JUST saying…(overheard on the Net)

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DEFEAT CAPITALISM AND ITS DEADLY SPAWN, IMPERIALISM
ecological murder •
JUST SAYING
 
THOUGHTS, INFO, TOPICS, AND COMMENTARY OVERHEARD ON THE NET
(AND WORTHY OF A BIGGER AUDIENCE).


BELOW: Comments found on Moon of Alabama, a site we strongly recommend for its uniquely insightful geostrategic analyses, timeliness, and professionalism. If you can, support Moon of Alabama.


Above: CNN's triumphalist reporting on Kiev's attack on Russian bases.


RE: Those pesky Ukie missiles hitting Russian strategic bases deep inland

Rambert

IMO. They're not traveling 600km. They're locally launched within abt 50km. That's why they're "not seen". They're launched by sabotage groups operating in Russia. They're designed to undermine the faith in Russian security. The claim of 600km is generated by ukrops channels to increase the propaganda element.

Posted by: MoA HERMIUS | Dec 29 2022 15:27 utc | 40


@ HERMIUS | Dec 29 2022 15:27 utc | 46

@ Orwellian Language | Dec 29 2022 14:57 utc | All


RE: The problem with Russophobic Poland (and WW2...)

@ Julian [45]

Poland has a fair claim to 5 Western Ukrainian oblasts.

Poland lost its "fair claim" by their own government's actions to make sure WW2 would happen. Both the Polish government and the vast majority of their citizens were adamantly opposed to any security agreement with France and the USSR. The memoirs of French General Doumenc are unequivocal. August 1939, two weeks before WW2 started, he was on a mission to Moscow to get an agreement. The sticking point was Polish refusal. He sent Captain Beaufre to Warsaw to get the Poles to change their mind. His proposal to allow Soviet armies into Poland under very tight conditions, if Germany ever attacked, was rebuffed in such strong terms that the French and British diplomats stationed in Warsaw refused to ask the Polish government a second time. Obviously, the fact that a minor nation (i.e. Poland) would be allowed to dictate French and British policy shows that these two major powers also did not want any security agreement with the USSR. Doumenc clearly discussed British intransigence in his memoirs, and you can indirectly read French intransigence as well. By Doumenc's account, it was only on August 19 at 10 pm, that Doumenc says the Soviets turned away from the French-UK mission and agreed to allow the German delegation to come to Moscow.

So the Polish government formally refused the only security agreement that would have prevented WW2 and saved Poland. That government went out of existence when the Nazis defeated it, a week before Soviet troops entered what had been Eastern Poland. It was a BS fiction of the British to have an "exile government" in London. In 1944, it was another British BS fiction to have an early uprising in Warsaw that cost the lives of thousands of Polish patriots, merely in order to do damage to the Soviet Army and its reputation. After WW2, the USSR did not want a repeat of the Polish hyenas of the 1920s and 1930s. If "hyenas" seems too harsh, that was Churchill's word, when the Nazis seized Czechoslovakia and Poland tore off a piece for herself, Těšín, and the region around this town in 1938. The Soviets paid a large economic price with its occupation of Poland, in order to create goodwill with the Polish people. Obviously, this did not succeed. Even President Lech Wałęsa, who had a significant role in the demise of the Soviet Union, regretted what his nation had become after the USSR collapsed. after he became President, retired, and rough men, probably puppets of the West, replaced him. I never followed Polish politics, but I suppose the Vatican and the CIA steered the Polish people into what is nearly a suicidal and entirely immoral hatred of Russia.

So Poland does not deserve those territories even though 250,000 Poles were massacred there, because these victims were murdered by the same Banderas that Poland officially supports today.

Galicia needs to become a sort of Alcatraz, isolated for the criminals living there. It needs the sort of treatment that Hans Morgenthau, the American Jewish banker, wanted for postwar Germany: purely agrarian and totally de-fanged.

Posted by: MoA JessDTruth | Dec 29 2022 16:54 utc | 49


Today, Lavrov was interviewed by Rossiya Segodnya. As Lavrov interviews go, this one is very short, yet it does cover two important points: whether Russia will remain in OSCE and is there anyone in Ukraine capable of conducting negotiations. The two other questions don't pertain to Ukraine or related events.

Question: Given the state of affairs in the OSCE, does Moscow consider it necessary to maintain its representation at the Organisation?
Could there be a question of suspending our membership in it?


Sergey Lavrov:
Let me be clear: things are not going well in the OSCE. The organization was created as a platform for equal dialogue and cooperation, but over the past few years it has been in a deep crisis.

The West perceives the OSCE as a tool to promote its collective interests and has turned it into an arena for propaganda battles. In 2022, the current chairman of the Organization was Poland with its openly anti-Russian attitudes. According to our assessment, the Poles succeeded in only one thing – they reduced the effectiveness of the OSCE's work to zero.

This did not come as a surprise to us. After all, in general, Western countries – and they, for the most part, are both OSCE participants and NATO members – have long and purposefully trampled on the principles of the Vienna organization's activities, the spirit and letter of the basic documents adopted in it – including at the highest level – in the field of European security. For example, NATO's expansion and the approximation of its military infrastructure to Russia's borders flagrantly violates the commitment not to strengthen one's own security at the expense of the security of others. We are now reaping the benefits of the selfish, short-sighted policies of our former partners, whose credibility has been thoroughly undermined. And one of the lessons is that if and when we return to working together, it will have to be done on new principles, because the old approaches no longer work.


Question: Do you think there is a political force or politician in Ukraine now with whom Moscow would be ready to negotiate, and can such a figure appear in the foreseeable future?


Sergey Lavrov: The current clip [clique] of Ukrainian politicians is well known to everyone for its inability to negotiate. Most of them are outspoken Russophobes.

Let me remind you that immediately after the start of the special military operation, Zelensky took the initiative to sit down at the negotiating table. We did not reject it and agreed to meet with his representatives.

Several rounds of talks have shown that mutually acceptable agreements can be found. However, the negotiation process that began in February demonstrated the complete lack of independence of V.Zelensky in making important decisions. Already in April, at the behest of the Anglo-Saxons, interested in continuing hostilities, he quickly stopped negotiations and sharply hardened his position.

It is obvious that Kiev is not ready for dialogue. Putting forward various ideas and "formulas for peace", V. Zelensky cherishes the illusion of achieving with the help of the West the withdrawal of our troops from the Russian territory of Donbass, Crimea, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, the payment of reparations by Russia, the appearance "with guilt in international tribunals", etc.

Of course, we will not talk to anyone on such terms. It is difficult to say whether adequate politicians remain in the territories controlled by the Kiev regime, especially given the widespread practice of suppressing dissent and summary executions of dissenters. Could some sane political figure appear in Kiev later? We'll have to wait and see. [My Emphasis]

As you read, the Poles are held in contempt--Again. But they are acting no differently than most of the other NATO/OSCE members. For those who missed Lavrov's previous two lengthy and very important interviews, The one with TASS is here, while the one with Channel One's program The Great Game is here.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 29 2022 17:15 utc | 53


RE: The long, long (but hidden) CIA-Nazi connection

James C @78--

During the 1990s, many secret docs about Outlaw US Empire involvement with keeping Nazism and OUN alive in Ukraine and elsewhere were released and several books were written based upon them, and Congressional hearings were also held as a result. That documentary record is very clear and damning as you would expect. Cynthia Chung's second of her three-part series provides the essential info and links about 1/3rd of the way through the text. Here's some of that meat:

"In 1998, the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG), at the behest of Congress, launched what became the largest congressionally mandated, single-subject declassification effort in history. As a result, more than 8.5 million pages of records have been opened to the public under the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act (P.L. 105-246) and the Japanese Imperial Government Disclosure Act (P.L. 106-567). These records include operational files of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the CIA, the FBI and Army intelligence. IWG issued three reports to Congress between 1999 and 2007.

"A research group was put together to compile and organise key elements of this massive newly declassified database, the result was the publication of “U.S. Intelligence and The Nazis” in 2005, and “Hitler’s Shadow Nazi War Criminals, U. S. Intelligence, and the Cold War” in 2011, both published by the National Archives, and which will be used as a key reference for the rest of this paper."

If your father is unwilling to read facts, then there's no help for him--sorry. If you have trouble reaching the linked article, here's the link to Chung's article's substack page.

I also note that Chung has published the first of two volumes about "The Birth of International Fascism and Anglo-American Foreign Policy" whose full title is The Empire on which the Black Sun Never Set: The Birth of International Fascism and Anglo-American Foreign Policy. Info about that and more can be found here. I have yet to read her book, but her thesis corresponds to one which several of us at MoA have developed over the last several years and which I wrote a short note about saying WW2's outcome remains unfinished as Nazism was never expunged as was agreed but was kept alive by the Outlaw US Empire and its fascist allies in UK and Europe.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 29 2022 19:53 utc | 90


BELOW: Comments found on The Vineyard of the Saker, a fraternal site.
RE: Iran's intrinsic value

Why do i keep seeing iran in the list of the big four is always a mystery to me. as an Iranian i don't see any greatness in our technological and industrial capabilities. we may become powerful if we survive the current protests, regime change and the economic maelstrom of our own making.
OnePinguArmy on December 31, 2022  ·  at 11:37 am EST/EDT


i don't have a doubt about the geopolitical value of Ukraine and iran. what i am saying is that iran by it self and under this government fails to be the most powerful in its own region. additionally its plagued by an unbelievable number of faults and problems which now turned into cancer inside Iran, economic mismanagement, worsening welfare, constant devaluation of our currency, decaying and sometimes incomplete infrastructure that is wasting alot of resources and making Iran incaple of competition in industry, but above all an atmosphere of cynism and distrust towards the government. especially in the current situation in Iran.
OnePinguArmy on December 31, 2022  ·  at 12:27 pm EST/EDT


Russia and China as well as anyone with an IQ above room temperature would strongly disagree with your evaluation.  Iran isn’t just Iran, Iran is the nucleus of the Axis of Resistance, spread far and wide.

Keeping Russia and Iran apart is US-NATO’s’-Israel’s greatest achievement to date. The Zionist and Neocon long-term plan of suffocating Iran/Ally is Over. Iran survived the brutality and stood firm. Iran will flourish economically (150 Billion) in foreign investment and it will take its rightful place on the BRICS + Security Council, which in Zone B will not have a western UN deadbeat majority of declining powers.
WTFUD on December 31, 2022  ·  at 6:26 pm EST/EDT


Thank you for answering Yi-Ping so well. I would only add that we should be mindful of the severe damage wrought by the US in both Iran and the Ukraine. Decades of blockades, assassinations, and coups have not destroyed Iran. But then it doesn’t have a Jewish government.
Virgil on December 31, 2022  ·  at 9:14 pm EST/EDT


Sounds a bit like you don’t support your Country which is fighting against the war-mongering US. In case you didn’t know your Country Iran is under unbelievable sanctions etc that make life tough for all Iranians. Your post is a disappointment.
james1 on January 01, 2023  ·  at 5:08 am EST/EDT


If the current political system in Iran were to be brought down, most likely by the US/Neocons working in the background, the country of Iran will be no more, à la former Yugoslavia. What will ensue as result is the division of Iran into a number of smaller and much weaker vassal states, along ethnic and racial divides, run by the Neocons and their masters in the City of London, from behind. This may also be the method by which the political system gets taken down. I.e., a color revolution using violence à la Ukraine 2014. Thus, the unrest that we have witnessed more recently, and even previously.
Tit-for-Tat on December 31, 2022  ·  at 12:46 pm EST/EDT


Think of the context. Iran has been under sanctions for almost a century and yet, not only has it survived but it is a major player. Countries capitulate to the west suffering much less, Iran is doing great.
Uranus
on December 31, 2022  ·  at 12:58 pm EST/EDT


You see Iran, because being part of the New World is not just a question of size, or any other objective measurement. You are seeing it because it has constructed a major Paradigm Shift, from an old, anachronistic one, to a new one, one which fits the new Dominant Paradigm constructed and enacted by Russia and China, and increasingly the other named nations.

This is what I wrote further down, but it explains your query also:

Pamela St on January 01, 2023  ·  at 1:46 pm EST/EDT


RE: Weaponised general confusion

Polls show that the public doesn’t think Russia is a threat because we are winning and fighting over there and Ukraine is the good guys. As long as the Neo-cons and libs don’t think Russia is dangerous to them, they will try to subdue Russia, and if the need arises for the US to use tactical nukes, Russia will be blamed because they are losing. We know what winning looks like in Iraqu and Afghanistan and Vietnam, and it was shock and awe. We also used napalm, which would be effective in trench warfare, cluster bombs, perfect against infantry, and depleted uranium. Russia is fighting trying to fight a moral war, which looks weak. Yes, the public thinks war is Tom Cruise flying around and bombing bad guys, and we are winning. Actually, it is Russia’s apparent weakness, its not wanting to fight a nuclear war, and not wanting to hurt anybody makes nuclear war more likely.
ShivaJim on December 30, 2022  ·  at 8:19 am EST/EDT


The 2nd question that must be asked is –

How long will it be before our Euro-Elites come to the realisation that their Romanesque incestuous orgy of lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy, and pride, the 7 deadly sins, with their American peers is over?

Pride for sure will be the greatest hurdle, but with a rope (and hard labour) awaiting the Captains/Champions of the Sinking Ship the rest of the Motley Crew will see the light.

Every American base/construct in Zone B/Europe will be dismantled, turned into housing or used for appropriate industrial purposes to aid the recovery in all of the countries they’ve subjugated.

Fittingly, the judges who signed our rights away will be among the first to feel the rope burns.
WTFUD on December 30, 2022  ·  at 11:55 am EST/EDT



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The future belongs to the leftist renaissance. To the centenary of the USSR.

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DEFEAT CAPITALISM AND ITS DEADLY SPAWN, IMPERIALISM
ecological murder •
Elena Panina

The peripheral resource capitalism of modern Russia has brought back the long-forgotten theses of confrontation between classes and their ideologies. The surge of nationalism in the former USSR is precisely the reincarnation of bourgeois ideology.



MOSCOW, December 30, 2022, RUSSTRAT Institute.

 
The centenary of the Soviet Union is a good opportunity to understand the winning and strong sides of the social system that was able to give rise to a huge sphere of influence. Why it was not possible to keep it is important. But no less important is the way in which this was achieved.

The peripheral resource capitalism of modern Russia has brought back the long-forgotten theses of confrontation between classes and their ideologies. The surge of nationalism in the former USSR is precisely the reincarnation of bourgeois ideology. The paradox is that in modern Russia, in order to maintain interethnic peace, the authorities instinctively use crypto-Soviet methods of forming national solidarity to keep interethnic peace.

The leftist idea, as the idea of ​​social progress, has not gone away, but it should not be confused with globalist neoliberal leftism. The left is not about feminism, green energy and LGBT rights, but about family protection, progress and social justice.
However, without ideological content, as was the case in the Russian Empire (Orthodoxy-Autocracy-Narodnost) and in the USSR (proletarian internationalism and class solidarity of the working people), this gives rise to attempts to invent that same hybrid - the “third way”, where the not fully clarified and therefore, ideological pieces of different ideologies that are not understandable to the population. However, even Lenin and Stalin said that the third way is a utopia. There is no third way. Any third way is a return from socialism to capitalism, and under capitalism, it is the conservation of its contradictions, and not their dialectical resolution.

There is no doubt that if the USSR were now within the former geographical boundaries and on the former ideological and political basis, but with the inclusion of controlled elements of the market and a multi-structural economy, it would now be what China is, or even more.

The centralized one-party system, which is the core of the state, consisting of 15 national republics, is more effective. China, which has a no less complex structure of sub-ethnic groups, with the old enmity of the North and the South, has proved this in competition with the multi-party and equally federal US and EU.

The combination of passionate ideology and strategic planning with economic freedom under the protection of the nuclear umbrella and the most powerful military-industrial complex on the territory of one-sixth of the [planet's] land, which was the USSR, would give us a much more stable and developed world. Having abandoned the Soviet experience, we threw out the baby with the bathwater. This is what we need to understand first of all on the day of the centenary of the USSR.

 
In the example of China, we see that socialism is capable of becoming a leader in the race for scientific and technological progress. At the same time, capitalism in the former Soviet republics has shown that it is capable of reproducing and preserving backwardness and dependence. The leftist idea, as the idea of ​​social progress, has not gone away, but it should not be confused with globalist neoliberal leftism. The left is not about feminism, green energy and LGBT rights, but about family protection, progress and social justice.

The left renaissance is yet to come, and the crisis of modern capitalism leaves no other options for getting out of it, except towards updated versions of socialism. All our future alliances with third-world countries will be built on this basis. Now the traditionalists in the minds of young people are losing to the liberals precisely because they do not give a picture of the future, and for young people this is unacceptable. It's just that the time has not yet come to understand it.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elena Panina is director of the Rustrat Institute. She holds advanced degrees in engineering and economics.
 
Subscribe to the Telegram channels of the RUSSTRAT Institute and its director Elena Panina

Источник: https://russtrat.ru/analytics/30-dekabrya-2022-1903-11573

 

A D D E N D U M


By Eric Arnow

Today is the 100-year anniversary of the founding of the Soviet Union.

 
This is an interesting video on YT, created by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.
 
It is easiest to follow if you go into settings on the lower right (the little wheel). Set the speed to .75x (slower than normal) and set autotranslate to English. The subtitles work fairly well that way.
Специальный репортаж «Вперед в СССР»
 


Putin himself pointed out that the will of the Soviet people in referendum was disregarded by the so called leaders, really traitors.
 
I also see that RT has an interview with Alexander Dugin, and I am sure others will be talking about its significance.
 
The video points out how the average person perceived life then, and I have heard from many how happy their childhood was, how excellent the education system was then, all based on a system that did not put money as the highest value.
 
Given how the world situation has deteriorated since its fall, I came to realize over the course of the last 20 years, how much of a tragedy the fall of the USSR has been, what could have been and what has been lost.
—EA


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“Our people, our land, our truth”: Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev – on the results of 2022, which changed the world order

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DEFEAT CAPITALISM AND ITS DEADLY SPAWN, IMPERIALISM
ecological murder • endless wars • ingrained racism & social injustice • worker exploitation • incurable via reforms

Dmitry Medvedev


"Our people, our land, our truth": Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev - on the results of 2022, which changed the world order

Dmitry Medvedev (Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, Chairman of the All-Russian political party "UNITED RUSSIA")
 

2022 is coming to an end. Complex, formidable, dramatic. The year is on the threshold of a new era, which is already marked by cardinal changes in everything - from the arrangement of global "centers of power" to the daily way of life of many people. The inevitable transformation awaits most of the international institutions that have been created over many decades. They are pretty decrepit and do not perform their tasks. Some of them have become purely decorative, others are trying to maintain their former influence, though not very successfully. Some are just forming... —Dmitry Medvedev named six main results for 2022. / RIA News


After many years and even generations, historians, of course, will issue a timeless verdict - what did happen in our days and to what end it came. Time will judge all. The experts of the future will "blow the dust off" digital information about the events of 2022, calmly flip through its virtual pages and close the saved files.

And we simply do not have the opportunity to wait for abstract-wise, but belated assessments. We live here and now. Our world has changed, and this is forever. And the main thing that needs to be understood is where it is moving right now and with us together. What future begins today? What can we expect? And most importantly - how to act. It is critical to find these answers as quickly as possible.

I will express my own position on current events. I do not pretend to impartial detachment, since I am a direct participant in them. Yes, it is impossible when it comes to the fate of your homeland, our people and the whole world. But the first thing that all normal sane people, regardless of their citizenship, really need now is to maintain a sober mind and a strong will. Coolness and fortitude. Sharp eyesight and open eyes. To see the real state of affairs in the world and draw conclusions solely on the basis of objective facts. The logic of your own actions - to build in the same way. Without succumbing to anyone's false words (vile lies have overwhelmed all foreign channels of information), tempting promises or outright pressure under the guise of defending the "true values ​​of democracy." This has happened in abundance in recent decades. And it led to real, not at all illusory tragedies and catastrophes. The past year has proved all this to us in full.

The results are quite clear.

Outcome first. Nazism is near, but it will not pass

To carry out the tasks of the special operation, 300,000 citizens were called up for service as part of a partial mobilisation. (RIA Novosti)

Since last winter, the whole world has been living under the sign of dramatic events in and around the Donbas. Although the tragedy began, as is known, much earlier, the "civilized world" did not see it at close range.

For ten months now, a special military operation has been going on, the goals of which were initially outlined by the country's President V.V. Putin. This is the protection of our compatriots in the new territories, which, after the referendums held in them, became part of Russia. Denazification of the disgusting, almost fascist regime of Ukraine. Complete demilitarization of the Ukrainian state. Guarantees against aggression in the future.

The decision to launch a special military operation in February 2022 was a difficult, forced step under the pressure of circumstances. It was not only about protecting the fraternal republics of Donbas but also about the security and sovereignty of Russia itself. Let's face it - about her survival. It was impossible to delay any further. This became obvious already at the end of 2021, when the North Atlantic Alliance refused to give guarantees that Ukraine would not join NATO.  And Ukrainian drug addicts announced their desire to revive the nuclear arsenal.

The battles in Donbas are not just for settlements, whose names have become symbols of the resilience, patriotism and courage of our soldiers and officers today. The special operation is a continuation of our long-standing uncompromising struggle against bastard neo-fascism and nationalism in all its manifestations. We rebuff any attempt to humiliate and destroy entire nations for the sake of vested interests. Black paint and blood - rewrite history. Ultimately - and today it is obvious to our enemies - to limit our development, and then divide our country into parts. This is the ultimate plan of all who oppose us. Yes, they do not hide it anymore. Directly, without hesitation, they say: "Russia must be destroyed."

The first thing all sane people need is to draw conclusions based on objective facts.

The saddest outcome of not even a year, but decades that have passed since the collapse of the Soviet Union, is that the lessons of World War II have been completely forgotten by Western states. Neo-Nazism has found support even in countries that have always declared their rejection of Hitler's ideology, whose historical memory is full of pain, shame and anger. We could not calmly watch how the odious nationalist regime of the heirs of Konovalets, Bandera and Shukhevych, with the support of their curators, seeks to reduce to zero not only Russia, but the entire "Russian world", to which hundreds of millions of people proudly rank themselves.


RF soldier: demining in Mariupol. Immediately after liberation the city is returned to normal life. (V. Anosov)

We will make every effort to ensure that all goals of the special military operation are achieved. And the disgusting regime of the Kyiv nationalists ceased to exist. Today, apart from us, no one else can cope with this mission.

Outcome second. Illusions are over, today we are separated from the Western world by much more than we are united

The past year has been truly a turning point. Like knee-deep, he broke, among other things, the last illusions about the modern Western world, which so loves (and completely in vain) to call itself the "golden billion". Now it is finally clear that in the relationship of independent and sovereign states with the Anglo-Saxon world in the current configuration, there can be no talk of trust, hope for the decency of partners, their loyalty to the word and even their own beautifully stated principles. Alas, but now we have no one to talk and negotiate with in the West, there is nothing to talk about, and there is no need to.It was the events of the past year that annulled the very possibility of a confidential and respectful dialogue with representatives of this world "pole." There remains only squeamish bewilderment: do these people seriously consider themselves world leaders, claim something global, dream of dictating their will to others? On what basis, if they discredited themselves, signed their impotence, lied, mired in problems?

The deeds and deeds of current and former Western leaders are striking in their calm and direct cynicism. As the ex-chancellor of Germany recently admitted, the Minsk agreements signed in 2014 were just a screen that masked the true intentions of the West. They were started to "give Ukraine time to become stronger" and build up military power. That is, they were originally conceived in order to prepare for a bloody war. What the Kyiv neo-Nazis did - with the full connivance or direct assistance of "civilized Europeans." Unfortunately, we then trusted our partners, not expecting from them direct betrayal and open work to destroy our country. I well remember the meeting of the Russia-NATO Council at the highest level in Lisbon in 2010, in which I participated as President of the Russian Federation. The members of the alliance convinced us then, that we do not pose a threat to each other and are ready to work together for the overall security of the Euro-Atlantic. NATO expansion to the East and preparations for confrontation, in fact - for war with Russia, did not stop for a minute. Endless muddy streams of cynical lies.

The general crisis of confidence in the so-called developed countries and the legal institutions they have created is also obvious. For the sake of political interests, it turns out that it is easy to write off the fundamental principles of legal relations. Such as the inviolability of private property and the rule of international law. Western politicians who have violated the law are trying to confiscate Russian assets "without trial or investigation" - that is, simply steal them. And the sanctions regimes against us and our allies are introduced with a stroke of the pen of narrow-minded Washington functionaries and their European vassals. All this is the last signal to all other states: from now on it is impossible to have affairs with the Anglo-Saxon world. As with a thief, a swindler, a card sharper, from whom you can expect anything.

RF officer in the special military operation zone (V. Anosov)/RG


For years, perhaps decades ahead, normal relations with the West can be forgotten. This is not our choice. Now - let's do without them until a new generation of reasonable politicians comes to power there. Let's be careful and vigilant. We will develop relations with the rest of the world. Fortunately, it is very extensive and normally applies to us.

Outcome third. The epidemic of Russophobia requires treatment with strong means

And 2022, and at least eight previous years, if we count from the "Crimean Spring", passed under the sign of the growth of wild, irrational Russophobia in the Western world. Another acute relapse of this contagious bad disease in the West occurred precisely in recent years.

In time, it partly coincided with the pandemic of a real deadly infection - the coronavirus, with the decline of the global economy, the breakdown of ties between states, the logistical crisis, and the aggravation of social problems. Other negative trends, which made themselves felt even without any pandemic, had an even greater impact. In order not to be responsible for the obvious mistakes of their own, it was necessary to revive the main enemy. Rally your ranks in the fight against him, simultaneously getting rid of indecisive or dissident partners. This is exactly what the Western world has done. Moreover, one-seventh of the land already greatly annoyed him with its development. She grew, strengthened, did not listen to the "correct advice" and stubbornly followed her own, quite successful path.

The framework of traditional decency after the introduction of illegal, absolutely boorish sanctions against our country should no longer limit us in any way in the choice of methods of protection

Cursing before the "masters" and due to its stupidity, the Kyiv regime desperately seeks to "ban" not only any contacts of its citizens and businesses with Russia. But also any "Russian spirit", Russian culture - even one that has rightfully become a world classic. In Ukraine, monuments to Russian writers and generals are being demolished, and the streets of Pushkin are given the name of the scumbag Bandera. They outlaw the Russian language in schools and at home, they put Russian books under the knife. What a familiar handwriting - only concentration camps and Kristallnacht are missing. Gogol, Bulgakov, Malevich, Akhmatova, Vernadsky, and even Lesya Ukrainka or Taras Shevchenko must be turning over in their graves. All this is accompanied by hysterical propaganda convulsions and calls to "punish" obstinate Russia by any means.

At the same time, the West has a cynical non-medical "amnesia", as well as a partial loss of "hearing" and "vision". What the Nazi fosterlings, flaunting in uniform with a swastika on their sleeves, are doing and have been doing in the controlled territories, bypass "delicate" silence, giving these scoundrels indulgence in advance for all past and, most importantly, future torment and murder. However, what to expect from some European countries, which at some point gave birth to National Socialism and Fascism! It is they who are today responsible for the revival of the Nazi ideology. Apparently, the phantom pains of lost greatness in the political class of these countries cannot be removed by the medicines of time. And although the ruling forces there call themselves leftist or Christian, in fact they are the true heirs of the NSDAP cause and the Partito Nazionale Fascista.

DNR: A fighter of PMC Wagner firing a D-30 howitzer at the Ukrainan positions.


We've been through stuff like this before. Each chronicle has its own background, especially since dirty Russophobia has deep roots. If it comes to that, then it is necessary to remember not only the 20th, but also the 19th century, when anti-Russian hysteria also raged in the world. The one that F.I. Tyutchev called "broken off the chain." Let me remind you once again of his prophetic words: “Russia was simply offered suicide, a renunciation of the very foundation of its existence, a solemn recognition that it is nothing else in the world, as a wild and ugly phenomenon, as an evil that needs to be corrected…”

Suicide or reprisal did not take place either in the century before last or in the last century. Not after the First and Second World Wars or the collapse of the USSR. Today, Western countries are again calling for our country to be multiplied by zero. Well, let the strained screamers hoarse before they put it in their pants.

It is impossible to trample on Russia, and with it the "Russian World", to split it or to subordinate it to someone else's will. The lecherous hands of the Anglo-Saxons and other countries "sworn to darkness" were short even in the most difficult times for us. It won't come out now.

Outcome fourth. The West has driven itself into a cage. Let him sit in isolation

As V.V. Putin, our world has entered a period of revolutionary transformations, and they are of a fundamental nature. New development centers are being formed that represent the majority of the world community and are ready not only to declare their interests, but also to protect them.

What is happening is a direct consequence of the systemic crisis in the West, primarily in the US itself. This is not only about slowing down the pace of economic growth and technological progress, or about the crisis of all management systems. The problem is wider. There is a global ideological and philosophical collapse of the Western worldview, its model of the world order. In modern realities, this is especially noticeable.

In the early 1990s the famous American publicist F. Fukuyama hastened to proclaim the onset of the "end of history" as a continuous series of wars and confrontations between the two world systems, the liberal West and the communist East. Because of the death of the USSR, the fight is over, he believed. However, Fukuyama's prediction failed miserably. The West's dreams of a unipolar world, where one can reign supreme and dictate one's will, have not come true. Moreover: in modern conditions, the West is not at all able to offer the world any new ideas that can bring humanity forward, solve global problems, and ensure collective security. An interesting metamorphosis is taking place. In the old days, the term "iron curtain" meant the blockade of objectionable countries or their associations, which needed to be isolated in one way or another from the rest of the global society. Now it is obvious that the Western world is gradually turning into a besieged fortress, the entrances to which it tightly closes with walls (by the way, often quite real), locks and concrete from the inside. It encloses itself in a cage - while the rest of the world lives quietly in the wild. That is where it is dear. Let him live on the reservation.

Meanwhile, the world economic system is sinking ever deeper into an abyss of uncertainty, into a crisis of unprecedented proportions. Even the financial storm of 2008-2009 developed countries overcame relatively quickly. But now the situation is fundamentally different. The inflation rate in the US and the euro area literally breaks through the "bottom" of pessimistic forecasts: it is 8-10%, respectively, with a GDP growth of 2%. Not to mention various half-assed people from Eastern Europe or the Baltic states, where inflation has skyrocketed beyond 20%.

One can only sympathize with ordinary citizens of the EU countries. Their fiery slogans about solidarity with Ukraine will not warm the house, they will not fill the gas tank of the car. All "hellish sanctions", blockades and other restrictions on their shoulders endure those who now have to pay insane bills for utilities or fuel. To take on the content of Ukrainian refugees and give them jobs. Survive crisis after crisis through the fault of their own politicians who ignore the questions - why all this torment? Who ended up getting worse? Why, as usual, only America is in relative gain? Their citizens understand that poverty and uncertainty are a very long time. And there is no joy about this - reports from street protests appear daily on news feeds in Europe.

The main problem is that the West is destroying the fundamental principles of a market economy with its own hands - without which one can forget about one's development and partnership with anyone. Endless bans and exceptions to the generally accepted rules, especially in the field of trade in petroleum products, have already led to the creation of a giant "gray zone" on the world market, where transactions are carried out without regard to the powers that be. Under pressure from politicians, new rules are being introduced in the financial sector, and business is again forced to look for workarounds for settlements.

Alas, but now we have no one to talk and negotiate with in the West, there is nothing to talk about, and there is no need to. It was the events of the past year that annulled the very possibility of a trusting and respectful dialogue

I'm not even talking about the technological and information blockade, which is designed to limit access to high technology to all potential US competitors. Obviously, states that have been subjected to illegal sanctions or restrictions by Washington and other Western countries to one degree or another will try to circumvent all these prohibitions. Acting quietly or, on the contrary, boldly, regardless of international rules, not taking into account any interests of developed countries, including denying them the protection of their intellectual property. We have yet to learn all this. And the framework of traditional decency after the introduction of illegal, absolutely boorish sanctions against our country should no longer limit us in any way in the choice of methods of protection. Including any use of the rights and property of economic entities from unfriendly countries.


Yakutia nuclear icebreaker, launched at a Baltic shipyard. It bears the flags of Russia and four new regions of the country.  (RIA Novosti)

Things should be called by their proper names: the United States professes neo-colonialism, the unbridledness of which would make even R. Kipling blush and take a back seat with his "white man" arrogance. They are still trying to pretend that the whole world is their colony, to dictate enslaving conditions, to behave without regard to law and morality, to rob at every turn. What is worth at least the situation around the "grain deal", which literally made big American companies rich, buying up farmland in Ukraine. At the same time, the stated goal was not actually achieved - to prevent starvation in the poorest countries, where grain and fertilizers are exported from Russia and Ukraine (only about 3-5% of such cargoes eventually reach them). Even worse is the case in countries where the United States sought to establish supposedly liberal and democratic orders. The case always ends, if not with bloody upheavals, then with a deep systemic crisis and decline in all areas. Libya, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan are the bitterest victims of American "democratic missionary work"... Geopolitical tensions are constantly growing.

The United States has not yet lost the habit of doing business in its favorite primitive cowboy style: "If you don't like the way the table is set, knock it over." But each time they encounter more and more strong resistance from those who do not want to obey. China, India, the countries of the Middle East are strengthening their positions in the world market. Latin America and Africa are completely unwilling to obey the dictates of the United States. Russia has enough partners and like-minded people on these continents, with whom we are now conducting an intensive dialogue. At the end of this year, I had many talks with the leaders of a number of such states. And each of my interlocutors invariably confirmed their rejection of the methods that Washington and its allies are operating on the world stage.

Understanding this, the US and NATO are multiplying numerous "umbrella" structures that must rally around the "correct" foundations. Such as Eastern Partnership, Crimean Platform, AUKUS and others. At the same time, the contradictions in the camp of the allies are visible to the naked eye: Washington and London, using the situation in Ukraine, seek to weaken Europe and its industrial sector, reduce the economic influence of Germany and the military power of France. And also - to drive a wedge between China and the members of the European Union, to disrupt the plans of a long-term (and profitable) partnership of such countries with interstate structures and alliances that are not included in the orbit of US influence.

Several macro-regions are being formed in the world - each with its own internal rules and logic of development, but in general tuned to partnership and dialogue, and not to confrontation

In general, the interests of practically all the major Western states today contradict each other, no matter how ardently they assured the public of the opposite and created the appearance of unity. As N.M. wrote Karamzin, albeit about a completely different time, "these giants, driven by the inner restlessness of the spirit, strive from the difficult to the most difficult, destroy people and demand the names of the great as a reward from them." But sooner or later the alliances of big and strong Western countries will cease to exist. Friction abounds already now, even in the face of the "common enemy" that Russia has traditionally been designated as. There may be several options for the future development of events. It is most likely that several macro-regions will be formed in the world - each with its own internal rules and logic of development, but on the whole tuned to partnership and dialogue, and not to confrontation. And the entire system of international relations will become not only multipolar, but also multiform, based on the principles of benevolent non-intervention. This will significantly weaken the influence of leading international structures. But at the same time, it will make it possible to strengthen the security of such macro-regions, which is a clear benefit.

Some of the European states will try to preserve their independence to the best of their ability. A separate topic is how such countries as, for example, Poland, a model of impotent malice and a rare frenzied Russophobia, dependence and controllability, will get out of their own traps. Even in this country, it is already recognized that the bet on endless confrontation with Russia has led Warsaw to a dead end. One of the local politicians recently remarked with bitter irony: "The Poles hate Russia more than they love Poland." The Baltic countries have put themselves in the most stupid position. Provincial narrow-mindedness, rudeness, manners of thieving lackeys - this is their political style, from which even the rest of Europe jars. Apparently, in the near future, social explosions in these states will lead to an inevitable change of power.

The new world will be ready to cooperate with the West - but only on the principles of equality and mutual respect. It will take strength and political will not to break in this confrontation. And it will go on for a very long time. But in any case, sovereign states no longer accept attempts to impose on them the principles of a world order tailored according to American patterns. A clear realization of this truth is also one of the results of the past year.

New disarmament agreements are currently unrealistic and unnecessary. The sooner the guarantees of maximum security that suit our country are received, the sooner the situation will normalize.

The fiercest rivalry between the West and the rest of the world will continue to grow. The contradictions between the recent allies in the anti-Russian bloc will also intensify. In the future, a gradual change in the economic and energy structures in these countries is coming. There will also be new reserve currencies. Russia will have to take its own special place in the new world, relying on the new rules of partnership and cooperation with friendly states. And do everything to ensure your security, independence and sovereignty in key areas, from finance to science.

Outcome fifth. Until the apocalypse

"The world is dangerous not because some people do evil, but because some people see it and do nothing," the great physicist A. Einstein once wrote. A scientist and humanist who found it impossible for himself to remain within the same borders as Hitler's Nazis. And - as a brilliant analyst - long before the start of World War II, he felt its approach and declared it publicly. Einstein and many others were not listened to then. Many people are now talking about the "anticipation of the Third World War" or even its beginning (as Pope Francis did recently). As well as about the second coming of Nazism to Europe. But, alas, with the same effect.

By the end of 2021 - the beginning of 2022, the situation escalated to the extreme limit, actually reached the last line, after which - a global catastrophe. The collective West, represented by the United States and its European allies, is doing its best to support the insane Kyiv regime. It supplies him with weapons, trains mercenaries, pours huge funds into the budget of an unpredictable and corrupt state.

Is the West ready to unleash a full-fledged war against us, including a nuclear one, with the hands of Kyiv? Western politicians avert their eyes and hesitate to give an honest answer. But ask about this the inhabitants of the city of Energodar near the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, which was hit with aimed fire, almost hitting the representatives of the IAEA with stray fragments. The shelling continues to this day. Take the statements of cannabis-smoking cannibals from Kyiv. These are farcical comedians who are simply not able to realize the full measure of their own responsibility for people's lives in the real world. Remember the executions and torture in Kherson and other places.

Nevertheless, even in the face of such serious threats, Russia has emphasized more than once or twice: we are not fighting the Ukrainian people, but the Nazi bastard who has settled in Kyiv, who seized power as a result of a coup d'état. At the same time, our enemies are not shy about their means - on their conscience (although this word is hardly applicable to them) - thousands of destroyed houses, ruined lives, refugees and destitute people. And therefore, any negotiations with the current, puppet Ukrainian leadership became absolutely meaningless last year, as I wrote about in my article published at the end of 2021.


New Russian MS-21-310 with domestic PD-14 engines


The only thing that stops our enemies today is the understanding that Russia will be guided by the Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the field of nuclear deterrence. And if there is a real threat, it will act on them. The trouble is that in this case, no one will subsequently figure out what it was - a retaliatory strike or a preventive one. This, of course, frightens Western benefactors, who for a long time inspired the Ukrainian political rabble with the illusion of invulnerability and impunity in exchange for complete obedience. Therefore, the Western world is balancing between a burning desire to maximally humiliate, offend, dismember and destroy Russia, on the one hand, and the desire to avoid a nuclear apocalypse, on the other.

New disarmament agreements are currently unrealistic and unnecessary. The sooner guarantees of maximum security that suit our country are received, the sooner the situation will normalize. If we do not receive them, the tension will persist indefinitely. The world will continue to balance on the brink of World War III and nuclear catastrophe. We will do everything to prevent them.

Result six. Russia does not "survive", but lives. Evolves and wins!

The main result of the outgoing 2022 can be called the huge changes that we see today in Russia. In its economy, and most importantly - in the minds of a huge number of citizens.

Now almost everything depends on our people. His steadfastness and solidarity, patriotism and confidence in victory, maturity of thinking and firmness of spirit. The alien toxic foam that has formed on Russian society is gradually disappearing. I will not give a moral assessment to those who have chosen a new "philosophical ship" for themselves, because I do not know the motives behind each of them. God is their judge. Of course, this does not apply to those who, in the conditions of a military campaign, wish their country and its army to be defeated. They are just traitors. And they should not be forgiven.

The main thing is that the process of maturation of our society is going steadily. And it's irreversible. Of course, not everyone has yet realized how much our life has changed, what goals will be the main ones for many years to come. Shells are bursting on the front line, and someone believes that this is not his business. Some people are on duty at refugee accommodation centers and help rebuild houses destroyed by shelling, while others do not notice what is happening.

Our task is not only to protect new territories within the Russian Federation in the near future, but also to make their lives prosperous, safe, and comfortable.

And yet it is obvious: this year has forced our society to mobilize in the full sense of the word. Thousands of Russian citizens from the very first days of the special military operation went to Donbass as volunteers. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and officers are now undergoing combat coordination and heroically fighting at the forefront, liberating new territories within Russia from the Nazis. Worthy of great gratitude is the selfless work of volunteers who help refugees and displaced persons, families and children of the mobilized, are on duty in hospitals, and collect everything necessary for our fighters. All of them are true patriots of our Fatherland, our pride and glory.

Equally important is the mobilization of another, higher order. When, in the face of an external threat, in confrontation with the enemy, under cruel and unprecedented pressure, the country was able to unite in a matter of months and reach a new level of civic consciousness. This applies to all aspects of our life. 2022 has changed a lot for us. He forced me to express my thoughts and feelings. Learned to distinguish the minor from the really important. And appreciate the most important things for all of us. Courage. Mercy. Mutual assistance. Historical and family memory. Loyalty to duty and traditions. Justice. The truth. Conscience.

Technician working on the PD-14 engine of the MS-21-310 airliner. (RIA Novosti)

Our enemies failed to destroy our economy. Huge work is underway in the economic sphere, aimed at restarting the most important industries that ensure the security and defense of the country. The financial system is gradually and successfully adapting to work under sanctions. It did not work to "disconnect and cut off" us from the global infrastructure, to strangle us with bans and restrictions. The state was able to keep the foreign exchange market in balance and minimize the risks on it. Inflation is kept within manageable limits - the first shock quickly subsided thanks to the clear and professional actions of key financial institutions. The strategic reorientation of the entire Russian infrastructure to the markets of friendly countries continues. Annual price growth slowed down in October-November 2022. The state fulfills its social obligations in full. Wages and pensions are indexed, all benefits are paid.

The exit of foreign companies from our market (many did so reluctantly and under obvious pressure from their governments) did not bring down, as we were afraid, the consumer sector. On the contrary, import substitution is successfully going on in the most important segments for people. Most enterprises have not changed their investment plans for next year.

In a short time, we were forced to increase the production of modern weapons, to arrange the supply of everything necessary to supply the front and rear. Sometimes for this it was necessary to transfer the system to the "manual control" mode, achieving a clear and timely execution of the state defense order. Now we can already say that the Russian defense industry was able to give an adequate response to the most serious threats to the country's security. Defense factories are working stably, weapons and products for the needs of the army are produced and supplied in accordance with the new maximally increased tasks. The production volumes of armaments and military equipment are continuously growing day by day. We are obliged to create and will create the most powerful backlog of Russian weapons for the future!

Issues related to the large flow of refugees and internally displaced persons from the territories of Donbass and Ukraine required special attention this year. They were accepted by almost all regions. On behalf of the President of the country, everything was done to support such people and give them the opportunity to return to normal life. Find loved ones, send children to schools, heal physical and mental wounds. Assistance was also provided to the most vulnerable categories - families with children, the elderly, and the disabled.

Our task is not only to protect new territories within the Russian Federation in the near future, but also to make their lives prosperous, safe, and comfortable. This was already the case in 2014, when Crimea became part of Russia, returning home forever. Contrary to those who dream of driving him back by force into foreign borders, he threatened and intimidated, arranged an energy, water, transport, gas blockade for "their own" people. We see how dynamically this region of Russia is developing, with what a sense of pride its inhabitants speak about theirs today and tomorrow.

Important and indisputable. "We don't leave ours!" - became the motto of the outgoing year. We will make every effort to ensure that life in a large Russian family is normal and prosperous. Let's give millions of people the opportunity to gain confidence in the future. We will always stand up for their rights and freedoms, language and culture, faith and hopes. This is well understood by our enemies, those who desperately and hopelessly continue to wage a hybrid war against us, trying to put pressure on us and intimidate.

Happy New Year 2023 to all citizens of Russia! All those who are close and dear to us, who are ready to go with us towards any trials. A deep bow to our heroic Armed Forces. The enemies of Russia will be defeated! The truth will prevail! The future is ours!

Russian newspaper - Federal issue: No. 292 (8940)


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Eric Arnow: My Trip to Russia (Part I)

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


Eric Arnow

SPECIAL CONTRIBUTING EDITOR


My Trip to Russia Part I


Part One

While I was at a yoga resort in July, my friend Regis Tremblay, a peace activist and documentary filmmaker sent me an email. He’d visited Manita and Yuri, whose hostel I’d stayed at in 2015, in Sevastopol, the famous seaport and naval base, which has been part of Russia since 1783. 

Manita sent a video message, “We miss you…and remember the garden you promised?”.

While there in 2015, I’d seen a patch of land that was unused, and strewn with weeds. So I’d suggested planting fruit trees there. I’d planned to go back in 2020, but Covid prevented it.

The Trip

Plus, travel is far more difficult, since Aeroflot, which I booked a flight with in 2020 does not fly between Bangkok and Moscow. And US based ticket agencies don’t show any flights either.

At the resort, a Russian yoga teacher, Kira, was planning to go to Moscow in August, and her boyfriend told me how to get a ticket. So I booked a ticket during the hot season in Russia. The flight went through Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The flight was more than 50% more expensive but what the hell?

So on August 11, I got a flight from Chiang Mai to Bangkok. My plan was to arrive in Bangkok about 5 PM, to catch the 8 pm flight to Dubai. When the airplane didn’t show up in Chiang Mai, I got antsy and called the ticket agency. “What do I do if the flight is late, and I miss my flight from Bangkok to Dubai?”

The ticket agent said I was likely to miss my flight and that I needed to pay an extra $1000 to get the next day’s flight. I took the chance that he was lying, and fortunately, my flight to Bangkok arrived about 5:30 pm, and I checked in in plenty of time. What’s more, the flight from Bangkok to Dubai was over 2 hours late, too.

So, I left Bangkok at about 11 pm. Taking into account time zone difference and the 6 hour flight, I arrived in Dubai at 2 am. And the flight to Moscow was at 10 am. I just walked around or sat. No sleep. The cost of food in airports is notoriously overpriced, but in Dubai, even a lousy tunafish sandwich cost $15! I had brought some dry snacks with me, so that tided me over.

The Flight from Dubai to Moscow

Several times, guardian angels appeared on this trip. Sitting next to me was a woman named Tonya, short for Antonia. She had quit her job at the Russian Central Bank as a computer person, and had done one or two Vipassana retreats in the Goenka style. I’d done some retreats with that, too. So we had a great connection.

Visiting Three Hero Cities

As it turned out, (not realizing it) I planned to visit 3 socalled “Hero Cities” of the Soviet Union’s “Great Patriotic War”. Russians call the invasion, which was only a part of WWII, the Great Patriotic War. It was an existential struggle of the Soviet people against the planned destruction of the country, and the enslavement or death of the people. The Soviet Union lost 27 million people, and one third of the country –the equivalent of from the East Coast of the USA to Chicago levelled.

By contrast, the USA lost about 400,000 people and the UK lost 550,000. They faced 11 worn out German divisions vs the Soviet Union facing 220 divisions. As you read below, both President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill knew all too well what the Soviet Union did to win WWII.

On June 22, 1941, the following countries invaded the USSR without warning, in violation of the 1939 Nonaggression Pact, which the Soviet Union and Germany signed. Other countries such as Poland, England and France had also signed nonaggression pacts with Hitler. He broke all of them. These countries allied with Germany, or sent volunteers:

  1. Italy (under Mussolini)
  2. Romania
  3. Hungary
  4. Finland
  5. Sweden (which officially was neutral but supplied significant minerals as well as volunteer units)
  6. Croatia (a part of Yugoslavia, which had already been occupied by Germany, and which had a substantial fascist population)
  7. Spain, which was officially neutral, but sent 50-70,000 volunteers. The dictator Franco withdrew them in 1943.
  8. Vichy France, controlled by Germany, sent 7,000 troops. Most French did not support them, and many French, the Free French, fought against Hitler

Thirteen cities of the former USSR played a significant role in the war. Of the 13 Hero Cities, 7 are in present day Russia, 4 lie within Ukraine, while the remaining 2 are in Belarus.

I think it is significant in light of the current conflict that 4 cities were Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic cities. One, Odessa, saw the massacre of at least 42 people by fascists mobs in May 2014.

The three Hero Cities that I visited were:

  1. Moscow
  2. Volgograd (the successor name to Stalingrad)
  3. Sevastopol

Arrival in Moscow

When we arrived in Moscow, Tonya helped me get a Russian SIM card, so that I could use my mobile phone and access internet. She then booked a taxi to take me to my hotel, actually a popular hostel which, I discovered, is just a couple of minutes from the very center of Moscow…Red Square and the Kremlin, the nerve center of the Russian government.

I called the Kremlin and booked my appointment with Putin….just kidding. I have NOTHING to do with the Russian government. This trip was on my dollar, and not cheap since airplane costs have doubled since 2020. Since we’re bombarded 24/7 with the Western narrative, I wanted to go to Russia to see for myself what’s going on there.

Once I got settled at the Povordie Hostel, I started walking around. The Hostel is located just off of Nikolskaya Street, which is a very popular walking street.


Be sure to click on the images for best appreciation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolskaya_Street#/media/File:Moscow_NikolskayaStreet_F12_(cropped).jpg


BELOW: The Kremlin Wall, with the Lenin Mausoleum, where you can view the embalmed body of the ‘Founding Father’ of the Soviet Union, Vladimir Lenin. In the past, during parades, Soviet leaders would take their places on the roof to review the parade.

One of Many Beautiful Buildings in Moscow, Including the Russian Orthodox Church

By Russia, Lenin’s Mausoleum or more specifically image, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48098730


Souvenir Shops

There are a lot of souvenir shops in Russia, often with nostalgic memorabilia. Here are 2 T-shirts, one with Stalin, the leader of the USSR, from about 1927-1953. He is highly controversial with many criticizing him for his alleged crimes and authoritarianism, while others praise him for unifying and building the country, shattered by civil war and invasions from the West, so that the Soviet Union nearly singlehandedly defeated both the Nazi armies that invaded in 1941, as well as significantly contributing to Japan’s defeat, by defeating the 1 million man Kwantung Japanese Army that was occupying Manchuria, part of China, in August 1945.


T-Shirts, one with picture of Stalin, the other, Russian Federation Emblems

BELOW: T-Shirts, One with picture of Stalin, the other, Russian Federation Emblem. • Putin is generally very popular in Russia. • The Russian Bear, the Russian equivalent of the Bald Eagle, but, in my opinion, even more iconic. • Yuri Gagarin, still a national hero, the first man into space • And the jocular “KGB-Still Watching You”, even though it was dissolved with the end of the USSR. • A typical Soviet era style winter cap. With temperatures down to minus 40 degrees, they were pretty popular, then and even now. • Also, the flag of the former Soviet Union. You still see vestiges of that era, on the ‘Victory Flag’ commemorating the defeat of the Nazis in 1945. And the Hammer and Sickle is still seen in various places such as the Russian national airline, Aeroflot, uniforms.


Russian Bread

I’m a great fan of whole grain bread. And while many Russian people like white bread (though I never saw anyone eating Wonder Bread–which is sort of an oxymoron, since that might better be termed “Bread looking chemical fluffy mixture”) there was a great selection of different whole grain breads.


Heavy Russia breads, often made with rye or buckwheat flour as well as nuts or seeds.


More Russian bread and rolls


The Moscow Subways–People’s Museums


No, this is not a museum. This is one of the Moscow subway Metro stations. This iconic statue of a Soviet soldier with his guard dog is famous and it’s good luck to rub the nose of the dog.  Many of the subway stations which were first built during Soviet times, as far back as the 1930’s, were loaded with sculpture, mosaics and other art, to make city commuting an enjoyable experience for the people.


Here, you see a young boy rubbing the dog’s nose for good luck. People constantly passing by did the same thing, resulting in the dog’s nose having a fine polish.

Helpful Friends

One major issue is how to pay for things in Russia. I brought US dollars from Thailand, and I needed to change to Russian Rubles to buy stuff. Also, in some cases, it’s useful to have a payment card. But foreign cards don’t work.

Fortunately, at the Hostel, a young Syrian guy appeared, named Dean (his English name). Kira helped me as well, setting up a bank account. He directed me to an ATM machine and helped me set up an ATM card. But how to change money into Rubles? There was a money exchange place but it charges a spread between ‘buy and sell price’.

Tonya saved the day. She wants to study in Portugal. So she bought my dollars for a good price in exchange for Rubles. Later, Dean would get me out of a real hot spot regarding a place to stay in Moscow. But during my first days in Moscow, Dean showed me where the local supermarket is, and we had a lot of discussions about politics and philosophy. Nice to meet such an intelligent guy. He speaks fluent English, Russian and his native Arabic.

Meeting My Lovely Friend Kira

My yoga teacher friend Kira showed up, and took me to lunch at a ‘real Russian’ Soviet style restaurant. Unfortunately, I was using a USB device that failed. So I don’t have pictures of it.

Kira was born in Uzbekistan, one of the Soviet Republics, however, when the Soviet Union broke up, she, like many ethnic Russians was stranded. Life was not easy for her and her family, but she’s come through it well. We talked a lot about each of our own spiritual journeys. Now she teaches yoga in Thailand.

Here are some pictures that she took which I am sharing.

Kira, left, Yana, Kira’s friend, Center, and the author.

We went for a nice walk on the Moscow river, and had a picnic with a favorite Russia food, which I think comes from Turkey, called a Shawarma…something like that. It’s a flat round bread, like a chapati or tortilla. It wraps vegetables and other items like falafel or typically chicken.

The Moscow River with Its Promenade. Note the tour boat coming down the river.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


LEFT: A Typical Shawarma

 

BELOW: Kira’s friend Yana showed up. We went to a very interesting shop, perhaps I’d call it a Curio Shop with a lot of art objects, books, incense, bells. It even had Chinese teas which I knew of from my travel in China. Lots of Tibetan items, and even a vintage copy of the classic Hippy Book by Richard Alpert, aka Ram Dass. Be Here Now.

Here are some instruments, such as ‘bell drums, lower left’, Didgeridoos, guitars, in the background are teas.

Be Here Now


Touring with Tonya

The next day, I spent with Tonya, who took me to several very interesting places.  First, we went to the Tretyakov Gallery. This gallery has something like 65 exhibition halls. It’s endless! We only got to see about 40 of them because we had other places to go.



ABOVE: Here is a portrait of the most famous Russian poet, Pushkin. One thing that struck me was the number of visitors to the museum. Apparently, Russian people are interested in art and culture beyond pop music and what passes for art these days.

We then visited the Museum of Aviation and Space, aka The Cosmonaut Museum. I wanted to see this since as a kid, I’d been fascinated by the first Satellite shot into space, Sputnik. And then, the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, who gained great fame and love. After his trip, he travelled the world advocating peace.

In Defense of Communism: Yuri Gagarin: 10 facts about the legendary ... Yuri Gagarin, first man in space. (Photo courtesy: https://www.idcommunism.com/2016/04/yuri-gagarin-10-facts-about-legendary.html)

BELOW: Pictured here is a photo of the cooperative work of US Astronauts and Soviet Cosmonauts. There was a time of sanity, when the two countries cooperated in Space and achieved a lot by working together.



The Iconic Obelisk honoring the Soviet space program. Look carefully and you’ll see a rocket at the top.

A colorful globe in the museum


The first Earth Satellite, ‘The Sputnik’. Now, the Russian media station, also called Sputnik is banned in the West. When the Sputnik was launched in 1957, it caused panic…how could those Soviets be so smart as to beat us into space?


Rocket Engines. For many years, Russian rocket engines were so reliable and powerful, that the US bought Russian rocket engines to use in US Rockets. Due to sanctions, I’m not sure what the status of that is now.

 
 

All we are saying, is give peace a chance. During the 1970’s, the US got the crazy idea that cooperation is better than blowing up the planet in a nuclear war. So we got a nuclear arms reduction treaty. And the US and USSR worked together on the space program. The US broke the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 under George W. Bush, and the Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2019 under Donald Trump. Cooperation in space has continued but due to tensions currently, it will end soon.

Here is a Soviet song about the space program

Glory to the ones who look forward

An inspiring tune from the early 1960's Soviet Union composed by Alexandra Pakhmutova, a Soviet composer responsible for multiple similar pieces within this time period. This particular version was sung by Josef Kobzon, a Ukrainian singer hailing from Donetsk Oblast. The last three art pieces within this video was by Andrey Sokolov, a Soviet stamp maker and painter, while the first one was by Alexei Leonov, a former Soviet cosmonaut.

Click on the image to play….very inspiring!

(As of this writing, October, 2022, the Ukrainian government in Kiev is bombing Donetsk.  And in retaliation, Russia is bombing Kiev….What the hell happened to the friendship and solidarity of Ukraine and Russia? What a tragedy!

Following our trip to the Cosmonaut Museum, Tonya took me to a Soviet themed restaurant. Here is a typical poster showing Soviet “Pioneer” kids.

Here is a popular song sung by the young pioneers.

Soviet Pioneer Song – Это я и ты/That’s me and you

Here is an excerpt of the lyrics:

Childhood, childhood, Kindness not warmed in vain…All people on the Great Planet Should Always Be Friends. Children should always laugh and live in a peaceful world.

Pavilion of Soviet Republics

After Dinner, we went to the Pavilion of Soviet Republics. It was night time, so we couldn’t go into the buildings, one for each of the former Soviet Republic, which featured information about each one, such as the culture, art, and products they produce. It is often referred to as VDNH. Here is a post that explains what it is in detail. But basically it is a free and open park and museum space in Moscow. https://russiau.com/vdnkh-vdnh-park-moscow/

Since it was night, there were several fountains that were lit up. 


This fountain is called “Friendship of the Peoples”. What a concept. When people reminisce about Soviet times such as in Ukraine, people remark how everybody got along so well. Nobody cared what language you spoke. Now, people are killing one another over this issue.  Such a pity!


This is the pavilion of Kazakhstan SSR


ABOVE: This pavilion was originally that of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic until 1964, when it was called ‘Agriculture’.

The USA and Europe like to pretend that there are no ties between Ukraine and Russia, much less friendship. So buildings like this, and the many cultural and family relationships clearly show that Ukraine and Russia are family. However, unfortunately, sometimes family disputes be a problem. If one looks into this matter, one sees foreign influence to disrupt, divide and ultimately conquer.

In Part II, the journey continues to Volgograd.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE
Eric Arnow is a peace activist and Buddhist. For the last 15 years or so he's been living in Thailand with a lot of time spent in China practicing Zen - and a few trips to Russia. You can find more on and by Eric at his Bumble Buddhist Blog  on WordPress. There are links to that and stuff he's written about Asia etc.


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ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS




The Goldilocks War

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DEFEAT CAPITALISM AND ITS DEADLY SPAWN, IMPERIALISM
ecological murder •
by Dmitry Orlov
Crossposted with the Saker blog



Are you happy with the way the war in the former Ukraine is going? Most people aren’t—for one reason or another. Some people hate the fact that there is a war there at all, while others love it but hate the fact that it hasn’t been won yet, by one side or the other. Bounteous quantities of both of these kinds of haters are found on both sides of the new Iron Curtain that is hastily being built across Eurasia between the collective West and the collective East. This seems reasonable; after all, hating war is standard procedure for most people (war is hell, don’t you know!) and by extension a small war is better than a big one and a short war is better than a long one. And also such reasoning is banal, trite, platitudinous, vapid, predictable, unimaginative and… bromidic (according to the English Thesaurus).

Seldom is a war-watcher to be found who is happy with the progress and the duration of the war. Luckily, Russian state television shows a very significant one of these almost daily. It is Russia’s president, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. Having paid attention to him for over twenty years now, I can confidently state that never has he been so imbued with calm, self-assured serenity leavened with droll humor. This is not the demeanor of someone who feels at any risk of losing a war. The brass at the Ministry of Defense appear dour and glum on camera—a demeanor befitting men who send other men to fight and possibly to be wounded or to die; but off-camera they flash each other quick Mona Lisa smiles. (Russian men don’t give stupid American-style fish-eyed toothy grins, rarely show their teeth when smiling, and never in the presence of wolves or bears).

Given that Putin’s approval rating stands firm at around 80% (a number beyond reach of any Western politician), it is reasonable to assume that he is just the visible tip of a gigantic, 100-million-strong iceberg of Russians who calmly await the successful conclusion of the special military operation to demilitarize and denazify the former Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (so please don’t even call it a war). These 100 million Russians are seldom heard from, and when they do make noise, it is to protest against bureaucratic dawdling and foot-dragging or to raise private funds with which to remedy a shortage of some specialty equipment requested by the troops: night vision goggles, quadrocopters, optical sights, and all sorts of fancy tactical gear.

A great deal more noise is being made by the one or two percent whose entire business plan has been wrecked by the sudden appearance of the New Iron Curtain. The silliest of these thought that fleeing west, or south (to Turkey, Kazakhstan or Georgia) would somehow magically fix their problem; it hasn’t, and it won’t. The people we would expect to scream the loudest are the LGBTQ+ activists, who thought that they were going to use Western grant money to build East Sodom and East Gomorrah. They’ve been hobbled and muzzled by new Russian laws that label them as foreign agents and prohibit their sort of propaganda. In fact, the very term LGBTQ+ is now illegal, and so, I suppose, they will have to use PPPPP+ instead (“P” is for “pídor”, which is the generic Russian term for any sort of sexual pervert, degenerate or deviant). But I digress.

It can be observed rather readily that those who are the least happy with the course of the Russian campaign are also the least likely to be Russian. Least happy of all are the good folks at the Center for Informational and Political Operations of the Ukrainian Security Service who are charged with creating and maintaining the Phantom of Ukrainian Victory. These are followed by people in and around Washington, who are quite infuriated by Russian dawdling and foot-dragging. They have also been hard-pressed to show that the Ukrainians are winning while the Russians are losing; to this end, they have portrayed every Russian tactical repositioning or tactical withdrawal as a huge, humiliating defeat personally for Putin and every relentless, suicidal Ukrainian attack on Russian positions as a great heroic victory. But this PR tactic has lost effectiveness over time and now the Ukraine has become a toxic topic in the US that most American politicians would prefer to forget about, or at least keep out of the news.

To be fair, the Russian tactical cat-and-mouse games in this conflict have been nothing short of infuriating. The Russians spent some time rolling around Kiev to draw Ukrainian troops away from the Donbas and prevent a Ukrainian attack on it; once that was done, they withdrew. Great Ukrainian victory! They also spent some time tooling around the Black Sea coastline near Odessa, threatening a sea invasion, to draw off Ukrainian forces in that direction, but never invaded. Another Ukrainian victory! The Russians occupied a large chunk of the Kharkov region that the Ukrainians left largely undefended, then, when the Ukrainians finally paid attention to it, partially withdrew behind a river to conserve resources. Yet another Ukrainian victory! The Russians occupied/liberated the regional capital of Kherson, evacuated all the people who wanted to be evacuated, then withdrew to a defensible position behind a river. Victory again! With all these Ukrainian victories, it is truly a wonder that the Russians have managed to gain around [36,000 sq mi] of the former Ukraine’s most valuable real estate, over 6 million in population, secured a land route to Crimea and opened up a vital canal that supplies irrigation water to it and which the Ukrainians had blocked some years ago. That doesn’t seem like s defeat at all; that looks like an excellent result from a single, limited summer campaign.

Russia has achieved several of its strategic objectives already; the rest can wait. How long should they wait? To answer this question, we need to look outside the limited scope of Russia’s special operation in the Ukraine. Russia has bigger fish to fry, and frying fish takes time because eating undercooked fish can give you nasty parasites such as tapeworm and liver fluke. And so, I would like to invite you to Mother Russia’s secret kitchen, to see what’s on the cutting board and to estimate how much thermal processing will be required to turn it all into a safe and nutritious meal.

Mixing our food metaphors, allow me to introduce Goldilocks with her three bears and her porridge not too hot and not too cold. What Russia seems to be doing is keeping their special military operation moving along at a steady pace—not too fast and not too slow. Going too fast would not allow enough time to cook the various fish; going too fast would also increase the cost of the campaign in casualties and resources. Going too slow would give the Ukrainians and NATO time to regroup and rearm and prevent the proper thermal processing of the various fish.

In an effort to find the optimal pace for the conflict, Russia initially committed only a tenth of its professional active-duty soldiers, then worked hard to minimize the casualty rate. It opted to start turning off the lights all over the former Ukraine only after the Kiev regime tried to blow up the Kerch Strait bridge that linked Crimea with the Russian mainland. Finally, it called up just 1% of reservists to relieve the pressure from the frontline troops and potentially prepare for the next stage, which is a winter campaign—for which the Russians are famous.

With this background information laid out, we can now enumerate and describe the various ancillary objectives which Russia plans to achieve over the course of this Goldilocks War. The first and perhaps most important set of problems that Russia has to solve in the course of the Goldilocks War is internal. The goal is to rearrange Russian society, economy and financial system so as to prepare it for a de-Westernized future. Since the collapse of the USSR, various Western agents, such as the National Endowment for Democracy, the US State Department, various Soros-owned foundations and a wide assortment of Western grants and exchange programs have made serious inroads into Russia. The overall goal was to weaken and eventually dismember and destroy Russia, turning it into a compliant servant of Western governments and transnational corporations that would supply them with cheap labor and raw materials. To help this process along, these Western organizations did whatever they could to drive the Russian people toward eventual biological extinction and replace them with a more docile and less adventurous race.

Starting well over 30 years ago, Western NGOs set to corrupting the minds of Russia’s young. No effort was spared to denigrate the value of Russian culture, to falsify Russian history and to replace them both with Western pop culture and propaganda narratives. These initiatives achieved limited success, and the USSR, and Soviet-era culture, have remained ever-popular even among those who were too young to have experienced life in the USSR firsthand. Where the damage has been most severe is in education. Excellent Soviet-era textbooks that taught students how to think independently were destroyed and replaced with imports. These were at best useful for training experts in narrowly defined fields who can follow previously defined procedures and recipes but can’t explain how these procedures and recipes were arrived at or to create new ones. Russian teachers, who saw their job not just in educating but in bringing up their students to be good Russians who love and cherish their country, were replaced by Western-trained educationalists who saw their mission as providing a competitive, market-based service in bringing up qualified, competent… consumers! Who are these people? Well, luckily, the Internet remembers everything, and there are plenty of other jobs for these people such as shoveling snow and stoking furnaces. But identifying and replacing them takes time, as does finding, updating and reproducing the older, excellent textbooks.

But what of the young people left behind by this wave of destruction? Luckily, not all is lost. The special military operation is providing them with some very valuable lessons that their ignorant educationalists left out: that Russia—a unique, miraculous agglomeration of many different nations, languages and religions—has been preserved and expanded over the centuries through the efforts of heroes whose names are not just remembered but venerated. What’s more, some of them are alive today, fighting and working in the Donbas. It is one thing to visit museums, read old books and hear stories about the great deeds of one’s grandfathers and great-grandfathers during the Great Patriotic War; it is quite another to watch history unfold through the eyes of your own father or brother. Give it another year or two, and Russia’s young people will learn to look with disdain on the products of Russia’s Western-oriented culture-mongers. Their elders do already: opinion polls show that a large majority of Russians see Western cultural influence as a negative.

And what of these Russian culture-mongers who have been worshiping all things Western for as long as they can remember? Here, a most curious thing happened. When the special military operation was first announced, they spoke out against it and in favor of the Ukrainian Nazis—a stupid thing to do, but they thought it good and proper to keep their political opinions harmonized with those of their Western patrons and idols so as to stay in their good graces. Some of them protested against the war (ignoring the fact that it had been going on for eight long years already). And then quite a few of them fled the country in unseemly haste.

Keep in mind that these are neither brain surgeons nor rocket scientists: these are people who prance around on stage while making noises with their hands and mouths; or they are people who sit there while makeup artists do things to their faces and hair, then endlessly repeat lines written for them by someone else. These are not people who have the capacity to analyze a tricky political situation and make the right choice. In an earlier, saner age their opinions would be steadfastly ignored, but such is the effect of the Internet, social media and all the rest, that any hysterical nincompoop can shoot a little video and millions of people, having nothing better to do with their time, will watch it on their phones and make comments.

The fact that these people are voluntarily cleansing the Russian media space of their presence is a positive development, but it takes time. If the special military operation were to end tomorrow, there is no doubt that they would attempt to come back and pretend that none of this ever happened. And then Russian popular culture would remain a Western-styled cesspool full of vacuous personae who seek to glorify every single deadly sin for the sake of personal notoriety and gain. Russia has plenty of talented people eager to take their place—if only they would keep out long enough for everyone to forget about them!

Particularly damaging to Russia’s future has been the emergence and preeminence of pro-Western economic and financial elites. Ever since the haphazard and in many cases criminal privatization of state resources in the 1990s, there was brought up an entire cohort of powerful economic agents who does not have Russia’s interests in mind. Instead, these are purely selfish economic actors who until quite recently thought that their ill-gotten gains would allow them to enter into posh Western society. These people usually have more than one passport, they try to keep their families in some wealthy enclave outside of Russia, they send their children to schools and universities in the West, and their only use for Russia is as a territory they can exploit in creating their wealth extraction schemes.

When in response to the start of Russia’s special military operation the West mounted a speculative attack on the ruble, forcing Russia’s central bank to impose strict currency controls, these members of the Russian elite were forced to start thinking about making a momentous choice. They could stay in Russia, but then they would have to cut their ties to the West; or they could move to the West and live off their savings, but then they would be cut off from the source of their wealth. Their choice was made easier by Western governments which worked hard to confiscate the property of rich Russian nationals, freeze their bank accounts and subject them to various other indignities and inconveniences.

Still, it’s a hard choice for them to make—realizing that, in spite of their sometimes fabulous wealth, for the collective West they are just some Russians that can be robbed. Many of them are mentally unprepared to throw in their lot with their own people, whom they have been taught to despise and to exploit for personal gain. A quick victory in Russia’s special military operation would allow them to think that their troubles were temporary in nature. Given enough time some of them will run away for good while others will decide to stay and work for the common good in Russia.


Next in line are various members of the Russian government who, having been schooled in Western economics, are incapable of understanding the economic transformation that is occurring in Russia, never mind helping it along. Most of what passes for economic thought in the West is just an elaborate smokescreen over this fundamental dictum: “The rich must be allowed to get richer, the poor must be kept poor and the government shouldn’t try to help them (much).” This worked while the West had colonies to exploit, be it through good old-fashioned imperial conquest, plunder and rapine, or through financial neocolonialism of Perkins’s “economic hit men,” or, as has recently been grudgingly admitted by several top EU officials, by taking advantage of cheap Russian energy.


That doesn’t work any more—not in the West, not in Russia or any place else, and mindsets have to adjust. There is a great deal of inertia in appointments to government positions, where there are many vested interests vying for power and influence. It takes time for such basic ideas to percolate through the system as the fact that the US Federal Reserve no longer has a planet-wide monopoly on printing money. Therefore, it is no longer necessary for Russia’s central bank to have dollars in reserve to cover their ruble emissions to defend it against speculative attack since it is no longer necessary for Russia’s central bank to allow foreign currency speculators to run rampant and stage speculative attacks.

But some results have already been achieved, and they are nothing short of spectacular: over the past few months, just a few well-chosen departures from Western economic orthodoxy have made the ruble the world’s strongest currency, have allowed Russia to earn more export revenue by exporting less oil, gas and coal, and have allowed it to drive inflation down to almost zero. Since the start of the special military operation, Russia has been able to reduce its national debt by a large amount and increase government revenues. A swift end to Russia’s special military operation may spell the end of such miracles and a most unwelcome return to the untenable status quo ante.

With well over a hundred Ukrainian casualties a day the pickings are bound to get even slimmer over time. Foreign mercenaries have been used to fill the gap—Anglos, Poles, Romanians—but there is a major problem with them: as Julius Caesar pointed out, lots of people are willing to kill for money but nobody wants to die for money—except an idiot, I would add.

Beyond the intangible world of finance, equally significant changes have been occurring throughout the physical Russian economy. Previously, many economic sectors, including car sales, construction and home improvement, software development and many others, were foreign-owned and the profits from these activities left the country. And then a decision was made to block the expatriation of dividends. In response, foreign companies sold off their Russian assets, taking a huge loss and depriving themselves of access to the Russian market. The change has been quite stunning. For example, at the beginning of 2022, Western car companies owned a large share of the Russian auto market. Many of the cars that were sold had been assembled within Russia at foreign-owned plants and the profits from these sales were expatriated. Now, less than a year later, European and American automakers are pretty much gone from Russia, replaced by a swiftly reborn domestic auto industry. Chinese automakers have immediately grabbed a large market share for themselves, while South Korea continued to trade with Russia and has held on to its market share.

Equally stunning have been changes in the aircraft industry. Previously, Russian airlines were flying Airbuses and Boeings, most of them leased. After the start of the special operation Western politicians demanded that these leases be rescinded and the aircraft returned to their owners, neglecting to take into account the fact that this would be ruinous financially (glutting the market for used aircraft for years to come and destroying demand for new aircraft) and, furthermore, physically impossible, given that there was no way to effect the transfer of the aircraft. In response, the Russian airlines nationalized the aircraft registry, stopped flying to hostile destinations where their aircraft might be seized, and started making lease payments in rubles to special accounts at the Russian central bank.

TU-214

Then came the news that Aeroflot is planning to buy over 300 new passenger jets, all Russian МС-21s, SSJ-100s and Tu-214s, all before 2030, with the first deliveries slated for 2023. There has been a scramble to replace almost all Western-sourced components, such as composites for the carbon fiber wing of the MC-21 and jet engines, avionics and much else for all of the above. Over this period many of the previously leased Boeings and Airbuses will be phased out, but these companies’ market share in the largest country on Earth will be gone forever. Damage to Western aircraft manufacturers will be matched by the damage to Western airlines. At the outset of hostilities, the collective West [petulantly] closed its airspace to Russia, and Russia reciprocated. The problem is that Europe is small and easy to fly around while Russia is huge and flying around it takes a whole day. European airlines suddenly found that theу can’t compete on routes to Japan, China or Korea.

Following the closing of the airspace came other sanctions, from both the European Union and from the United States, all of them illegal, since the UN Security Council is the only body empowered to impose sanctions. Right now the European Union is working on the ninth packet of sanctions, all of which have been dubbed “sanctions from hell”. Speaking of hell, Dante Alighieri’s “Inferno”, there are nine circles of hell, so perhaps the sanctions juggernaut is about to run its course.

These sanctions were supposed to have swiftly destroyed the Russian economy and caused so much social upheaval and suffering that the people would gather on Red Square and overthrow the dread dictator Putin (or so thought Western foreign policy experts). Clearly, nothing of the sort has happened and Putin’s approval rating is as high as ever. On the other hand, the good people of the European Union are indeed starting to suffer. They can no longer afford to heat their homes or to take regular hot showers, food has become outrageously expensive for them, and so much else is going wrong that huge crowds of protestors have been gathering all across Europe and demanding, among other things, an end to anti-Russian sanctions, normalization of relations with Russia and a return to business as usual. Their demands are unlikely to be met, since this would mean a major loss of face for the European leaders.

But there is a more important reason why the sanctions will stay: a return to business as usual would mean that Russia would once again provide energy and raw materials to Europe cheaply while allowing European companies to profit from the labor of Russians. This is quite unappealing and is therefore unlikely to happen. Russia is using the sanctions as an opportunity to rebuild its domestic industry and reorient its trade away from hostile nations and toward friendly nations that are fair and sympathetic in their dealings with Russia. It is also working hard to phase out the use of currencies that Dmitry Medvedev called “toxic”; namely, the US dollar and the euro.

Add to this list a wonderful new Russian innovation called “parallel import.” If some company, in complying with anti-Russian sanctions, refuses to sell its products to Russia or to service or upgrade its products in Russia, then Russia will buy these products and upgrades from a third or fourth or fifth party without permission from the US, the EU or the manufacturer. If a certain brand-name product becomes unavailable, the Russians simply rename the brand and make the same product themselves, or have the Chinese or another trade partner do it for them. And if the West refuses to license its intellectual property to Russia, then that intellectual property becomes free in Russia.

This works particularly well with software: free copies of brand-name software are just as good as the paid-for copies, and if tech support, training or other associated services become unavailable from the West, the Russians simply organize their own. Intellectual property of various sorts makes up a large portion Western notional wealth, and Western sanctions are having the effect of letting Russia make use of it free of charge. Thanks to modern digital technology, it works rather well with hardware too. Instead of painstakingly reverse-engineering products, now the same effect can be achieved by buying the 3D models on a thumb drive and 3D-printing them or automatically generating the mill and drill paths to create them on an NC mill. Putin likes to use the expression “tsap-tsarap” to describe this process. It is hard to translate directly but pertains to the act of a cat snatching its prey with its claws. The short of it is, what Russia previously had to pay for is now, thanks to sanctions, free to it.

Since the Goldilocks War is, after all, a sort of war, we need to briefly discuss its military aspects. Here, too, a steady-as-she-goes approach seems to be the most copacetic. The stated goal is to demilitarize and denazify the former Ukraine, and to some extent this has already been achieved: most of the armor and artillery that the Ukraine had inherited from the USSR has already been destroyed; most of the diehard Nazi battalions are either dead or a shadow of their former selves. Gone too are most of the volunteers that once fought on the Ukrainian side. After over 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers “have been killed” since February 2022 (as forthrightly stated, then sheepishly denied, by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen), and after perhaps as many as half a million casualties, scores of service-age men bribing their way out of the country and several rounds of the draft, it is slim pickings. With well over a hundred Ukrainian casualties a day the pickings are bound to get even slimmer over time. Foreign mercenaries have been used to fill the gap—Anglos, Poles, Romanians—but there is a major problem with them: as Julius Caesar pointed out, lots of people are willing to kill for money but nobody wants to die for money—except an idiot, I would add. And on NATO’s Russian front an idiot and his life are soon parted. Up-to-date information on Russian casualties is a state secret and the only number divulged by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu in late September 2022 was 5937 killed since the start of the campaign. Casualty rates are said to have been significantly lower since then.

At present, there is still no shortage of idiots on the Ukrainian side—yet—and neither is there a shortage of donated Western weaponry. First came used Soviet-era tanks and other weapons systems donated from all over Eastern Europe; then came actual Western weapons systems. And now throughout NATO one hears plaintive cries that they have nothing left that they can give to the Ukrainians: the cupboard is empty. Nor can they manufacture more weapons in a hurry. To start churning out weapons at the same rate as Russia is doing, these NATO members would first need to reindustrialize, and there are neither the human resources, nor the money to do so. And so the Russian army grinds away, demilitarizing the Ukraine, and the rest of NATO with it. In the process, it is perfecting the art of fighting a land war against NATO—not that a single NATO country would even entertain such an idea.

Finally, we come to what is perhaps the least important reason for the Goldilocks War: the former Ukraine itself. In view of Russia’s other strategic goals, it seems more of the nature of a sacrificial piece in a chess gambit. Given what Russia has already achieved over the past nine months—four new Russian regions, six million new Russian citizens, a land bridge to Crimea, irrigation water supply to Crimea—there isn’t much left for Russia to achieve militarily before its military campaign reaches the stage of diminishing returns. The addition of Nikolaev and Odessa regions and full control of the Black Sea coastline would, of course, be most valuable; control of Kharkov and Kiev somewhat less so. Control of the entire Dniepr hydroelectric cascade is a definite nice-to-have. As for the rest, it could be left to languish for ages as a deindustrialized, depopulated wasteland, labeled “Mostly harmless.”

Let me divulge a personal detail or two. Two of my grandparents were from Zhitomir, my father was born in Kiev, my first romantic interest was a girl from Odessa, and over the years I’ve had as many friends from Odessa, Kharkov, Lvov, Kiev, Donetsk, Vinnitsa and elsewhere as anywhere else in Russia. Russia? You read that right: there is no way to convince me that so-called “Ukrainian territory” somehow isn’t Russia or that the people who live there somehow aren’t Russian—regardless of what some of them have been recently brainwashed to think. What’s more, none of these people I have known over the years ever thought of themselves as the least bit Ukrainian and they would probably view the very idea of a Ukrainian nationalist identity as symptomatic of a mental condition. The label “Ukrainian” was to them some Bolshevik nonsense; since then, Ukrainianness has been turned into a Western method for exploiting minor ethnic variations in order to make one group of Russians fight another group of Russians.

In case you are doubtful, let’s apply the good old duck test: Do the people there walk, quack and look like Russians? All of that territory, with one minor exception in the far west, was part of Russia for anywhere between ten and three centuries; most of the people there, and virtually the entire urban population, speaks Russian as their native language; their religion is predominantly Russian Orthodox; they are genetically indistinguishable from the rest of the Russian population. So, what happened to them?

Unfortunately, a small piece of this Russian land spent three centuries in captivity to the Austro-Hungarian Empire or as part of Greater Poland, and this poisoned their minds with foreign ideas such as Catholicism and ethnic nationalism. Unlike Russia, which is a multinational, multi-ethnic, religiously diverse monolith, the West is a mosaic of ethnic nationalisms, and where there are nationalists there may be Nazis, ethnic cleansing and genocide.

As one drop of poison infects the whole tub of wine, these Western Ukrainians, with lots of help and funds from the German Nazis, then the Americans and the Canadians, managed to infect a large part of the formerly Ukrainian territory with a fake nationalism based on a forged history and a haphazardly concocted culture. Official bans on the teaching and, eventually, the use of Russian have brought up a generation of young people who are essentially illiterate in their native Russian. They are taught in Ukrainian, but Ukrainian literacy is close to an oxymoron, since nothing of any great consequence has ever been written or published in that language and the vast majority of Ukrainian literary works are, you guessed it, in Russian.

The Russian special military operation that’s been ongoing since February 2022 has polarized the entire population. Those who had decided to be with Russia back in 2014 were, obviously, overjoyed to finally get some help from Russia. The now Russian regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye and Kherson gladly voted to join Russia. But as far as the rest of the former Ukrainian territory, the polarization is mostly in the opposite direction. Those who wanted to be with Russia mostly voted with their feet and are now living somewhere in Russia.

This is something that time alone can fix. Eventually the population of the former Ukraine will be forced to make a choice: they can be Russian, or they can be refugees somewhere in Europe, or they can die fighting Russians at the front. Note that even Donetsk and Lugansk didn’t make this choice right away, the way Crimea did. At that time, only some 70% of their population was in favor of leaving the Ukraine and rejoining Russia. It took eight years of relentless Ukrainian bombing to convince them to make this choice.

Over these intervening years, the diehard “Ukrainians” filtered out, leaving behind a population that was close to 100% pro-Russian. It was only then that the Kremlin granted them official recognition, sent in troops to defend them from imminent invasion and, soon after, accepted them into the Russian Federation. And now the same sort of sorting operation has to take place throughout the rest of the former Ukraine. How long will it take? Only time will tell, but it is already clear that, as far as Russia is concerned, there is no compelling reason to rush.


Please download my books of essays:

Ready… Set… Bolt!, 2022
The Arctic Fox Cometh, 2021
The Meat Generation, 2020
Collapse and the Good Life, 2018
Collapse Chronicles, Volume V, 2017
Everything is Going According to Plan, 2016
Emergency Eyewash, 2015
Societies that Collapse, 2014
Absolutely Positive, 2012

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / WIKIPEDIA

Dmitry Orlov (born 1962) is an American engineer and writer on subjects related to "potential economic, ecological and political decline and collapse in the United States", something he has called "permanent crisis".[1] Orlov believes collapse will be the result of huge military budgets, government deficits, an unresponsive political system and declining oil production.[2] Orlov was born in Novokuznetsk, Russia, and moved to the United States at the age of 12. He has a BS in Computer Engineering and an MA in Applied Linguistics. He was an eyewitness to the collapse of the Soviet Union over several extended visits to his Russian homeland between the late 1980s and mid-1990s.[3] (Wikipedia)

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