Ukraine Update: Regime Change Coming?

Alexander Mercouris of The Duran has been consistent all along in his commenting on the American war on Russia. The Neocons and their European vassals were convinced that they could quickly crush Russia with sanctions “shock and awe”. All they needed to do was to goad Russia into commencing military action to provide the pretext. Mercouris has frequently described the European euphoria prior to the war, at the Munich Security Conference, at the prospect of looting Russia of its natural resources after crushing the country. They got what they were wishing for—war. But their quick victory is turning into a long and painful defeat for NATO and the collective West. Once it became apparent that sanctions were a flop, and were instead generating blowback on a global scale, the Neocons doubled down on military war. Ukraine, they believed, would become another Afghanistan for Russia. But Mercouris consistently predicted that it would, instead, turn into a second Vietnam for the American Empire—complete with regime change for the puppet Kiev regime.

It’s starting to look like that’s coming—perhaps sooner rather than later. In a shrewd video, Mercouris discusses the current situation in unusually brief fashion. Most of what I believe are by far the most important parts are presented in the second half of a half hour video:

US inches closer to regime changing Zelensky

I’ll summarize those important points.

First, Mercouris goes over Zelensky’s travails—his rough trip to the UN and then to DC, his even rougher trip to Canada, his continuing troubles with Poland. In recent posts I’ve maintained that there’s no possible way that Poland could be taking all the actions that are presenting Zelensky in a terrible light, without US complicity. I don’t for a moment discount the Polish propensity for looking out for their own interests, but the lack of any US reaction is, to me, a clear signal that Poland’s repeated slams on the Zelensky regime fit in with the US game plan—as it is now. Zelensky is being set up for regime change.

Mercouris points out that the collective West has been “intensely relaxed” about the Zelensky regime’s authoritarian measures at home: canceling elections, shutting down opposition parties, newspapers, religions, etc. But now, all of a sudden, the West is engaged in “a huge push for elections” in Ukraine. To Mercouris this all looks like the prelude to regime change—but in an orderly fashion. The US would prefer some semblance of electoral process rather than a coup. The CIA has a long history of obtaining the election results in foreign lands that they Deep State wants, so regime changing Zelensky that shouldn’t present a technical problem—just buy off the relevant Ukrainian oligarchs. It will still look bad, but not as messy as a coup, which would remain the last ditch scenario.

As for the Russians’ views on these Western regime change shenanigans …

AC: [Zelensky] needs to capitulate. Well, that's not what's going to happen. [The West is] gonna maneuver him out.

AM: I agree. We are looking at regime change in Kiev. We've talked about it many times. It's the West that is demanding these elections--that's important to understand! Obviously the Russians are past caring any longer what happens in Kiev. They know that the purpose of these elections is to replace Zelensky, who is somebody who follows Washington's orders. That's not something that the Russians are interested in or care about at all. [Vyacheslav] Volodyn [Speaker of the lower house of the Russian Duma] has now set out what the objectives are: either Ukraine capitulates and accepts all Russian demands--which would mean that the Ukraine we have known and which Zelensky is defending and which the West is supporting ceases to exist--or Ukraine ceases to exist completely as a state. That's the alternative that the Russians are giving, and the Russian Defense Ministry is now dropping very heavy hints that once this Ukrainian offensive is over then the very much bigger and far more powerful Russian offensive happens. Odessa and Kiev are both objectives.

That last sentence leads us to the military update. I’ve long avoided military updates on a short term basis. Overall, the war is continuing as the Russians prefer it to. The Ukrainian “offensive” has been a complete flop and a disaster. Ukraine is now reduced to lobbing a relative handful of missiles at Crimea at irregular intervals—most are shot down, but a few get few and cause relatively minor damage. These Ukrainian nuisance attacks, however, are provoking massive Russian counter strikes that are going after Ukrainian infrastructure as well as the installations from which the attacks are launched. Perhaps more significantly:

[Russia] is also targeting these Western mercenaries who are now clearly a target that the Russians are hunting. [Mercouris is referring to Western personnel who are providing technical assistance.] But the other thing that the Russians are doing is that they're clearly coming after the locations from which they think some of these missiles are being launched, and some of the facilities the Ukrainians are using to continue their attacks on Crimea.

This morning I was listening to a John Mearsheimer interview with Judge Napolitano. It was generally very succinct and incisive. One area in which I disagree with Mearsheimer has to do with Russian war aims. Mearsheimer repeated the views that Doug Macgregor has also championed, namely, that the Russians will not push to the Polish border because that would involve taking over areas where the population would be hostile. I understand the thinking behind this view, and I agree that that was probably the Russian plan in the earlier stages of the conflict. However, Putin has openly stated that the longer the conflict continues the harder the terms will be—the more maximalist will be Russian demands. And the tone from Russian officials in recent months has been uncompromising—as we saw above.

My view is that the Russians view Ukraine as a chronic threat to their national security, because it has been repeatedly used during the past hundred years by foreign powers seeking to damage or destroy the Russian state. Nothing has changed with this latest war, the war of the American Empire against Russia. For that reason I believe the Russians will pursue maximalist goals that will permit, at most, only a rump Ukraine that is totally under Russia’s thumb. That will include control over Ukraine’s western borders to prevent the flow of weapons and personnel into Ukraine from the West who may be hostile to Russia. Ukraine will not be allowed to remain a launching pad for attacks on Russia. In addition, I believe that Mearsheimer and Macgregor fail to understand that Kiev and Odessa have a deeply embedded significance in the Russian national consciousness that Russia will not be inclined to relinquish.

So, with that, I offer this final excerpt from The Duran which begins with a discussion of a video put out by some organ of the Russian state. I believe it supports some of my contentions:

AC: We had a video come out from--I don't know if it was a Russian Ministry of Defense that put out this video advertisement or another group--but the video hinted at Russia moving towards Odessa. Which is interesting because there was another video that came out about a week and a half ago which hinted at the Russian military moving towards Kiev. So, is Russia signaling something?

AM: Yes, they are clearly signaling something. I think both of those videos--which show reservists, by the way, Russian reservists--they're talking in the first case about Kiev and now they're talking about Odessa. They're clearly indicating that these are now objectives. And we've had this statement from Volodin [above], ... The Russians are being completely uncompromising and it's clear to me that they're moving towards a position of ending the war militarily, and both Kiev and Odessa are going to be objectives of the big Russian offensive that is coming.

My take on this is in line with Mercouris’ views. The Russian position on the outcome of this conflict has now hardened. The Neocons can do whatever they like with the Kiev regime—they can regime change Zelensky via an election or via a coup. It doesn’t matter. Russia will dictate terms on the ground and none of these shenanigans will delay Russia’s timetable, which has probably been determined by this point. So the war will continue, but at Russia’s pace, and with the likelihood of tougher responses to Western provocations.