Retrospective: Before The Special Military Operation
Will Schryver has been republishing some of his older tweet threads, and they still make good reading. Here’s a twelve part one from January 16, 2022—so a couple of months before Putin launched the SMO in Ukraine. It’s very prescient, but more than simply looking back at Ukraine and Russia, it also looks forward to China.
The conclusion to be drawn is that our ruling class dragged the US into this mad war on Russia through the usual Neocon flummery—combinations of geopolitical hubris and belief in their own infallible ability to finesse things. Militarily and economically. We were never going to be involved militarily because we’d finesse the war through sanctions shock and awe. Woops!
And I saw a pretty good example of that way of thinking just yesterday, in a NYT article that spoke of early Ukrainian plans—and an actual attempt—to decapitate the Russian military by taking out Gen. Gerasimov, head of the “Stavka.” According to the NYT, the US panicked and begged the Ukies not to do that crazy thing, lest Russia react accordingly. The Ukies went right ahead—but failed in the attempt. The key here is that the US thought this scheme went too far. The US wanted to force Russia into a long, debilitating war, using Ukies as cannon fodder—but NOT risk a full on war with Russia. In other words, the Neocons knew they couldn’t go toe to toe with Russia in Ukraine, but thought they could finesse the issue geopolitically. Wrong.
And so here we are—not only turning much of the military capability of the collective West to rubble, but doing the same to the economic landscape of the collective West. Dismantling NATO, restructuring global geopolitics to the advantage of Russia and China, and midwiving the birth of alternative financial and economic relations to the realm of King Dollar.
And that’s just for for starters.
Will it go THIS far?
Well played, Neocons!
By "plausible conflict" I mean that any putative military engagement between the US and Russia/China would necessarily take place in the adversary's backyard – e.g. in Ukraine or the Black Sea (against Russia), or in the South China Sea or Taiwan (against China).
In battle, the only relevant equation is how much power can be brought to bear on the battlefield in question.
And, because American military might is spread widely over a global empire, only a fraction of its aggregate power can ever be arrayed against an adversary.
In Iraq (1991 and 2003), Iraq was helpless to prevent the US from concentrating forces in the theatre over an extended period of time.
Neither Russia nor China would stand idly by if the US were to attempt to concentrate forces against them.
We have certainly seen this dynamic in play during the past year, both in Russia’s backyard as well as in the seas and air surrounding Taiwan.
The Pentagon must surely know this, and also that, against Russian or Chinese (and arguably even Iranian) missile capability, any substantial concentration of naval or ground forces would be highly vulnerable to attacks against which the US has no effective defense.
I am thoroughly convinced that, in the event of likely conflict, Russia would *welcome* the US to sail carriers into the Baltic or Black Sea, just as Iran would be thrilled to see a carrier pass into the Persian Gulf via the Strait of Hormuz.
They would be sitting ducks.
In fact, it’s not necessary for US carriers to enter those confined naval spaces—some of Russia’s hypersonic missiles have the range to strike (depending on the launch platform) to the Mediterranean and even to the Arabian Sea.
Which raises another often overlooked fact: for years now, the US Navy has been unable to operationally deploy more than 3 battle-ready carrier groups simultaneously. Most carriers are stuck in their home ports, and the lack of qualified pilots and air wings is acute.
Similarly, only a fraction of the total inventory of aircraft, in all military branches, is air-worthy at any given time. The F-22 and F-35 are consistently among the worst types in that respect, but ALL types suffer from appalling readiness ratios.
As for ground forces, the entire compliment of US forces in Europe – even if they *were* permitted to concentrate – is utterly inadequate to make war against Russian forces that could be deployed against them. It would be a farcical mismatch.
And I cannot conceive of any scenario whatsoever where US ground forces could be used to fight China anywhere in the South China Sea or Taiwan. Any amphibious landing beyond a commando raid would be absolutely unthinkable.
In summary, I am entirely persuaded that the US military cannot and will not attempt to lock horns with Russia or China in the places mentioned above. Even an attack against Iran has become, in my estimation, far too risk-laden to consider.
In my view, the US, in its own best interests, *must* relinquish its overextended empire, pull back from the majority of its foreign bases, and focus on finding ways to live peaceably in the new multipolar world. The alternative is military catastrophe and economic ruin.
12/end
I say bring Will Schryver to DC to advise—and send this knucklehead Wicker, obviously paid to say this sh*t, back where he came from:
They think they’re up to this performance, but it’s not even close (Spanish cleaned up a bit in the subtitles):
If the bull is the Russian bear and the Neocons are riding, this doesn’t get to the one second mark. And, in fact, because we’re scrambling and improvising—arguably mostly for PR purposes—we’re just making matters worse:
The rulers of the collective West increasingly know they can’t hold the ranks together just on their own. Here in the US a sophisticated gaslighting operation run by the Intel Community is being disrupted via Twitter, sending the ruling class into low earth orbit. But I really like this warning from one of our Five Eyes allies, NZ. They’ve put out a booklet listing 50—that’s right, FIFTY—warning signs that you should keep in mind while closely observing your family and friends. This is where Western Values increasingly land us, to one degree or another. But the trend is everywhere apparent:
Is it even possible for this colossal shit storm to get any worse? Short sighted, check. Arrogant, check. Believe their own propaganda, check. Totally devoid of any sense of real world history, as opposed to the fairy tales that they call reality, check.
Absolutely convinced that they can escape unscathed from the consequences of their blunders, check. Every move they make defies logic to anyone with even the slightest bit of common sense, check. Makes you long for the Carter years, check.
So, what to do? Washington will openly declare war upon its own people instead.