96

Obama Requests Military Support for Possible War Against Russia

by Eric Zuesse

According to an April 23rd article carried by Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten (German Economic News), U.S. President Barack Obama is “demanding the active deployment of the Bundeswehr [Germany’s armed forces, including their Army, Navy, and Air Force] to NATO’s eastern borders” at Poland and the Baltic republics, to join the quadrupling of America’s forces there, on and near the borders of Russia. This is an extreme violation of what Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to when he ended the Soviet Union and its NATO-mirror organization the Warsaw Pact, but it’s actually culminating a process that began shortly after he agreed to America’s terms, which included that NATO “not move one inch to the east.”
Furthermore, DWN reports that on April 25th, the U.S. President will hold a summit meeting in Hannover, Germany with the leaders of Germany (Angela Merkel), Italy (Matteo Renzi), France (Francois Hollande), and Britain (David Cameron). The presumed objective of this meeting is to agree to establish in the NATO countries bordering on Russia a military force of these five countries, a force threatening Russia with an invasion, if or when NATO subsequently decides that the ‘threat from Russia’ be ‘responded to’ militarily.
NATO’s encirclement of Russia with forces hostile to it is supposedly defensive — not an offensive operation — against Russia and is presented as such by our media.   During the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis,  J. F. Kennedy didn’t consider Nikita Khrushchev’s plan to base nuclear missiles in Cuba to be ‘defensive’ on the USSR’s part — and neither does Russia’s President Vladimir Putin consider America’s far bigger operation of surrounding Russia with such weapons to be ‘defensive’.  The U.S. government, and NATO, act as if Russia is threatening them rather than them threatening and encircling Russia — and their news media transmit this lie as if it were a truth and one worthy of being taken seriously.  In actual fact, NATO has already expanded right up to Russia’s western borders.
Obama is thus now adding to the economic sanctions against Russia that he had imposed because of Russia’s alleged ‘seizure’ of Crimea from Ukraine after the US and EU engineered coup overthrew Russia’s ally Viktor Yanukovych who had led Ukraine until the coup in February 2014.
Even though Western-sponsored polls in Crimea, both before and after the coup, had shown higher than 90% support by Crimeans for rejoining with Russia, right after Crimeans voted overwhelmingly to rejoin Russia, Obama slapped sanctions against Russia. Nuclear weapons were prepared, both on the U.S.-EU side and on the Russian side, for a possible nuclear war.
This is no mere restoration of the Cold War (which was supposedly based on the capitalist-communist ideological disagreement); it’s getting forces into position for a possible invasion of Russia, pure-and-simple — raw conquest — though no major news-media in the West are reporting it as being such.
The current preparation doesn’t necessarily mean a nuclear war will result from them. Russia might accept whatever the demands ‘the West’ makes of it and thus lose its  sovereignty.  Alternatively, if Russia stands-its-ground and refuses to yield up its national sovereignty,‘the West’ (the U.S.leadership, and the leaderships in its allied countries) could cease with its evermore-ominous threats and simply withdraw from Russia’s borders.
Basically, by 2013 the U.S. leadership had decided to take over Ukraine and refused to acknowledge the rights of the Crimean people to reject the new dispensation in Kiev and decide on its own future — and, by late February 2014, Russia’s leadership decided to protect them against the type of invasion that subsequently occurred in Ukraine’s former Donbass region, where the opposition to Obama’s coup was even more intense.
The West keeps asserting that Russia is somehow in the wrong here.  However, since even the head of Stratfor has called what Obama did in Ukraine “the most blatant coup in history”, and since the fact that it was a U.S. coup has been documented extensively on cellphone and other videos, and in the most thorough academic investigation that has been performed of the matter — and was even acknowledged by Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko, a participant in the coup, to have been a coup — and since evidence survives on the Internet of the U.S. Embassy’s preparations as early as 1 March 2013 for the February 2014 coup; and since even the U.S. government’s hired polls showed that Crimeans rejected overwhelmingly the U.S. coup and supported rejoining Russia; the question still needs to be answered: What is the basis of the West’s aggressive actions threatening Russia’s national security other than its own imperialist ambitions towards Russia camouflaged with the lies about an aggressive Russia and an aggressive President Putin the Western mass media have been bombarding the public with?  And, that’s a very worrisome basis — worrisome regarding, essentially, a type of dictatorship in the West, rather than any dictatorship outside it.   The aggression and the threat here seem clearly to be coming from the West, against the East.
Back in January, Russian President Vladimir Putin had once again called out American President Barack Obama on Obama’s big lie that America’s “ABM” weapons to disable in-flight nuclear missiles were being installed in Europe in order to protect Europe against Iranian nuclear missiles.  Now, however, while the U.S. acknowledges that Iran doesn’t have, and won’t have, any nuclear missiles, Obama is stepping up (instead of ending) those same ABM installations in Europe, close to Russia’s borders.  The only real reason they have been installed, as Putin argues, is in order to enable a sudden nuclear attack against Russia capable of disabling Russia’s retaliatory capacity in a matter of minutes.
The only rational response by the Western public to what Obama and his foreign allies are doing is to recognize what is actually happening and to take action against their own leaders, before this increasingly high-stakes confrontation becomes terminal.  In this instance, the people of the countries that comprise the political West need to defend themselves against their own national leaders. This is a situation that is frequently encountered in dictatorships.
The key questions are not being asked in the Western press, however; they are being ignored by it.  Unless these questions are publicly dealt with — and soon — the answer to them all could well be terminal for millions of civilians in Europe and elsewhere.
The closer things get to a nuclear war, the more difficult it is for either side to back down from it — and this is especially the case with the aggressor, most especially when it falsely claims that it is being aggressed-against.
This is the reason why the lies peddled by the political leadership of the West urgently need to be exposed.

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of  CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.

SUPPORT OFFGUARDIAN

If you enjoy OffG's content, please help us make our monthly fund-raising goal and keep the site alive.

For other ways to donate, including direct-transfer bank details click HERE.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

96 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
dots
dots
Oct 15, 2016 8:55 PM

inna sadomskaya your husband evgeny sadomskiy set you up talking about tatarian connection in your family if we will catch him will send him to heaven.

Derrick Owen
Derrick Owen
Aug 16, 2016 5:18 PM

Why would anyone who values democracy defend Putin?

Arby
Arby
Jul 16, 2016 4:07 PM

Ironically, Sheldon Stern’s “The Cuban Missile Crisis In American Memory” gives me a good idea what Putin and his top advisors must be thinking and talking about in their high level emergency meetings revolving around these provocative and illegal actions by the West. (Stern is an acknowledged expert, and his work has impressed Chomsky. But he’s a shameless JFK booster, which is astonishing. Chomsky’s own book on JFK reveals Chomsky’s own astonishment at the cult of Camelot, in which the idea of a good, peaceful Kennedy is pushed by the US ruling class, so I think that were Chomsky to read this latest Stern book, he might have to acknowledge Stern’s sad failure to be [truly] objective. I learned about Stern’s book when I came across Chomsky’s reference to it’s imminent arrival. It had not yet been published when Chomsky wrote about Stern.) One of Putin’s options could be to take out the offensive missiles without declaring war, but after notifying Obama or his successor of his intention. This puts the US on the spot. If the US declares war in such a situation, the world sees that that is what it wants. Although, Good luck with that. The US is hyperviolent, as Chomsky would put it. Putin is certainly aware of that. That’s why he probably wouldn’t take that option, although that’s one option that the American president and his advisors discussed in ’62 in relation to Russian missiles in Cuba.

Inez Deborah E Altar (@inezaltar2)
Inez Deborah E Altar (@inezaltar2)
May 28, 2016 1:14 PM

SURE LET THE EUROPEAN UNION AND MY COUNTRY BRAZIL SUPPORT HIM IF ISRAEL DOES NOT WANT TO IT IS TOO WEAK ANYHOW AND IT SHOULD NOT CONFIRM AND NOT DENY WITH ITS NEAR NEIGHBOUR IRAQ AS IT IS BETTER THAN IS AND SHOULD LIBERATE THEM WITH TRUE PEACE AND FREEDOM

John
John
May 25, 2016 10:50 PM

SPAM ALERT! SPAM ALERT!! SPAM ALERT !!!
The post above by barry brown is pure spam.
Please get it removed immediately and block any more postings from this source.
THANK YOU !!!

John
John
May 25, 2016 10:06 AM

This original blog has somewhat meandered around different subjects and I think it is now apposite to address the original question: “Is Obama preparing for a possible war against Russia?”, to which my response is “No”.
Regardless of his true intentions, it is a fact that he is a “lame-duck” President. After November of this year, his authority and ability to determine any kind of forward-looking policy of any kind will be strictly limited.
There is another question to be asked: “Is the US industrial-military complex preparing for a possible war against Russia?”, which is much more open to debate as it continues long after this or any future POTUS remains in place.
It may be instructive to look at the history of END: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Nuclear_Disarmament.
This movement gained a huge following across Europe after a US military commander made a statement to the effect that the US missile placements across Europe constituted a form of “trip-wire” between the US and former USSR, so that while limited tactical nuclear conflict might rage across the European continent, this would permit time for the US and USSR to resolve their differences and avoid strategic nuclear damage to their territories.
This admission considerably fueled the anti-nuclear debate across Europe on a mass movement scale, resulting – as the Wikipedia article mentions – in passage of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty.
If Europe were ever to become again threatened with potential nuclear devastation, I cannot see most Europeans simply allowing it to happen. Such a move would see a re-emergence of a pan-European movement, committed to stopping the placement of offensive nuclear weapons on European soil.

Thomas Baker
Thomas Baker
May 27, 2016 9:18 PM
Reply to  John

If anything is worthless it is your “assessment” on the threat. Obama does not plan a war? What planet on you on “Planet Britania”? Obama’9s intentions as the trained killer He is is to start thermal nuclear war. Stop being in denial of this. You fool no one other than your duped peers. Wickipedia your source? You make Lord Bertrand Russell proud.

Z54
Z54
May 24, 2016 1:16 PM

Germany, France, Poland and Italy should take a step back and think this through a bit. If the US starts a war with Russia, the fighting is going to take place on European soil, not amerikan. At least not until the missiles start flying, then all bets, and probably all life is lost. Europe’s answer to the US should be to politely, but firmly say no!

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 24, 2016 5:50 PM
Reply to  Z54

Really! Why is that I live in the USA and this is the first time I have heard of OBUMMA asking for this. I believe that the European press and the 2nd rate media sources are just whispering fear again. Let’s face it Z54, any war of any kind in Europe cannot be won without the help of the USA. We proved that a few times in the last century and some of Europe still hasn’t become the smarter for it. And if we do get into a pissing match with the Russians I am sure that we can handle Putin and his thugs expeditiously. It is China I have concerns with and North Korea. Putin isn’t stupid, brazen maybe but not stupid. And neither is the rest of Russia.

Vaska
Vaska
May 24, 2016 6:44 PM
Reply to  raymondsabb

It is an elementary historical and military fact that the war in Europe was won by the Red Army, i.e. the Soviet Union.
In the event of a USA-RF war, Europe will inescapably become one of the grounds of nuclear exchanges between the attackers and the defenders of the Russian Federation. Given that, the Europeans are either in denial or on a consciously chosen suicidal course in failing to oppose American war-mongering on their continent.

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 25, 2016 2:17 AM
Reply to  Vaska

Wow, just simply wow. There is so much paranoid vibes rolling around on so much mis-information or lies. Glad I live here.

Derrick Owen
Derrick Owen
Aug 16, 2016 5:17 PM
Reply to  Vaska

WWII was lost by Hitler when he decided to invade Russia and got stuck there in the wintertime – NOT because of any tactical or strategic brilliance on the part of the Russian military, which of itself was not the equal of Germany’s, much less America’s. The losses Russians suffered were horrendous, but it was not Russian might that defeated the Nazis.

Vasily Erkin
Vasily Erkin
Sep 30, 2016 12:40 PM
Reply to  Derrick Owen

This is a very superficial point-of-view.

Thomas Baker
Thomas Baker
May 27, 2016 9:22 PM
Reply to  raymondsabb

First time? Get used to it because once he is forced to release the 28 pages despite his weakling narcisstic protests, the truth will be known by all who care enough to change their flawed behavior.

Freija
Freija
Jan 12, 2017 2:46 PM
Reply to  Z54

Unfortunately our politicians are not even fit to govern a kindergarten, they have very small brains, have a very small attention span and lack all imagination, so they probably haven’t got a care in the world, it’s doesn’t fit their world view, so it can’t be true. The world is sinking and all policor people are blind and deaf.

rosablanca
rosablanca
May 18, 2016 5:59 PM

Sorry, getting here a little late, better late than never. Vaska is on point. Western Media is an oxymoron like UN Peace Keepers or enhanced interrogation techniques. Ukraine Coup-Nuland “Fuck” Europe, ISIS-Neo-con, Yinon Plan, Refugee Crisis Kalergi. Destruction of U.S. Constitution, 20 trillion in U.S. debt Clive-Piven- ‘starve the beast.” Call them what you will Zionists, Globalists, Jesuits, Elitists, CFR Illuminati what have you. Follow the money. Follow the Fabian socialists. Orwellian double speak the norm. Central banks the key. Obama true Marxist, radical. Anita Dunn Loves Mao. First laws past after Bolshevik revolution outlawed of anti-Semitism-Solzhenitsyn, just saying. Hate speech-Censorship by the left. Both parties corrupt R/D. Most governments filled with deviant perverts easy to blackmail, manipulate England, America, New Zealand, Canada, Australia all deny Satanic Ritual Abuse as fantasy-funny how that works, just us crazy Christians. What would U.S. do if Russia put “defensive” missiles in British Columbia? Are we actually having a debate? Putin is demonized and everything Russian is bad. Russia can’t even win Eurovision for fear of sympathy for Russia, very sad. Putin said no to GMO’s, vaccines, central banks, perversion. Not a fan of oligarchic communism or oligarchic capitalism. Who wants the New World Order-not me.

John
John
Apr 26, 2016 3:21 PM

See “The Jewish Declaration of War on Nazi Germany – The Economic Boycott of 1933” at http://www.wintersonnenwende.com/scriptorium/english/archives/articles/jdecwar.html.
Of course, this was immediately opposed by the zionists, who entered into a transfer agreement with the nazis.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haavara_Agreement for details of the agreement.
This meant that while world jewry sought to boycott nazi germany, the zionists in Palestine undermined the boycott.
The zionists were prepared to dine with their equivalent of their devil if it brought eretz yisrael closer.
They still are!
Even now, they are one of the main backers of ISIS and the Al Nusra Front – among other terrorist groups.

D_D
D_D
May 18, 2016 3:56 PM
Reply to  John

What a bunch of BS in this article. For an ‘investigative reporter’ you didn’t investigate very much. The amount of troops that NATO has forward deployed (on a rotational base so it doesn’t actually violate any agreement) isn’t nearly enough to invade Russia. In fact, most defence specialists argue that it’s not even enough to credibly defend the Baltics for some time until reinforcements arrive. This is just more scare mongering coming straight from the Kremlin’s propaganda machine. What you don’t mention is how Russia has praticed nuclear assaults on their neighbours, involving over a hundred thousand troops in some cases. NATO hasn’t done anything like that close to Russia’s borders and it doesn’t practice nuclear attacks on Russian soil.

Arby
Arby
Jul 16, 2016 3:53 PM
Reply to  D_D

The assertions in this article aren’t just Eric’s. All of my reading about American foreign policy and NATO lead to these conclusions. Provide some sources for your assertions.

Brad Smith
Brad Smith
Apr 26, 2016 4:56 AM

I think for now it’s just more posturing and of course money making for the MIC. However, if Killery gets in office then who knows what will happen. She seems to truly despise Russia. Trump would be much better for Russia at least listening to his current Rhetoric. He has pretty much denounced and defeated the neo-con Republicans.
Obama does get pushed around by the neo-cons, Hillary on the other hand is absolutely a full blooded neo-con war mongress.

Isaac
Isaac
Apr 26, 2016 5:51 AM
Reply to  Brad Smith

Obama just does what the Neo-cons, the Zionists, the Rothschilds, the Judaic Criminal Mafia tell him to do. All of the presidents from Bush the Father to this present one are just marionettes, stooges, water boys for the Jews.

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 14, 2016 11:57 AM
Reply to  Brad Smith

You are an IDIOT!

Catte
Catte
May 16, 2016 11:44 AM
Reply to  raymondsabb

Your comment is ad hom, with no useful content whatever. We don’t censor for opinion, but we do actively discourage empty abuse. One-line comments such as “you are an idiot” will tend to be deleted if they occur too often. So, consider this a warning.

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 17, 2016 10:35 AM
Reply to  Catte

It galls me to listen to foreigners pound our government when they have no clue as to what they are talking about. Killery does not hate Russia. She just does not like Putin and neither does the rest of America except for Trump. Why don’t you censor this…..
Isaac….Obama just does what the Neo-cons, the Zionists, the Rothschilds, the Judaic Criminal Mafia tell him to do. All of the presidents from Bush the Father to this present one are just marionettes, stooges, water boys for the Jews.
This comment is hateful and racists. So therefore when I say You Are An Idiot , I mean it with full intent as to the subject I am commenting on. So take your warning and ……….ah never mind.

D_D
D_D
May 18, 2016 3:58 PM
Reply to  raymondsabb

Agreed, it’s really strange to see you censor his comment while some of the racist and anti-Semitic garbage is left unchallenged.

Thomas Baker
Thomas Baker
May 27, 2016 9:30 PM
Reply to  raymondsabb

Actually Obama is a stooge for the British Empire. Trained by a mass murderer, his stepfather Barry Cowgirl, groomed by British agent Valerie Jarrett, and installed through the stupidity of many Americans fed up with GW Bush. Obama is a Satanic figure. He is insane and this has been proven by enough competent and impartial proffessionals to have him removed as a section 8, mentally incompetent. He continues his provocations against Russia and China on his imagined boogeyman threats. I am glad we have a man such as Vladimir Putin to outflank the weak minded and narcisstic Obama. The threat of thermal nuclear war is real and can be understood in Obamas own words on his recent trip to Japan and Vietnam. Time for all you intellectual cowards to wake up. Bertrand Russell is finished, kaput.

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 28, 2016 12:38 AM
Reply to  Thomas Baker

Really John, why don’t you just say it, you hate Americans.
Cattle, you censoring this too?

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 28, 2016 12:41 AM
Reply to  raymondsabb

Sorry John, meant Thomas Baker.

Gary Brunecz
Gary Brunecz
Sep 14, 2016 9:29 AM
Reply to  raymondsabb

What is an American, is it the poor desperate refugees who you let come here, or is it the few rich who came here to take you over and undermine your economy. There is absolutely no loyalty in this nation due to race and class. Let us not forget religion. This country has been sold out to the highest bidder and your rights are forever gone.

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 25, 2016 9:43 AM
Reply to  raymondsabb

Wow Issac, that is really a racist remark. You do not even know me and you call me a Jew when I clearly stated the obvious. Just for your information bonehead, I am not a Jew but I do not hate Jews, I am a Christian and have some very close friends that are Jews and I love them with all my heart. Being Jewish is not a crime as you would make it out to be. And one last thing Issac, it does not matter if a person is Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Christian or any other religion or belief. You sit here making comments behind your computer that breathes hate and contempt. That is what an idiot does which was stated earlier. Why don’t you grow up. You judge people, I don’t. Only God can judge me so please spare us all the pain of reading your rubbish and crawl back in your hole little person.
@Catte, why not censor his comment? Ad hom!

Isaac
Isaac
Apr 26, 2016 3:58 AM

That is exactly the way these imperialists started WWi, WWII with false pretenses. The Zionist masters of deception declared war on Germany since 1933 and ever since they have declared wars , invaded countries, overthrow governments and murdered their presidents telling the American people nothing but lies. The Rothschild’s Criminal Mafia now have declared war on Russia because Russia does not let herself be manipulated by the international banking system. Its all about money, the Criminal Mafia are at war with Iran, China, Syria and the countries who make up the BRICS nations and want to be liberated from the Satanic money lenders.

louisproyect
louisproyect
Apr 26, 2016 12:07 PM
Reply to  Isaac

“The Zionist masters of deception declared war on Germany since 1933 and ever since they have declared wars , invaded countries, overthrow governments and murdered their presidents telling the American people nothing but lies.”
So interesting how Putinite outlets like this one, Moon of Alabama and Information Clearing House are a magnet for anti-Semites. I guess that’s what a Red-Brown alliance generates, even though the red part of it is about the size of the head of a pin.

Jen
Jen
Apr 26, 2016 1:48 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Well then why are you still visiting here? You’ve been called out as a troll many times on Off-Guardian comments forums and yet you still insist on popping up here like a perpetual priapic Jack-in-the-box to pass judgement on people and this site and make comments that contribute nothing to the conversation. What’s your excuse for hanging around again like a … an anti-Semite?

louisproyect
louisproyect
Apr 26, 2016 1:53 PM
Reply to  Jen

I am visiting here to debate with you. You are welcome to come to my blog and debate with me. I think that you are unhappy with my visits because you simply lack the theoretical background and the grasp of historical detail to answer me. If you are okay with people making comments about “Satanic money lenders” making war on Germany in 1933, there’s a lot of theory and history you need catching up on.

Jen
Jen
Apr 27, 2016 12:56 AM
Reply to  louisproyect

Well you should have engaged directly with Isaac and disabused him (or maybe her) of his beliefs about Zionism and the history of Germany in the 1930s.
But is it more likely though that Isaac happens to sit just across from you at work at the call centre and that you and he (or maybe even just you, because for all we know, Isaac could be one of your personae) initiated this thread in order to waste our time talking to you?

raymondsabb
raymondsabb
May 15, 2016 7:33 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

You are an idiot. You say you want a debate, there is nothing to debate. Only a fool argues with a fool.

Harold Smith
Harold Smith
Apr 26, 2016 5:14 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Ok, so you’re an anti-semite apparently drawn by this site. But since you’re not disputing the statement you quoted, what’s your point?

louisproyect
louisproyect
Apr 26, 2016 8:24 PM
Reply to  Harold Smith

What in god’s name are you talking about? I was quoting someone who said that the Jews attacked Germany in 1933. My reply was under his anti-Semitic garbage. His name is Isaac and he posted the crap on April 26th. Learn to read. Actually I noticed there were two really nasty comments from him. I didn’t see this one at first:
“Obama just does what the Neo-cons, the Zionists, the Rothschilds, the Judaic Criminal Mafia tell him to do. All of the presidents from Bush the Father to this present one are just marionettes, stooges, water boys for the Jews.”
This is the kind of garbage you would not expect to see on a leftist website but as I pointed out when you make alliances with the ultraright as Putin is doing throughout Europe, you will begin to attract neo-Nazis as this website apparently feels okay with. I myself would have deleted such a comment if it showed up on my blog in the same way I would delete a comment about “fags” or “niggers”.
But then again if this is a free speech forum, the filth remains. Meanwhile people are more upset with me for pointing out that a neo-Nazi has made a home here.

John
John
Apr 26, 2016 8:52 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

I think you have your “facts” the wrong way round.
Putin may be an arch Russian nationalist but he is in no way a neo-nazi.
That epithet surely belongs to the crowd who staged the coup in the Ukraine – does it not?
Their fathers and grandfathers sided with the nazis in the second world war, did they not?
As did many leading US industrialists and financiers – like the Bush family.
Your true purposes – I suggest – is the promotion of pro-zionist hasbara propaganda.
Even you – it seems – cannot avoid emulating nazis like Dr Joseph Goebbels, it seems!
Incidentally, don’t blame me for the Ha’avara Agreement. I wasn’t even born then!

louisproyect
louisproyect
Apr 26, 2016 8:57 PM
Reply to  John

I did not say that Putin was a neo-Nazi, only that he was making alliances with them.
http://www.thenation.com/article/decrying-ukraines-fascists-putin-allying-europes-far-right/
But, please, Mr. Putin, stop with the talk about Ukraine being run by “Nazis” and “fascists”—at least as long as you’re in league with actual pro-fascist parties in Europe.
This isn’t exactly new, and of course Russia’s alliance with Europe’s Nazi-like far right takes second place to Moscow’s enormous business ties with Europe’s oil and gas consumers and Germany’s corporate elite. Still, it’s getting new attention lately, and it’s more than troubling that Moscow is in bed with Hungary’s Jobbik party, Geert Wilders’ Party of Freedom in the Netherlands, Marine Le Pen’s National Front in France and other anti-European Union extremists.

John
John
Apr 26, 2016 9:09 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

And your actual evidence to support your mere assertions of Putin getting into bed with Le Pen and others of a similar stripe is what, exactly?

louisproyect
louisproyect
Apr 26, 2016 9:34 PM
Reply to  John

What kind of evidence are looking for? The National Front party got an $11.7 million loan from a Russian bank to help finance various campaigns. Meanwhile, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder and retired leader of the party, got a separate $2.5 million loan from a holding company belonging to a former K.G.B. agent. There has been no denial from either Le Pen or the Russian banks when that was reported. The National Front has backed violent attacks on immigrants in France and got started as a bulwark of the French colonists during the Algerian war. Is that the kind of party an “anti-imperialist” government should be bailing out? Obviously you people and I don’t share common values.

John
John
Apr 26, 2016 10:12 PM
Reply to  John

@Louis: But where is the evidence that Putin was involved? Banks and businesses everywhere are free to lend and trade with whom they wish. There is no direct connection to Putin in any of this that I can see. Anything else?

Vaska
Vaska
May 15, 2016 8:55 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

None of the far-right parties in Europe The Nation claims Putin is friendly with — the evidence for such an assertion being that they advocate economic and immigration policies that favour the nation state — is even close to what the Ukrainian neo-Nazi parties are. None of them can legitimately be called neo-Nazi, and some of them are not even far right, except in the discourse that has to distinguish right-wing parties that favour the nation state from those that favour the international/globalist oligarchy.
Btw, the Nation article you’ve referred to is a perfect example of the sort of anti-Russia propaganda some of the US progressive media feel they need to carry from time to time in order to avoid being slammed with the accusation of being pro-Putin or pro-Russia. Its assertion that Russia is allying itself with Europe’s far-right parties depends for its credibility on the readers’ ignorance of Russian politics. It takes its place in the ranks of similar anti-Russia propaganda pieces published by NATO-mouthpiece papers such as The Guardian and Der Spiegel.
An accurate and objective review of this topic, and of the bank loans you’ve cited as “proof” that the Russian state is allied with the European far right, can be found here:
http://qz.com/326487/putin-has-friends-on-europes-far-right-and-left-but-mostly-right/
Even the Western-owned Moscow Times, perhaps because it is read by members of the Russian liberal elite who do actually know who’s who in Moscow and what their relation to Putin and the government is and who would therefore scoff at the idea that Putin’s government is in cahoots with EU nationalist parties, covers the same topics as a reflection of Europe’s far-right leanings towards Moscow, and not vice versa.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/far-right-europe-has-a-crush-on-moscow/511827.html

Thomas Baker
Thomas Baker
May 27, 2016 9:39 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Now that is completely false and irresponsible to say. Putin is in a process by which Russia is developing its own economic system. It has been difficult as to historical tratment foisted on Russia by the British Empire over the centuries. Do not be so let down when Putin gets to the point that he adopts Alexander Hamiltons system of public credit creation, known as the American System. Pres. Putin allying with neo Nazis? C’ Mon now that is just ridiculous since he has first hand experience defeating them. For Christs sake half his family was murdered by the Nazis.

Seamus Padraig
Seamus Padraig
Apr 26, 2016 10:52 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Stop being so grandiose. This is not an “alliance”, just a website. The MSM sites have gotten so bad that we now have little choice but to set up our own, where we are free to trade information, opinions and reactions using any old language we like.
If free speech offends your tender little sensibilities that badly, I’m sure there are any number of ‘safe spaces’ out there on the web where such epithets are banned. In fact, there’s even The Grauniad, where they’ll censor comments for having links to ‘forbidden’ websites, or even sometimes just for criticizing the article!

Seamus Padraig
Seamus Padraig
Apr 26, 2016 11:09 PM
Reply to  Seamus Padraig

By the way, on the subject of the loan to Front national, the real question is this: Why couldn’t a 44 year-old French political party–the largest or second largest in the country, depending on which measure you use–get a lousy $11 million bridge loan from FRENCH bank? Did orders come down from on high, perhaps? But if the French government bribed or coerced private banks into refusing to lend money to a bona-fide opposition party, wouldn’t that be a serious case of political CORRUPTION?
On a related subject, I suppose you must also be up in arms about that $5 BILLION that the US State Dept. pumped into Ukraine in order to manipulate their political system–right? Or maybe I’m confusing apples and oranges here? The Maidanovtsi, after all, weren’t using the money to contest elections like Front national; no, they were using it to help overthrow an elected government. My bad …

Isaac
Isaac
Apr 27, 2016 12:53 AM
Reply to  louisproyect

I do not know where you have got your information from but looks like you are a Zionist boy or a misinformed Gentile. “Goyim”. Now telling the truth you guys call ANTI-SEMITISM. Threat is to intimidate people who speak the truth. Read some books before you dare to call us anti Semites. I am pro Semite, pro Palestinian, pro peace pro justice. The truth hurts, You can’t stand the truth.

Jen
Jen
Apr 27, 2016 1:04 AM
Reply to  Isaac

Oops, I didn’t see your reply to Louis Proyect before I blagged off above. Sorry if I offended you by suggesting you might be one of his thumb puppets.

Isaac
Isaac
Apr 27, 2016 2:02 AM
Reply to  Jen

No offense. I am with you. I was replying to Louis Proyect. I read your comments and I am glad to see them. Sorry if I said something wrong.

Vaska
Vaska
Apr 27, 2016 11:01 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

We do not censor reader comments, whatever their content, and that includes even anti-Semitic BS such as the claim that Jews ever declared any kind of war on Germany.
Debate and refute anti-Semitic nonsense as vigorously as you like — so far, however, you’ve done nothing of the kind, being more focused on slandering Off-Guardian as a fascist (brown) organization. The claim is too absurd to be worth discussing.

John
John
Apr 28, 2016 3:38 PM
Reply to  Vaska

It is not so-called antisemitic to point to historical facts such as “The Jewish Declaration of War on Nazi Germany – The Economic Boycott of 1933” at http://www.wintersonnenwende.com/scriptorium/english/archives/articles/jdecwar.html. [my earlier entry above].
Palestinians and Arabs – as well as some African peoples – speak semitic languages.
Therefore, the use of the term antisemitic is clearly incorrect.
Being anti-Jewish or anti-zionist is not the same as being anti-israel or anti-occupation.
Let us not all get misled by zionist hasbara propaganda and “spin” into using incorrect terms.
The term antisemite was only brought into general use in the 1860s by a Viennese journalist.
Before then, it was virtually non-existent. Why do so many people fall for journalese “spin”?

Vaska
Vaska
Apr 28, 2016 8:26 PM
Reply to  John

You are trotting out is the same anti-Semitic bs the Nazis used to rationalize their political pathology.
A call for an economic boycott by a population scattered around the world and numbering some 15 million all told against one of the most highly industrialized nations with a population of over 66 million, the time) whose imperialistic ambitions had plunged all of Europe into a World War less than 20 years previously — and the Nazis and their pathetic sympathizers call that a “war”….

John
John
Apr 28, 2016 11:04 PM
Reply to  Vaska

We are now experiencing similar nonsense in Britain over the historically accurate remarks of Ken Livingstone about the collaboration between German zionists and the Nazi Party in 1933 over the Ha’avara (Transfer) Agreement.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haavara_Agreement for further details.
It seems Netanyahu in Tel Aviv and his stooge Regev in London are pulling the strings of the media globally and that zionists are getting a free pass by diverting attention away from their murderous occupation policies in Palestine.
I thought people might be wised up to hasbara tactics by now. It seems we still have some way to go yet.

White Eagle
White Eagle
Apr 29, 2016 11:37 PM
Reply to  Vaska

The Germans were not the ones that actually caused WW1.
But think…we really haven’t learned the lessons of history. Our founding Fathers here in the US warned against ‘Entangling Alliances’ and advised not having such with Europe as they were always in a constant state of war.
Sure enough, an assassin killing one head of state, started a chain reaction, dragging everyone else into the brew. Entangling alliances indeed, and of course the Military Industrial Complex had its fingers in it.
War is a Racket!

Isaac
Isaac
May 13, 2016 1:31 AM
Reply to  Vaska

I taught you were more knowledgeable but I realized that you are not. There are links in the Internet that show you newspapers from 1933 (The Sun Times, the New York Times etc,,,) that literally say “JUDEA DECLARED WAR ON GERMANY”. Are you trying to cover something up? I should know better, you are a Zionist shill.

Catte
Catte
May 13, 2016 3:05 PM
Reply to  Isaac

No one denies the existence of the headline, rather your literal and agenda-driven interpretation of it.
You are certainly doing your best to sell the idea that anyone who questions Israeli foreign and domestic policy is some sort of quasi-nazi racist. Whether that’s intentional or not I have no idea, but let’s be clear – this site and most of its readers do not endorse racism of any kind, and we consider any discourse that descends to that level to be at best ignorant and at worst an attempt at diversion and discrediting by association.
You know which best applies to you.

Vaska
Vaska
May 13, 2016 4:30 PM
Reply to  Isaac

“There are links in the Internet that show you newspapers from 1933 (The Sun Times, the New York Times etc,,,) that literally say “JUDEA DECLARED WAR ON GERMANY”.”
There are also scores of books written by eminent historians about the extent and degree of anti-Semitism prevailing in the West in the period between the two World Wars. Such headlines are a testimony of that; they are to be analyzed, and not taken at face value.
We’re thus faced with two equally pernicious evils:

  1. That of died-in-the-wool anti-Semites who use Zionism to justify their hatred of Jews as a people, as an ethno-religious group

  2. That of the Zionists who use the existence of such anti-Semites to tar all critics of Israel with the same anti-Semitic brush

SFS
SFS
Apr 27, 2016 3:37 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

“So interesting how Putinite outlets like this one [… ] are a magnet for anti-Semites.”
louisproyect, your Obamaite concerns regarding “anti-Semitism” (as commonly defined) are admirable. However, there are two general groups of Semites subject to defamation and hatred on the Web these days, but only one of these groups suffers hatred and defamation as a mere corollary to the lethal military aggressions of NATO. In other words, when on your crusade to protect Semites from Anti-Semitism, wouldn’t it make more sense to concentrate your efforts on protecting the people(s), who are suffering actual exile and genocide, first? I’m fairly sure the vast majority of J**s and the Z******s in the UK, Europe, Israel and the USA are safe for the foreseeable future. Let’s worry about the Semite women, children and men who are actually dying, eh? Because it’s not the 1930s, now, is it? Things have changed. Sensitivity to the memory of an historical atrocity should not trump the awareness of a contemporary atrocity.
When the relentless land-theft and slaughter are finally stopped by your passion for justice, we can then worry about the people, on the other side of the fence, whose feelings are being hurt.

tezla valve
tezla valve
Apr 28, 2016 2:57 AM
Reply to  SFS

Louis is some sort of Marxist would-be revolutionary. If he was British, I’d assume he was working for the intelligence services. Presumably, the genocides committed by Stalin and Mao against white/oriental people were just teething problems on the road to a glorious Communist utopia.
Marx’s old sparring partner Michael Bakunin, wrote;
“… this Jewish world today stands for the most part at the disposal of Marx and at the same time at the disposal of Rothschild. I am certain that Rothschild for his part greatly values the merits of Marx, and that Marx for his part feels instinctive attraction and great respect for Rothschild.
This may seem strange. What can there be in common between Communism and the large banks? Oh! The Communism of Marx seeks enormous centralisation in the state, and where such exists, there must inevitably be a central state bank…” (I’ve edited out some of the more anti-Semitic parts of the quote, to spare the sensitive.)
Marx seems to have seen the state apparatus as a necessary stepping stone to his equalist utopia (which would then melt away), whereas Bakunin saw it as the root of oppression (I’m with him on that – fuck the Orwellian/Kafkaesque EU.)
Most ‘anti-semites’ (rightly or wrongly) dislike Judaism, because they believe it to be a racially supremacist religion. That’s not quite the same as hating people for the colour of their skin (although some white supremacists hate people for that, too). Personally, I’m not entirely convinced race is a ‘thing’ – just another divide and rule tactic. The Thule Society and K.K.K. follow the ‘mystery school’ model. The common root of the mystery schools is cabalism. Plato may have been a cabalist. I think the roots of communism and fascism are found there. Maybe I’m wrong, but at least I can refer to Platonism without being accused of being a racist.

White Eagle
White Eagle
Apr 29, 2016 11:49 PM
Reply to  SFS

Again, its the leaders messing things up. To their credit, Israel practically bent over backwards attempting to come up with a peace deal during the Camp David Accords that would be acceptable for the Palastinians. 5 separate times East Jerusalem was included in various propositions.
Guess Arafat didn’t want his gravy train, donations from various charities, to end, he said NO to all that was offered, rejecting everything as not good enough. The Palastinians today have what Israel considers a terrorist organization running their government now, not much different than the old PLO. Israel does not need to give up its own land, but it does need to stop the human rights violations. And it needs to negotiate with SOMEONE to get things settled, even if that means buying a large chunk of land that is decent, to offer to resettle the Palastinians on. And to start compensating properly those whom they have harmed with their bulldozers. In the old testament, thieves were supposed to compensate their victims with payment worth 7 times what they took.

John
John
Apr 29, 2016 11:58 PM
Reply to  White Eagle

Why are things the way they are? Because that is how people in power want them to be. Does that explain why the zionists continue to occupy Palestine? You can bet your life on it. They were never serious about granting the Palestinians a country of their own and they have now made it impossible for a separate Palestinian state to emerge. Therefore, there is only one possible conclusion: one single secular state of Palestine from the sea to the river, with equal rights for all regardless of religion or race. Incidentally, Clinton and Bush made sure the process of achieving a Palestinian state was frustrated and another President Clinton will also ensure the Palestinians do not get their own state now. She is under the sway and the pay of the zionists and she has to dance to the tune of her Tel Aviv paymasters. That is why things are they way they are.

White Eagle
White Eagle
Apr 29, 2016 11:11 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Remember the Liberty? How about the explosives-laiden white vans driven by Mossad agents In NYC, as well as the ones that had set up their cameras and were dancing ontop of a building when the twin towers went down?
The cruse missile strike on the financial-investigative section of the pentagon…highly convient and suspiciously timed, right after the announcement of the missing 2 trillion. Dick Cheney running things from the White House while Pres. Bush was away in Florida, no intercepts of the wayward jets which would have been protocall the minute they deviated from their flight plans. The Masters of Deception are indeed the Zionists who boast that that is the way they will make war, and the plotters of our own, Operation Gardenplot and related schemes. It is all there out in the open, citizens of all countries need to be aware of whats happening and kick their neocon pediphiles out of office, and preferably behind bars, like Iceland did.

Vaska
Vaska
Oct 15, 2016 10:42 PM
Reply to  louisproyect

Yes, it is. Our own guess is that they’re meant to discredit us.

Harold Smith
Harold Smith
Apr 26, 2016 5:07 PM
Reply to  Isaac

Actually it has nothing to do with “money”.

Howard Lewis
Howard Lewis
Apr 26, 2016 3:33 AM

Anybody giving Obummer DeSoto or whatever his name is so much as a slingshot SHOULD BE HUNG BY THE NECK UNTIL DEAD!

Bobby
Bobby
Apr 25, 2016 11:50 PM

The people running the U.S. are bat sh-t crazy.. What are they doing, taking advice from John, Dr. Strangelove McCain.?? LOL

kennethgeade
kennethgeade
Apr 25, 2016 3:30 PM

Reblogged this on Kenneth Eade.

Brad Benson
Brad Benson
Apr 25, 2016 12:42 PM

Excellent job Eric and Off-Guardian! I’ll make a point to link to this on the American Sites I frequently visit. Keep up the good work.

Douglas Baker
Douglas Baker
Apr 25, 2016 1:49 AM

President Obama continues a treaty observation by breach, that started with America’s first, and has carried forward to our current, with all American Presidents in between leaving behind broken treaties by the score in the shadow of their service, that has now allowed those that control the American Empire to drop a iron curtain wrap of armed force surrounding The Russian Federation, that Napoleon or Hitler would be envious of, as they had to slog through Central Europe in an attempt to conquer Russia; and they didn’t have the benefit of waging a sustained economic war against Russia.

Arrby
Arrby
Apr 24, 2016 9:18 PM

*What is the difference between new posts and new comments?
*This site, like some others, takes a long time to load. I’m right now using my smartphone on the Virgin/ Bell network.
This is stuff I talk about all the time. But until numerous progressive authors talk about it, my warnings are just strange ideas from a stranger. It would help if good people cared a little more to pay attention a little more and ‘actively’ learn. Buy and read books. Read around, which means more than a website or two. And read around alt media. Some will be better than others and some will be almost bogus, but at the end of the day you’re going to know enough to know what to think. That makes you part of the solution instead of part of the darkness.
I’m pretty sure that “Christ’s Ventriloquists” will be a hate-filled anti-God but popular diatribe. There’s a real hate-on on the Left for Christianity and it isn’t always kept out of site. And there’s no solidarity.

Arby
Arby
Apr 25, 2016 3:27 AM
Reply to  Arrby

Googled Cif. ‘comment is free’.

moscowexile
moscowexile
Apr 24, 2016 8:02 PM

It was Chief of the Prussian General Staff Helmut von Moltke the Elder, uncle of the WWI Helmut von Moltke, who was no great shakes, who said that.
Moltke the Elder was responsible for wiping the floor with the Austrians in 1866 and the French in 1871.

Frank
Frank
Apr 24, 2016 6:52 PM

The rationale of NATO forces being beefed – apparently by a quadrupling of current military expenditures – and sitting on Russia’s western borders because of ‘ Russian aggression’, is so incredible that only a halfwit could believe it. The US knows it, Russia knows it and the US knows Russia knows it. But the western publics live in a propaganda bubble generally believing what they are told by a media which is in part state controlled, or the self-censorship has been outsourced to the private sector. And it has to be said that this mass thought-control has become utterly relentless and extremely effective. It has employed all the methods used in advertising pioneered by the father of PR, Edward Bernays, who strongly influenced Nazi propaganda chief Josef Goebbels.
So what is NATO – that intervention arm of the US, as Chomsky called it – up to exactly? Is this growing military presence actually intended for a war against Russia? Personally I am sceptical. It will be very difficult to defeat Russia in its own backyard, just as it was in 1812, 1920 and 1941. Secondly this war would soon escalate into a nuclear exchange, and the Russians have made this abundantly clear. NATO must be aware of this and they would not be able to avoid massively high causalities whatever such a war’s outcome might be. The US/NATO is not going to commit what would amount to nuclear suicide over the fate of Estonia, no more than Russia can, or even wants to, invade Europe. The brute fact of the matter is that nuclear weapons have levelled the playing field and any full scale conventional war would soon turn into a nuclear exchange.
Thi US/NATO first strike option is based upon the rather dubious notion that this would wipe out most of Russia’s land-based ICBMs and any remaining ones would be dealt with by the anti-ballistic missile system the US has placed on Russia’s borders. Easy peasy right? This I suppose this is another one of those military theories which has never been tested and invariably don’t pan out as planned. As the German WW1 commander, Moltke, once opined ‘No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy’ seeming all too reminiscent of the plans for the battle of the Somme almost 100 years ago. An Anglo-French sustained artillery barrage was going to smash the German front line and our troops would simply walk in unopposed. In the event, British casualties on the first day were almost 60,000 with 20,000 dead. This battle dragged on decisively for months with no clear winner and total British, French and German casualties in excess of one million. Such is the way with those usual hare-brained military theories which tend to come to grief in the fog of war.
The first-strike theory also makes no mention of submarine launched ballistic nuclear missiles which provide second strike capabilities. Both the Russians and Chinese have these nuclear armed submersibles. Secondly those land based missiles may well be mobile carried by train or truck, or based in super-hardened silos ready for a retaliatory launch. As of July 2009, Russia’s strategic arsenal reportedly shrunk to 2,723 warheads, including: 367 ICBMs with 1,248 warheads, 13 SSBNs with 591 warheads and 76 bombers with 884 warheads. Doing some arithmetic let us suppose, for the sake of argument, US air defences destroy 95% of Russian warheads; this would still leave 28 nuclear warheads hitting the US, with probably most of the big cities on the east and west coasts wiped out. The devastation in Russia would probably be even greater, but then of course there would also be the rather unprepossessing prospect of a nuclear winter which would descend like a bibilical nemesis on friend and foe alike. War could of course still happen by accident, but it is not a strategic option.
Moreover the much-vaunted and feared US-NATO conventional military juggernaut has only succeeded when it takes on weak states which cannot or will not put up a fight. When the opposition fights back as in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan the performance of the west’s unbeatable military machine has been less than impressive. The strategic error which US theorists make is that they think their enemy is going to fight on American terms in a symmetrical conflict. However, the US’s adversaries have not fallen into this trap, and they fight asymmetrical wars on their own terms.
Since Russia has never voluntarily surrendered to anyone a hybrid war is about an attempt to intimidate Russia by the presence of NATO forces combined with economic and propaganda warfare which has as its object regime change brought about by economic strangulation and the mobilising of the 5th column in Russia itself.

Arrby
Arrby
Apr 24, 2016 9:26 PM
Reply to  Frank

It will not be over the fate of Estonia. Don’t confuse the language of the doctrinal system for honesty. It’s just ‘great game’ evil. And that’s just aggression – for material gain, for glory, for a minority of lawless, godless actors operating under the shield of ‘law & order’ governments, much of whose membership often claims to on God’s side.

shatnersrug
shatnersrug
Apr 24, 2016 10:27 PM
Reply to  Frank

Let’s get this right – the Russian never built autobahns because they knew it would mean American tanks on the door step before you could say Bloody Coup. But there are autobahns in the west, it leaves Europe extremely exposed.
I don’t want to have a war with Russia, or anyone else for that matter – people are great! Not our enemies

gunnar-mobimation
gunnar-mobimation
Apr 25, 2016 5:32 PM
Reply to  shatnersrug

Autobahns are very vulnerable to needing roadwork

Brad Benson
Brad Benson
Apr 25, 2016 12:40 PM
Reply to  Frank

Good comment. I would only ask, “Wouldn’t that nuclear winter cure our global warming problem?”

Jen
Jen
Apr 26, 2016 12:54 AM
Reply to  Frank

Frank,
Consider that the military build-up along Russia’s western borders with various EU members is not only good business (and profits) for US arms manufacturers (and their pals and partners in Wall Street, and the puppet politicians in Congress who rely on them for funding their election campaigns) but is also needed by the governments of countries like Latvia and Lithuania whose economies are failing and have been failing since they joined the EU, and whose young people are voting with their feet. The Pentagon is providing technology, jobs and money for failing east European EU members which would otherwise have to rely on IMF loans and remittances from their diasporas.

Lucas
Lucas
Apr 24, 2016 6:16 PM

The US needs a global financial restet. They are clearly willing to start WW3 but want the history books to make it look like Russia or even China started it..that’s if of corse the US actually win a nuclear war, but clearly they are the aggressor and must think they have the ability to win it.
If they do win an all out nuclear war, look forward to your mutated grandchildren getting fed the same old lies and brainwash, in school and on the TV as to how America saved the world from tyranny…blah, blah, blah.

shatnersrug
shatnersrug
Apr 24, 2016 10:30 PM
Reply to  Lucas

They want to start a war and they’re using the Georring Principal

Isaac
Isaac
Apr 27, 2016 12:48 AM
Reply to  Lucas

Do not be so sure that the US will win the nuclear war against Russia and China. Russia alone has the capability to convert the whole US into a trash of radioactive ashes. Not that Like it but these idiots Zio boys in Tel Aviv should not push the US into a confrontation with Russia, China, or Iran.

White Eagle
White Eagle
Apr 30, 2016 12:33 AM
Reply to  Isaac

Maybe that’s the whole point? Obama ‘Americans are spoiled’ in reference to folks having their thermostats set at 72 Degrees was just one small clue, that he’s not an American in the first place. His whole reign seems to have as its goal the tearing down of the US, and if not by one way , then by another. What better way to destroy us that to pick at Russia in order to get it to do what Obama wants? Nothing like throwing someone else’s nation at your own to get away with mass murder.

John
John
Apr 24, 2016 6:11 PM

I think you are all over-reacting. Obama is a lame-dog president. Unless you harbour a belief he may be engineering a war with Russia so as to declare himself POTUS indefinitely – something FD Roosevelt never did – how can he start a war which he will not be in a position to finish? No US president ever started a war they did not finish, did they?
I think the idea that this is designed to get other NATO members to take up some of the financial burden of ring-fencing Russia is much more probable. It is all stupid and out-dated so-called “power” politics but that just shows how out-of-date the western thinking is today. My guess is that this whole scam is just another diversionary tactic.

shatnersrug
shatnersrug
Apr 24, 2016 10:38 PM
Reply to  John

It’s definitely a scam, what even is happening here, one thing is definitely happening, and that’s that someone is getting rich(er)
I think the problem here is the provocation element and the lack of dissenting media.

Keith
Keith
Apr 24, 2016 4:23 PM

President Trump will reverse all this anti Russian rhetoric from Obama and the New World Order. President Trump will create a new friendship between Russia and the United States and bring honor back to America!

Bob
Bob
Apr 24, 2016 6:09 PM
Reply to  Keith

You spelt ‘merica wrong…..

shatnersrug
shatnersrug
Apr 24, 2016 10:38 PM
Reply to  Keith

That’s nice then

paper doll
paper doll
Apr 24, 2016 1:40 PM

The West seems to be in its super nova stage, where a star flares up before going out. Everywhere it goes becomes a failed state …the neocons are not just psychopaths, they are spectacularly incompetent psychopaths…unless the idea is to make everywhere like Libya…and it well could be

nexusxyz
nexusxyz
Apr 24, 2016 9:16 AM

They are smoking some strong stuff that must soften the brain. They would need a couple of million men on the border and the full mobilisation of Europe.
No Western army has fought a fully mechanised military and much of the military in Europe is no more than paramilitary. Russia has strong force multipliers that would shatter an attacker. Also the Russians are now proficient again in combat and will no doubt deploy a layered tank, artillery and missile defence. On top of that Russia would not allow attacking formations to group and would use tactical nukes. General Montgomery had two rules of war – first, don’t march on Moscow and second, don’t invade China.
Russia is not going to back down and I hope the people at the Pentagram read the revised Russian military doctrine as it states that any attack on Russia will trigger a massive response.

Secret Agent
Secret Agent
Apr 24, 2016 9:05 AM

I think it’s just Obama trying to palm off the bill for the stupid Cold War he and idiot war monger Hillary Clinton started on their hapless German vassals.
Let’s not forget that the Americans started this whole thing to prevent closer relations between Germany and Russia, a strategic imperative dating back to the British Empire.
The Ukraine gambit failed, the Baltic strategy is going nowhere. This Cold War thing is really expensive and if you think the Baltic states are flat broke now and forever, and Poland can’t afford to fly it’s F16s…time to line up a patsy.
The Poles seem to have forgotten that Germany exterminated 20% of their population, But I think the Germans still remember what happened last time they went up against Russia.

jimsresearchnotes
jimsresearchnotes
Apr 24, 2016 8:56 AM

Reblogged this on EU: Ramshackle Empire.

Norman Pilon
Norman Pilon
Apr 24, 2016 6:22 AM

“The aggression and the threat here seem clearly to be coming from the West, against the East.”
Yes, clearly.
“The only rational response by the Western public to what Obama and his foreign allies are doing is to recognize what is actually happening and to take action against their own leaders, before this increasingly high-stakes confrontation becomes terminal. ”
That is certainly what needs to happen but is most unlikely to happen. There is too much confusion among the public, buried as it is under an avalanche of propaganda.
People are far too taken up with the business of having to work for a living or trying to find work in order to make a living, to be able to make the time to carefully scrutinize and independently fact check the bullshit that they are being fed. All of the main channels of information they are constrained by circumstances to rely on to keep abreast of current affairs are pretty much the monopoly of the imperialist warmongers.
There is therefore only a very low probability, I’d guess next to none, that the broader public will be able to “recognize what is actually happening,” let alone in time to do anything about it. Furthermore, the public, at least in the current conjuncture of events, has been and continues to be effectively neutralized: informed or uninformed, it has absolutely no influence on either the foreign or domestic policies instituted by its ruling elites. The situation is not merely akin to a dictatorship, it is a dictatorship.
We are therefore in our collective unknowing and impotence very much at the mercy of our national leaders.
So either Russia or NATO will simmer down, or we really are all screwed.

Eurasia News Online
Eurasia News Online
Apr 24, 2016 5:32 AM

Reblogged this on Eurasia News Online and commented:
Even the head of Stratfor has called what Obama did in Ukraine “the most blatant coup in history”, and since the fact that it was a U.S. coup has been documented extensively on cellphone and other videos, and in the most thorough academic investigation that has been performed of the matter — and was even acknowledged by Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko, a participant in the coup, to have been a coup — and since evidence survives on the Internet of the U.S. Embassy’s preparations as early as 1 March 2013 for the February 2014 coup; and since even the U.S. government’s hired polls showed that Crimeans rejected overwhelmingly the U.S. coup and supported rejoining Russia; the question still needs to be answered: What is the basis of the West’s aggressive actions threatening Russia’s national security other than its own imperialist ambitions towards Russia camouflaged with the lies about an aggressive Russia and an aggressive President Putin the Western mass media have been bombarding the public with?

susannapanevin
susannapanevin
Apr 24, 2016 5:00 AM

Reblogged this on Susanna Panevin.