In a recent news story, Russia announced that she is preparing for war:
A week after Russian president Vladimir Putin doubled-down on a warning to Russia’s geopolitical foes first made earlier this year by declaring that Russia would use its “unstoppable” nuclear weapons in response to an incoming missile attack shortly after US president Trump announced the US would pull out of the INF Treaty, a Russian diplomat has both confirmed (and denied) what US war hawks have been saying: Moscow is preparing for war, just in case the US starts one.
Speaking at the UN on Friday, Andrey Belousov, deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department of Nonproliferation and Arms Control, echoed Putin’s comments from last week that Russia is indeed readying itself for war, but only so it can defend its people against American aggression.
“At a recent meeting, the US stated that Russia is preparing for war. Yes, Russia is preparing for war, I can confirm it”, Belousov said adding that “We are preparing to defend our homeland, our territorial integrity, our principles, our values, our people.”
Russia’s military build-up and large-scale drills, which have often been painted in the Western media as preparations for all-out war, are a defensive necessity, he said.
Russia doesn’t seek a confrontation, he said, unlike the US. “Why else would the United States pull out of the [INF] Treaty, increase their nuclear potential, adopt a new nuclear doctrine that lowers the threshold for nuclear weapons use – that’s the question for us all.”
Belousov’s words came after a Russian draft resolution to reinforce the INF Treaty, which bans intermediate-range nuclear weapons, was overwhelmingly rejected at the UN First Committee.
“Most of those who voted against were supporters of the INF Treaty. I don’t understand their position,” Belousov said. Among those who voted down the draft were the UK, Germany, France, and, of course, the US.
Trump’s decision to scrap the Cold War-era agreement has alarmed both Europe and Moscow, which warned it would “make the world a more dangerous place” and vowed retaliation.
Washington has accused Russia of building missiles prohibited by the INF, while Moscow argued that American missile defense complexes in Europe can be easily turned into offensive weapons. Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that if the US moves to deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe, it will put the whole of Europe at risk of a retaliatory strike. (source, source)
Russia is preparing for war because she knows it is coming, and of concern to her is that she will not be able to win this time.
I found this clip from an October 23, 2018 meeting between US ambassador and supporter of anti-government Communist revolutionaries John Bolton and Vladimir Putin.
Watch it closely, especially from 2:20 to 6:08. The banter between the parties that happens is less important than the body language used by both Putin and Bolton:
John Bolton has a history as a warmonger who advocated for the destruction and subsequent genocides of Christian peoples in the Middle East as a part of a larger anti-Russian strategy done by the USA for her and her Israeli, Germanic, Japanese, and Turkish allies. His excessively calm demeanor and over-jovial presentation to Putin, especially his fake laugh at 4:22, while at the same time tacitly acknowledging and asserting the hawkish position of the USA towards Russia is a sign of concealing evil intentions. It is the same way that corporations will have a boss, supervisor, CEO, or other executive treat his employees very well, laughing and joking with them as though nothing is wrong before laying them off or firing them in a change of tone to stone-cold, heartless brutality. Machiavelli documented such examples of behavior during his time:
After waiting some days to arrange all that was necessary to his villainous projects, Oliverotto invited Giovanni Fogliani and all the principal men of Fermo to a grand banquet. After the dinner and the entertainments usual at such feasts, Oliverotto artfully introduced certain important matters of discussion, speaking of the greatness of Pope Alexander, and of his sou Cesare, and of their enterprises. To which discourses Giovanni and others having replied, he all at once rose, saying that these matters should be spoken of in a more secret place, and withdrew into a room where Giovanni and the other citizens followed him. They were no sooner seated than soldiers rushed out of hiding-places and killed Giovanni and all the others. After which massacre Oliverotto mounted his horse, rode through the town and besieged the chief magistrate in his palace, so that through fear they were obliged to obey him and form a government, of which he made himself prince. (source)
It is a documented fact that this behavior, which is psychopathic in nature, is a a common trait among CEOs and others who a society is supposed to regard as a “model” for a “man of power.” Simply put, most of these “characteristics” are not those of a human being, but of a deranged freak. It is not an exaggeration to say that John Bolton is a psychopath, and one is witnessing his psychopathic behavior on display before the entire world.
The concern I have more for is with Putin, where he warns about the USA under President Trump for pulling out of the Intermediate range nuclear treaty that was established by President Kennedy for the express purpose of preventing a near nuclear holocaust what almost happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis:
The U.S. also had no idea that in addition to the missiles, the Soviets had brought tactical nuclear weapons to Cuba and the troops on the ground had received permission to use them against a U.S. invasion without further authorization from Moscow. This, too, would have led to a U.S. nuclear response and Armageddon. McNamara first learned this when attending a Havana conference organized by Blight and Lang in 1992, on the 30th anniversary of the crisis. McNamara had also come to believe by Black Saturday that an invasion might be necessary. Blight and Lang report that McNamara turned pale and was temporarily speechless as he listened to an aged Soviet general describe the existence of the tactical nuclear weapons. When he spoke, it was to ask the translator to repeat himself.
Castro, too, had his preconceptions shattered at the conference. He had come to believe that the Kennedy administration was determined to invade Cuba again, nuclear weapons or not, and this time crush its young government and society. Cuba’s only choice was either to accept its destruction, or be destroyed and take America with it. Castro had therefore written a telegram to Khrushchev that arrived on October 27, beseeching him to use the Soviet Union’s full nuclear might against the U.S. if an invasion took place. But this was all wrong, McNamara told Castro: After the Bay of Pigs, Kennedy had decided that another invasion attempt was foolish.
So in the end, we’re not here to think about the 56th anniversary of Black Saturday because of our overweening military might, or because we forced our adversaries to bend to our will. It’s just the opposite, plus an extraordinary run of serendipitous flukes.
But what we can be sure of is that if people like Trump and Bolton had been in charge in 1962, then today there would be no discussion of the INF treaty — because there would be no treaty and no one to discuss it. It’s also certain that on our current trajectory, the day will come when the world will face a similar crisis. That time we won’t get the same roll of the dice. The hard reality of the Cuban missile crisis is that, as Blight and Lang put it, “either we put an end to nuclear weapons, or they will put an end to us.” (source, source)
I have watched many videos of Trump, Putin, and other world leaders. I cannot say I am an “expert” on Putin, but I understand something of how he has presented himself throughout the years.
The Putin I saw in this clip is not a Putin I have seen yet. This is a Putin more concerned than I have seen him before, perhaps ever in any speech or video.
Putin does not appear to be in control here, as he usually is. He seems submissive, nervous, and uncomfortable.
I suspect this is because he knows what is happening.
For a long time, I have discussed how the US has been working on the long-term destruction and fractioning of Russia into a series of warring states. This is the impetus behind Operation Gladio and the focus of all US policy post World War II and has roots going back to the anti-Russian positions of the British Empire. It is why the US defeated Germany and Japan in World War II but then proceeded to rebuild them and adopt the same national socialist philosophies they adhered to, for the dispute was not about objective moral truth, but an issue of power. Operation Paperclip only proves this to be true.
Russia could fight a war against Germany, Turkey, or Japan and win. She would be able to break even against the USA, and in a slim chance have victory. She could break even against any combination of two of the above powers, albeit with difficulty, and victory would be unsure, especially involving the USA. She cannot win a war against three or four of them, and definitely not if the US is involved. It is not a question of if she has the motivation or will to win because from a viewpoint considering strengths, weaknesses, strategies, manpower, firepower, tactics, resources, and accessibility, Russia does not possess the physical capacity to fight against such a united force coming from all sides against her. While there is the famous advice never to “march on Moscow,” nobody has to because the strategy of the Russia in Decline project is to target the surrounding areas of Russia, including the many Islamic and Turkic republics in Siberia (let alone the independent nations of Central Asia) that Russia already has to work diligently to manage. In this sense an “invasion” of Moscow is not necessary, but merely to break off parts of Russia into puppet states no longer able to be under the control of Moscow, and is it unlikely that Russia would be able to stop this from happening.
Putin knows all of this, and he has been working hard to keep Russia united within herself and her neighbors, but increasingly measures from the US and her allies are forcibly isolating Russia in spite of her efforts. Perhaps as noted, the greatest recent blow was the defenestration of the Russian Orthodox Church, historically a symbol of national unity even before an expression of religious piety, from the rest of the Orthodox world through the split with the Patriarch of Constantinople. This only adds to the situation with the western-backed seizure and annexation of Ukraine, which is the historical native land of the Russian people.
Russia is in a very bad position and Putin knows it as well as Bolton, who admits it is his life’s work to destroy the very deals that prevented a nuclear war.:
Even Bolton’s critics concede that he is a man who has met his moment. “He’s using this opportunity to achieve his life’s work,” said Tom Wright, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He added: “Bolton’s in a hurry” to undo as much international dealmaking conducted by past diplomats as he can in the potentially short time he has.
And Bolton himself makes no secret he’s enjoying his newfound influence. After eight years decrying the Obama administration’s foreign policy as a commentator on Fox News, Bolton told the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt he is loving his current gig. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything else,” he said. (source)
Keep ready, because the next ten years are going to be very interesting, because the fact is that Trump has been given a chance to show who he is, and he has shown himself to be a neocon warmonger who has sent his hawk John Bolton to push for what could become a nuclear holocaust with Russia, and Putin seems to be the only one who cares about the consequences.