War On Russia: Is Something Big Going On?
From my standpoint the American Empire appears increasingly overextended. From a geopolitical standpoint, maintaining influence over the peripheries of the Eurasian land mass—a land mass dominated by civilizational powers like Russia, China, India, and Iran—should logically take precedence over crazy adventures like the war on Russia. From the standpoint of maintaining imperial influence, the proxy war in Ukraine is increasingly an anchor around the Empire’s neck, dragging it down, consuming resources for no calculable benefit. So a move to settle with Russia makes sense.
Zerohedge has cited Kit Klarenberg regarding the WaPo’s demotion of Ukraine from its masthead. Here’s what I mean:
Fabius Maximus (Ed.) @FabiusMaximus01
WaPo deletes “War in Ukraine” as a tab on its masthead. The hysteria about Russian tanks rolling to Paris is yesterday’s narrrative. The Deep State has new lies for WaPo to broadcast.
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Kit Klarenberg @KitKlarenberg
It's over.
What Zerohedge doesn’t cite is another Klarenberg tweet that looks like a blockbuster. I haven’t seen it confirmed elsewhere, but it looks official and might fit in with the WaPo’s canceling of Ukraine:
Russian officials flying into Washington. Washington Post removing Ukraine from their website. Game over.
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Kit Klarenberg @KitKlarenberg
An hour and a half ago, a Russian "Special Flight Squadron" plane landed in Washington DC. They are used by Kremlin officials. It set out from St. Petersburg. You do the math.
Klarenberg swears up and down that this is Lavrov’s personal plane—or one that he does regularly use, along with Putin spokes Peskov. He cites reliable reports from German media saying that much of the US and NATO equipment in Ukraine is now non-functional because it was never intended for industrial scale war like this. Additionally, I saw reports of a GOPer critter saying no money to support boots on the ground in the form of advisers. The Congressional establishment could be ready to bail out, too. He believes something like the following is in the works:
I'm thinking the trajectory here is the US leaving Ukraine's "defence" entirely to Europe, and as the "garden" doesn't have the resources, wealth, or industrial capacity to keep this going, it'll collapse very soon, and then Europe can be blamed for the failure.
That would be a politically motivated cut and run, designed to appease the Dem base back home in an election year. Worth a try? The Neocons tried to get the Kiev regime to play along with the sellout/bugout, but Zelensky didn’t want to. So …
Kit Klarenberg @KitKlarenberg
As every "the war is over" light flashes, recall Kissinger's view of Mikheil Saakashvili, another US proxy who got fucked: "A small poker player coming to the table with big players without cards." Of course Z is seen in the same terms by Washington now.
AdrianFX @Adrian4reX
Lavrov or Peskov landing in Washington mostly likely means that Zelensky has been bypassed & is currently relegated.
How ironical that Ukraine's future is being discussed in Washington with absolutely no Ukrainians in the room.
8:34 AM · Dec 20, 2023
Again, this makes sense. Russia’s demand from pretty much the beginning—once a deal with Ukraine was scotched by the West—was to settle the matter with the real party in interest, the party that calls the shots and tells Ukraine what to do. No intermediaries, nobody hiding behind a curtain like the Great Oz: face to face, Russia - US. Well, would this be it?
Problem—no confirmation so far. This would be very big and others should be jumping all over this story.
Officially, Blinken is still talking about keeping the war going through summer. That doesn’t contradict the idea that the war is being turned over to the Euros to do the final bugout.
On the other hand, Putin is talking tough—very tough. Unconditional surrender by Ukraine, Russia will dictate terms to save everyone else the trouble. Nice and simple. But then there’s the matter of sanctions …
Here’s a very recent statement by Putin, in which he states the current state of affairs quite directly:
Sony Thang @nxt888
🇷🇺VLADIMIR PUTIN:
"The past year’s developments have confirmed, and we can all see it, that the West continues to wage hybrid warfare against Russia, actively providing the Kiev regime with real-time intelligence data, sending military advisers, transferring new weapons systems to the country, including high-mobility multiple rocket launchers, long-range missile systems, cluster munitions, and large batches of new UAVs.
As we know, Western countries are also planning to send F-16 multirole fighter jets to Ukraine, and pilots are now being trained in the West.
The NATO military bloc has increased its overall activity dramatically of late.
Considerable forces and resources from the United States have been redeployed to our borders, including aircraft.
The number of NATO troops in Eastern and Central Europe has increased.
As we know, Finland has been dragged into NATO already, and Sweden is planning to join.
In fact, this means a new stage of the alliance’s advance to our borders.
Let me remind you of what we all know: in 1991, they promised Gorbachev: no, no, not an inch to the east – well, there you go.
This is the kind of partners they are. They lie shamelessly, through their teeth.
At the same time, the bloc is no longer hiding its aggressive nature behind defensive rhetoric.
I was told years ago it was not a military bloc, but a political organisation. And last time I checked, Article 5 was still there.
At the same time, as I said, the aggressive nature of the bloc is not being hidden. US policy doctrines explicitly spell out its claims to global supremacy.
The West is not abandoning its strategy to contain Russia and its aggressive goals in Ukraine.
Well, we are not going to give up the goals of our special military operation either."
12:09 PM · Dec 19, 2023
Those words are patently intended for the domestic Russian audience, to maintain support for the war effort. On the other hand, as Putin looks to the West, he has no real reason to be in a hurry. A military settlement—defeat of Ukraine and NATO in detail—is by far the best outcome for Russia, rather than a diplomatic settlement in the the long term. That military settlement appears inevitable and is worth waiting for. It’s also the highest card in Russia’s hand. Barring a deal that’s way too good to refuse, the current course is just fine for Putin.
Ueber Zionist David Goldman (Israel in the Shadow of American Decline) is looking to a second Trump administration as Israel’s salvation:
The event most likely to mitigate Israel’s strategic predicament would be the election of Donald Trump to a second term in 2024. Unlike the neoconservatives and global liberals presently in charge, Trump has no interest in regime change in Russia, and has no reason to perpetuate the blunders of others. He has pledged to end the war in Ukraine, which means cutting America’s losses. He is likely to maintain strong American support for Israel while limiting damage to America’s position abroad by conflict avoidance with Russia and China. Unlike the Biden foreign policy team, Trump has little interest in how other countries manage their affairs: his concern is the best deal for the United States.
From that standpoint, Putin can only win by delaying a diplomatic settlement. If Trump wins, he gets a negotiating partner who would be reasonable to deal with. If Trump loses, well, Russia will still have spent a profitable 11 months or so on the battle field, degrading NATO and the US. Even better, Putin can spend those 11 months watching the Neocons dig ever deeper into their diplomatic hole, alienating the entire world. Thus, Goldman writes:
Attempting to move NATO’s boundaries to the Russian-Ukraine border may have been the stupidest act in the sorry drama of American foreign policy, and President Biden’s declaration on March 26, 2022 that Putin cannot be allowed to remain in power may be the emptiest boast ever by an American leader. With few exceptions, the American foreign policy establishment has wagered its credibility on the outcome of this war. Although a few establishment stalwarts like Richard Haass talk of “redefining success in Ukraine,” i.e., declaring victory and going home, most of the Establishment has closed ranks. The professional penalties for doing otherwise are severe.
Making Enemies
The atmosphere in Washington resembles Vienna in the Spring of 1914 as depicted by Robert Musil in The Man Without Qualities (1930): The reader, but none of the protagonists, knows that their world of illusions is about to come to a horrible end. The American Establishment refuses to know this, but Russia knows it, as do China, the Gulf States, and everyone else. The change in the world balance of power after the collapse of Ukraine will be so dramatic that all the players in this global game are cautious about their next step. But Russia and China are probing American weaknesses in ways that remain well below the threshold of a casus belli, testing American responses.
Nothing in life is a dead cert, but 11 months of “probing” by Russia and China—while the US struggles to somehow climb back up the slippery slope that its Neocon launched it down—looks like a very attractive choice for Putin and Xi. The other option is accepting a deal they can’t refuse. Don’t look for that to happen quickly. Russia will want to exact the max, and if Zhou offers the max, well, maybe they’ll ask for more. Time is on their side, so why not?
Prisoner swap, US - Russia. That's what the flight was about.
American foreign policy for most of my 61 years on this rock, can be characterized as: play stupid games, win stupid prizes. We the people are about to receive the grand sweepstakes prize, the total destruction of our national credibility, other nations will never trust the USSA to abide by any agreements past, present or future. The extra super bonus prize of domestic economic and societal collapse is gaining momentum daily.