even though Washington and the European Union will be weakened from the anticipated major war with the Russians.” (“Partitioning Russia after World War 3”, Global Research)

Washington’s relations with Russia have always been contentious but that has more to do with Washington’s geostrategic ambitions than any disruptive behavior on Moscow’s part. Russia’s only crime is that happens to occupy real estate in a part of the world the US wants to control by any means necessary. When Hillary Clinton first announced US plans to “pivot to Asia” most people thought it sounded like a reasonable scheme for shifting resources from the Middle East to Asia in order to increase US participation in the world’s fastest growing market. They didn’t realize at the time, that policymakers intended to goad Russia into a bloody ground-war in Ukraine to “weaken” Russia so that Washington could spread its military bases across the Eurasian landmass unopposed. Nor did anyone foresee the lengths to which Washington would go to provoke, isolate and demonize Russia for the express purpose of removing its political leaders and splitting the country into multiple statlets. Here’s Hillary making the case back in 2011:

“Harnessing Asia’s growth and dynamism is central to American economic and strategic interests… Open markets in Asia provide the United States with unprecedented opportunities for investment, trade, and access to cutting-edge technology…..American firms (need) to tap into the vast and growing consumer base of Asia…

The region already generates more than half of global output and nearly half of global trade…. we are looking for opportunities to do even more business in Asia…and our investment opportunities in Asia’s dynamic markets.”(“America’s Pacific Century”, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton”, Foreign Policy Magazine, 2011)

A careful reading of Clinton’s speech along with a review of the Wolfowitz Doctrine will help even the most obtuse reader to draw some obvious conclusions about the current conflict in Ukraine which has almost nothing to do with so-called “Russian aggression”, but everything to do with Washington’s plan to project power across Asia , control Russia’s massive oil and gas reserves, encircle China with military bases, and establish American domination at the epicenter of this century’s most prosperous market. Here’s Putin again:

“In order to free itself from the latest web of challenges, they need to dismantle Russia as well as other states that choose a sovereign path of development, at all costs, to be able to further plunder other nations’ wealth and use it to patch their own holes. If this does not happen, I cannot rule out that they will try to trigger a collapse of the entire system, and blame everything on that, or, God forbid, decide to use the old formula of economic growth through war.”

US foreign policy experts are shameless in their promotion of theories that threaten to trigger a direct military confrontation with Russia that could result in a nuclear exchange. In a recent “webinar for congressmen and women hosted on June 23 under the title “Decolonizing Russia.” The webinar, staffed by CIA operatives and right-wing nationalists from Ukraine and the Caucasus, effectively argued that Russia was a colonial empire that had to be broken up with the support of Washington.” (WSWS) The author explores the reasons why some experts want to brand Russia as “imperialist”? An article at the WSWS explains why:

...”the claim that Russia is “imperialist” serves a vital political function: It provides a political cover for the imperialist aggression against Russia and the war aims of the imperialist powers…. It is this strategy which the pro-NATO pseudo-left covers up for with its clamor about “Russian imperialism.” The fostering of nationalist, regionalist and ethnic tensions has been a key component of imperialist war policy for decades…..

Through a combination of NATO expansion, coups on its borders and military interventions in countries allied with Russia and China, the imperialist powers have systematically and relentlessly encircled Russia…

Indeed, if one reviews the history of the wars waged by US imperialism over the past thirty years, the unfolding war for the carve-up of Russia and China appears like a brutal inevitability. Despite their reintegration into the world capitalist system, the imperialist powers have been barred by the ruling oligarchic regimes from directly plundering the vast resources of these countries. Vying for these resources between themselves, and driven by irresolvable domestic crises, they are now determined to change this.

… the draft resolution describes the basic aims of the US war against Russia as follows: “the removal of the present regime in Russia, its replacement by an American-controlled puppet, and the breakup of Russia itself—in what is referred to as “decolonizing Russia”—into a dozen or more impotent statelets whose valuable resources will be owned and exploited by US and European finance capital.” This passage is central for understanding both the unfolding conflict and the politics of the pro-NATO pseudo-left and their insistence that Russia is an “imperialist country.” (“The historical and political principles of the socialist opposition to imperialist war and the Putin regime“, Clara Weiss, World Socialist Web Site)

Editor's Note: The above quote, from WSWS, a leading Trotskyist site, bears the stamp of their factionalist analysis, condemning both the US imperialist regime and President Putin's government as almost equal evils, a typical Trotskyist deformation, which we do not accept for clear strategic reasons. The important thing here is that Putin's Russia is currently a bourgeois, firmly sovereignist/nationalist system moving gradually toward socialism. In fact, it already has two major economic areas completely controlled by the state, the weapons industries (the Russian MIC), and energy production, along with a series of other important industrial sub-sectors. The Communist Party is also the country's second largest political formation.

As you can see, elite members of the foreign policy establishment are doggedly searching for new and more convincing justifications for a confrontation with Russia the ultimate purpose of which is to fragment the country paving the way for Washington’s strategic rebalancing or “pivot”. 20 years ago, during the Bush administration, politicians were not nearly as circumspect in their views about Russia. Former Vice President Dick Cheney, for example, made no attempt to conceal his utter contempt for Russia and was surprisingly candid about the policy he supported. Check out this excerpt from an article by Ben Norton:

Cheney: as vicious and dangerous as he looks, is the perfect henchman for a depraved oligarchy bent on conquering the world at any cost.

Former US Vice President Dick Cheney, a lead architect of the Iraq War, not only wanted to dismantle the Soviet Union; he also wanted to break up Russia itself, to prevent it from rising again as a significant political power…. Former US Defense Secretary Robert Gates wrote that, “When the Soviet Union was collapsing in late 1991, Dick wanted to see the dismantlement not only of the Soviet Union and the Russian empire but of Russia itself, so it could never again be a threat.”…

The fact that a figure at the helm of the US government not-so-secretly sought the permanent dissolution of Russia as a country, and straightforwardly communicated this to colleagues like Robert Gates, partially explains the aggressive posturing Washington has taken toward the Russian Federation since the overthrow of the USSR.

The reality is that the US empire will simply never allow Russia to challenge its unilateral domination of Eurasia, despite the fact that the government in Moscow restored capitalism. This is why it is not surprising that Washington has utterly ignored Russia’s security concerns, breaking its promise not to expand NATO “once inch eastward” after German reunification, surrounding Moscow with militarized adversaries hell bent on destabilizing it. Russian security services have published evidence that the United States supported Chechen separatists in their wars on the central Russian government. British academic John Laughland stressed in a 2004 article in The Guardian, titled “The Chechens’ American friends,” that several Chechen secessionist leaders were living in the West, and were even given grant money by the US government. Laughland noted that the most important US-based pro-Chechen secessionist group, the deceptively named American Committee for Peace in Chechnya (ACPC), listed as its members “a rollcall of the most prominent neoconservatives who so enthusiastically support the ‘war on terror’”.

They include Richard Perle, the notorious Pentagon adviser; Elliott Abrams of Iran-Contra fame; Kenneth Adelman, the former US ambassador to the UN who egged on the invasion of Iraq by predicting it would be “a cakewalk”; Midge Decter, biographer of Donald Rumsfeld and a director of the rightwing Heritage Foundation; Frank Gaffney of the militarist Centre for Security Policy; Bruce Jackson, former US military intelligence officer and one-time vice-president of Lockheed Martin, now president of the US Committee on Nato; Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise Institute, a former admirer of Italian fascism and now a leading proponent of regime change in Iran; and R James Woolsey, the former CIA director who is one of the leading cheerleaders behind George Bush’s plans to re-model the Muslim world along pro-US lines.

The fact that far-right Salafi-jihadists made up a significant percentage of the Chechen insurgency didn’t bother these anti-Muslim neocons – just as Islamophobic “War on Terror” veterans had no problem supporting extremist head-chopping Takfiri Islamists in the subsequent US wars on Syria and Libya….

…. Victoria Nuland, the third-most powerful official in the Joe Biden administration’s State Department, served as Vice President Cheney’s principal deputy foreign policy adviser from 2003 to 2005. (She also helped to sponsor the violent coup in Ukraine in 2014 that toppled the democratically-elected government.) Like her mentor Cheney, Nuland is a hard-line neoconservative. The fact that he is a Republican and she works primarily in Democratic administrations is irrelevant; this hawkish foreign-policy consensus is completely bipartisan.

Nuland (a former member of the bipartisan board of directors of the NED) is also married to Robert Kagan, a patron saint of neoconservatism, and co-founder of the Project for the New American Century – the cozy home of the neocons in Washington, where he worked alongside Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and other top Bush administration officials. Kagan was a longtime Republican, but in 2016 he joined the Democrats and openly campaigned for Hillary Clinton for president.” (“Ex VP Dick Cheney confirmed US goal is to break up Russia, not just USSR”, Ben Norton, Multipolarista)

US foreign policy is now exclusively in the hands of a small group of neocon extremists who reject diplomacy outright and who genuinely believe that America’s strategic interests can only be achieved through a military conflict with Russia. That said, we can say with some degree of certainty, that things are going to get alot worse before they get better.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE
.Mike Whitney is a Freelance Photographer and writer residing in Washington State.

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

Unfortunately, most people take this site for granted.
DONATIONS HAVE ALMOST DRIED UP…
PLEASE send what you can today!
JUST USE THE BUTTON BELOW

Did you sign up yet for our FREE bulletin?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Russian (LPR) Forces Heavy Battle Combat Training For Advancing On Kharkov Ukraine

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.

Patrick Lancaster

Russian (LPR) Forces Heavy Battle Combat Training For Advancing On Kharkov Ukraine

Patrick Lancaster / Oct 27, 2022

https://www.buymeacoffee.com/PLnewstoday

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

Unfortunately, most people take this site for granted.
DONATIONS HAVE ALMOST DRIED UP…
PLEASE send what you can today!
JUST USE THE BUTTON BELOW

Did you sign up yet for our FREE bulletin?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

What would a Russian defeat mean for the people of the West?

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

• Strategic retreat or disaster? The Kherson withdrawal by various observers

DIVERSE OPINIONS

OPEDS

There’s No Denying That The Partial Pullback From Kherson Has Uncomfortable Political Optics

Nov 10, 2022

Streamed Nov. 10, 2022

The Roundtable #34: The Kherson Withdrawal, with Brian Berletic, Andrei Martyanov

RUSSIA WITHDRAWS FROM KHERSON

Sun Tzu Walks Into a Kherson Bar…

Kherson, Pavlovka and General Surovikin to bring focus to operation

Top Russian general announces retreat from key city of Kherson Nov 10, 2022

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

The serial production of the TU-214 has started in Russia

BY DEVANSH MEHTA SimpleFlying

Large-scale efforts to protect Russian aviation

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Washington’s Plan to Break Up Russia

MIKE WHITNEY

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE.Mike Whitney is a Freelance Photographer and writer residing in Washington State.

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Russian (LPR) Forces Heavy Battle Combat Training For Advancing On Kharkov Ukraine

Patrick Lancaster

Russian (LPR) Forces Heavy Battle Combat Training For Advancing On Kharkov Ukraine

Print this article

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Top Russian general announces retreat from key city of Kherson
Nov 10, 2022

BY DEVANSH MEHTA
SimpleFlying

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE
.Mike Whitney is a Freelance Photographer and writer residing in Washington State.