Miscalculating In War, Diplomacy, And Politics

Today we’ll follow on (circle back?) from yesterday’s post on the potential for a day of reckoning looming for the collective West as a result of the disastrous war that the US initiated against Russia, and American attempts to drag most of the world into that war. One of the results has been that the use of sanctions has, far from coercing cooperation, induced many countries to jump ship and seek a safer haven outside the King Dollar regime—or, at least to diversify in order to be in a better resist unwelcome American pressure. An article at Zerohedge provides an overview of how the imminent debut of the new BRICS gold backed currency is a direct result of this misguided attempt to bully the world—brief excerpt, and one key is in the title: “implemented in stages”. So, slowly, then all of a sudden:

Rickards: BRICS gold-linked currency previewed Aug. 22, implemented in stages

This started because the West forced these countries to prioritize confiscation risk by the US higher than default risk between each other. We did this.

Part 1- Background

As the Aug 22nd BRICS annual meeting moves closer, dedollarization rhetoric escalates, especially on the BRICS side. …

There are two seemingly diametrically opposed opinions coming out of this.

• The Brics are launching a Gold backed alternative to the USD.

• The Brics have no immediate plans to launch a gold-backed alternative to the dollar

Keeping it simple, both statements are true. …

1- It Started With Sanctions (WHY ARE THEY DOING IT?)

Due to the sanctions and confiscation of Russia’s reserves, nations now need a way to ensure their own sovereign wealth will not be similarly … stolen. Right or wrong, this is an existential risk they cannot ignore.

US “diplomatic” managers keep trying to back other global players into a corner—and then end up unpleasantly surprised at the adverse reactions they provoke. Instead of trying to find ways to fix what’s wrong at home, and using that as a basis for a constructive relationship with the rest of the world, the American Ruling Class is determined to maintain a status quo that has been shifting out of their control for at least the last ten years. The result is that the US, having broken faith with much of the rest of the world, is losing the ability to influence the shape of the new multi-polar world order.

Naked Capitalism is featuring a clever article that highlights the collective West’s miscalculation in military terms. The author, Conor Gallagher, has assembled passages from the diaries of Goebbels and Hitler which show that the top German leadership became aware that Operation Barbarossa was an unfolding disaster within weeks. The popular impression is that the German invasion of Russia was initially a triumph of arms for Germany, with vast amounts of Russian war materiel destroyed, huge numbers of Russian troops killed or captured, enormous swaths of territory occupied. In actual fact, however, the Germans were dismayed at the ferocity of Russian resistance and the discovery that Russian war materiel was frequently superior to their own, even though not always employed to the best advantage. The offensive turned into a plodding affair, rather than the lightning victory that had been expected. German intelligence had failed. The scope of the task that was undertaken was spectacularly underestimated. Gallagher chronicles from the Nazi diaries the dawning realization of impending doom, then compares them to the delusional accounts of the Western media and intel services, which have once again underestimated Russia—willing to believe in the inferiority of their chosen enemy. I quote here from the intro to the diary excerpts:

Underestimate Russia at Your Own Risk: A Comparison of Hubris by Germany During WWII and Today’s Collective West

In honor of the NATO summit July 11 and 12, this is a comparison of how the Nazi leadership in World War Two and today’s collective West similarly underestimated Russia and overestimated their capabilities.

Despite Russia’s overwhelming upper hand in Ukraine, Western officials and media continue to largely pump sunshine and weave stories of Russian collapse.

There are increasing breaks in the fever, and it looks like maybe, hopefully the acceptance of the loss is gaining traction in Washington.

Meanwhile, the unwillingness or inability for hardliners to objectively assess efforts against Russia occurs today just as it did during Operation Barbarossa. As Seymour Hersh writes:

There is an enormous gap between the way the professionals in the American intelligence community assess the situation and what the White House and the supine Washington press project to the public by uncritically reproducing the statements of Blinken and his hawkish cohorts.

This too is reminiscent of the Nazi offensive against the Soviet Union when the failure was hidden from the German public. Adding to the similarities is the fact that both the Third Reich command and today’s officials in the West simultaneously downplay Russia’s military capabilities while endlessly hyping the threat from Moscow.

Hitler, similar to so many Western “experts” and officials today, mocked Russia’s supposed backwardness while also hyping the threat “Slavic Bolshevism” posed to the West. The progression of his comments show him seesawing between a reluctant acceptance and desperate hope as his miscalculations of Russia slowly dawn on him. It’s a path today’s governments in the West are still discovering.

On the other hand, Goebbel’s diary entries are faster to admit that Operation Barbarossa was a disaster.

Prior to the operation, he writes how there is no way the USSR could hope to oppose “the strongest army in all of history” and adds that “I consider the Russian military force to be very weak, even weaker than the Fuhrer believes. If anything is a sure thing, it is this.”

Indeed, German high command anticipated a quick collapse of Soviet resistance along the lines of the Blitzkrieg in Poland, but within a few weeks of the launch of the German offensive, it’s clear that Berlin underestimated the Russians. And the winter of 1941-42 saw the Nazi war machine stopped 12 miles short of Moscow and then driven back. It was all downhill from there.

Despite evidence that Russian resistance was much more capable than anticipated, Hitler continues to talk of Russian inferiority and a breakup of the country for months before a realization of the situation begins to set in. Read in tandem with Goebbels’ more honest diary entries, it calls to mind today’s battle within the Blob between the realists and anti-Russian fanatics.

Going back to “increasing breaks in the fever” of delusion and the possibility that “acceptance of the loss is gaining traction in Washington”, M. K. Bhadrakuman today points to some of the signs that the recognition of the extent of the looming disaster may, indeed, be sinking in. The volatile and demented Zhou is hopeless, of course, for purposes of reading the tea leaves. MKB prefers to focus elsewhere for clues as to the emerging thinking among the America Ruling Class. What he sees may explain the palpable sense that Zhou must somehow be removed:

What to expect from NATO Summit 2023

The trajectory of the Ukraine war hangs in the balance. All eyes are on the US President Joe Biden’s arrival in Vilnius for the NATO summit meeting (June 11-12.) …

However, the big picture is to be sought in the National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan’s press gaggle on Sunday en route to London, the first leg of Biden’s European tour that will take him to Vilnius and Helsinki. In atmospherics, simply put, Sullivan eschewed any form of a belligerent tone toward Russia — no threats, no challenging propositions, no defaming of Russia or demonising President Vladimir Putin personally. In fact, it is no longer “Putin’s war”! Even on the vexed issue of Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, Sullivan simply shrugged off saying he had “no update” on it.

Gone is the triumphalism, and what we see—at least from Sullivan—is a new reluctance to unnecessarily provoke Putin. As for the shrugging dismissal of questions about the Prigozhin farce, that’s also a far cry from the initial reactions, that Putin’s end was nigh. More “flawed intelligence”. The rude awakening, just as with the Germans in WW2:

Now, this will virtually put out the flicker of hope among the NATO Allies about political uncertainties within Russia hampering the Kremlin’s war effort. Quite obviously, there are no “cracks” to be seen anywhere on the Kremlin wall. Putin remains firmly in charge and the military operations to scatter the month-long Ukrainian offensive are succeeding beyond expectations.

Correspondingly, there is bound to be a greater sense of realism amongst the NATO Allies. Alas, momentous political decisions concerning European security were riveted on flawed intelligence.

The Americans had no idea about the capability of Russian weaponry or of the country’s defence industry, its seamless capacity to mobilise for a continental war, the mood of the Russian people, Putin’s strong power base with a consistent rating at 80% (more than double that of Biden), the Russian economy’s resilience to withstand sanctions, or the blowback from sanctions that eventually would devastate the European economies.

Things are falling apart for the Neocons and globalists. The sanctions backfire now extends beyond economics to politics:

… the war in Ukraine has far from isolated Russia but on the contrary, helped invigorate and expand Moscow’s orbit of diplomatic and political influence in the vast majority of the world community.

At the same time, on the military front too, the delusional hopes of NATO countries defeating Russia have withered away and the Vilnius summit’s decisions will reckon with this ground reality.

The scramble is on to find some form of “orderly withdrawal.” The dream of a “frozen conflict” lives on:

Thus, Biden thoughtfully touched down in London en route to Vilnius to mollify the UK that Ukraine cannot be the battleground of its “Global-Britain” dream. …

Evidently, the nuts and bolts of an orderly withdrawal will need to be painstakingly worked out within the framework of a ceasefire in the war. This means engaging with Russia in a near future and discouraging it from pressing ahead forthwith with any major offensive to end the war conclusively in its favour.

That dream is about to run up against the hard reality that Russia is winning the war and will dictate terms. Those terms will follow the outline of Putin’s draft treaties and Dmitry Medvedev’s recent statements. Certain countries will need to be prepared to be betrayed.

Now, it’s been quite a while since I’ve embedded a Doug Macgregor interview, so here’s an interesting one. Macgregor, among other topics, explains cluster munitions and why they won’t make any real difference. He also gets into politics and economics, maintaining in a nutshell: Everything we need to take care of is here at home. He also touches on the dawning realization of disastrous defeat for NATO:

Douglas Macgregor & Kim Iversen: The Russians Have 750.000 Troops Ready to Attack

To wrap this up, I came across this brief tweet with an embedded video from CNN. The point here is that David Axelrod is the one who’s telling the Dems they should be concerned about Cornel West running as the Green candidate. It’s entirely possible that this is a part of the concern among Dems to find an exit strategy—for Zhou. You can follow the link to watch the two minute video. There’s really not much there, nor in the tweet itself. Just something to be aware of. Now, Cornel West is undoubtedly dangerous to the Establishment—although not for any of the reasons given in the tweet. One way in which he could be dangerous would be running as a peace candidate. Also by telling black voters that there being shortchanged by all the money being spent on Ukrainians rather than on cities right here in America.

Empire Of Lies

@berningman16

Cornel West is dangerous to the establishment for three reasons:

1.) He's totally incorruptible. He can't be bought off.

2.) He'll speak the truth. No matter how inconvenient for Biden & the Dems.

3.) He's respected & intelligent. And people will listen to what he says.

Quote Tweet

CNN

@CNN

Jul 9

Poll shows why Biden should be 'a little concerned' about Cornel West

Watch again

0:23 / 2:07

7:56 PM · Jul 10, 2023