Cold War 2.0

[TsarSamuil]

Western nations see Russia as competitor, majority of Russians say in a poll.

RT.com
4 Feb, 2016 15:15

Over 40 percent of Russians think that Western nations perceive their motherland as a competitor, while 30 percent think Russia is viewed more as a foe by the West, according to a recent public opinion poll.

Thirty percent of Russians said that, in their view, Western countries treated Russia as an enemy, while 15 percent said that relations were an equal partnership. Five percent of participants in the poll answered that Westerners did not have any special approach to their country; four percent said that the West treats Russia as a friend.

The research was conducted by the independent polling service Levada-Center in January this year. It also showed that the number of Russians who consider their country to be one of the most influential states in the world has increased from 27 percent last year to 36 percent.

This year 25 percent of respondents said that the Russian economy was not developed enough for the country to be included in the list of leading nations. Four percent of respondents said that they blamed the resistance of Western states for Russia’s lagging behind, and three percent thought that the main reason was in the lack of democracy in the country or, on the contrary, the lack general stability in Russia’s political system. Twenty-six percent of those polled could not answer the question.

At the same time, 54 percent of respondents think that Russia should strengthen ties with Western nations, compared to 40 percent a year ago; 33 percent hold the opposite opinion, and believe it would do Russia good to further distance itself from the West.

Levada researcher Karina Pipiya said in comments with Izvestia daily that in 2007 and 2008 – when the Russian economy was booming – the number of citizens who thought that the West considered Russia mostly as a competitor also peaked. Over the past year, as the state of the Russian economy and the well-being of its citizens has decreased, the share of people with this view has also fallen.

Pipiya added that the growing share of those who support stronger cooperation between Russia and the West could be explained by the fact that the main causes of negativity – the conflict in Ukraine and the Western sanctions introduced in reply to Crimea’s accession into the Russian Federation – were no longer big news, and there was less anti-Western sentiment in the Russian mass media.

The researcher pointed out that the average Russian believes his country and the rest of the leading world nations now have a common enemy – the Islamic State terrorist group (IS, previously known as ISIS and ISIL).

[TsarSamuil]

The American Empire is Turning on Itself: Zsolt Bayer, László Bogár 2016.02.11.

Kittensinurface
Feb 12, 2016



This is a short clip from yesterday's episode of Háttér-kép on Echo TV. The topic of discussion is the upcoming US election and what it means to the world.

[TsarSamuil]

'Is it 2016 or 1962?' PM Medvedev urges Russia & West end ‘Cold War’ amid terror rise.

RT
Feb 13, 2016



The relationships between NATO and Russia have slid down toward a new Cold War, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said at a panel discussion during the Munich Security Conference, describing NATO's policy as 'unfriendly and not transparent.'

[TsarSamuil]

Just blame Moscow! Declassified papers reveal UK policy of accusing Soviets of everything.

RT.com
19 Feb, 2016 13:30

Declassified papers from the British Cabinet Office have put an end to the long-standing myth of Moscow's unwillingness to cooperate with the West, revealing the UK's efforts to blame every problem on Russia.

The papers date back to 1983, when the UK Foreign and Cabinet offices were ecstatic at the outcome of the Madrid review conference on the implementation of the Helsinki Final Act on security and cooperation in Europe.

"… We now have a provisional mandate for a CDE (Conference on Disarmament in Europe) which establishes four basic criteria, all of which have required concession on the part of the Soviet Union and her allies," officials in Whitehall wrote at the time.

But it was the fourth of the criteria that was the most exciting for the West.

"The fourth [proposal-NG] is a significant breakthrough for the West. It represents recognition for the first time that the West has a legitimate security interest in the whole of the European part of the Soviet Union."

But although Moscow showed its cooperation, the West wasn't as eager to be a team player, with one memo indicating how the Soviet Union had failed to gain “a corresponding concession in the exercise of the droit de regard [ right of access/inspection ] over Western military activities beyond Europe.”

The West's unwillingness to cooperate with Russia didn't stop there.

When Moscow confirmed it was willing to discuss the extension of Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) with NATO to European Russia, its proposal that NATO should agree to include the US and Canada in the plan was called a “geographic ploy” by the alliance, and was rejected.

'It's all Russia's fault'

And when Soviet leader Yuri Andropov – who had been portrayed as an ex-KGB hardliner in the West – made a goodwill gesture to allow the extension of CBMs up to the Urals, the move was seen as a sign of weakness. Indeed, a memo shows how Western leaders felt they could use the situation to “put pressure to bear on the East” and leave the Soviets with the problem of “explaining publicly why the eminently sensible measures proposed are not acceptable to them.”

Another memo stressed that if any problems were encountered, those issues would be promptly blamed on Moscow.

“Any failure to resolve existing problems (or even to engage in meaningful debate) should be seen to be attributable to the Soviet Union (and its allies) and not to the West," reads a Steering Brief for the UK delegation at the CSCE Cultural Forum in Budapest, issued by the Foreign Office on October 15, 1985.

Such words seem bizarre, considering they were written at a time of thawing relations between the West and the USSR, particularly since former President Mikhail Gorbachev had visited the UK and taken part in a conversation with then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher regarding disarmament and improving international security. He went so far as to show Thatcher a secret map of Soviet missile targets in the UK, in an effort of transparency.

'Criticism worth preserving'

Despite the appearance of cooperation between the West and Russia, there was another mission taking place behind the scenes in London.

Assessing the value that the Madrid review of the Helsinki process had on Britain, a Foreign Office memo stated: "This standing to criticize the Eastern European governments’ policies, both domestic and foreign, in an international forum is well worth preserving."

A similar memo was passed around ahead of the Budapest Cultural Forum, stating: "…We must be ready to...refute any assertion by the East that they must protect themselves from Western cultural pollution – pornography, propaganda for racialism and violence.”

[TsarSamuil]

‘We’re in a new Cold War’ – Stephen Cohen on mounting US-NATO military on Russia border.

RT America
Feb 18, 2016



The Obama administration’s and NATO’s recent ramp up of forces on the Russian border has raised many questions on why the mainstream media and the presidential campaigns have failed to acknowledge the growing military presence in the region. RT’s Ed Schultz speaks with Stephen F. Cohen, professor and author of The Nation article called “The Obama Administration Recklessly Escalates Confrontation With Russia,” about the situation.

[TsarSamuil]

Carter defends $583bn budget, says Russia now ‘No 1 challenge’, ISIS well down the list.

RT.com
18 Mar, 2016 15:34

Russia is now the US’ number one threat, followed by China, North Korea, Iran and Islamic State, Pentagon Chief Ash Carter said at a Senate hearing on the DoD’s budget request. It comes as the Pentagon struggles to keep the budget to 2017 levels.

Challenges arising from the “great power competition” and Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) still require a $583-billion military budget, Carter said at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee on the 2017 defense budget request, according to a Pentagon press release.

“The first such challenge is in Europe, where we’re taking a strong and balanced approach to deter Russian aggression – we haven’t had to devote a significant portion of our defense investment to this possibility for 25 years, and while I wish it were otherwise, now we do,” Carter argued.

The Russian Defense Ministry believes that calling Russia a primary threat has become a habit in Washington’s top circles, as it happens every year prior to debate on the Pentagon’s annual budget requests.

“It is not a thing to be impressed by,” General Igor Konashenkov, spokesman for the ministry, said in February. “The reason is simple – the discussion of the military budget in Congress for the next year.One needs to remember that the ‘Russian threat’ has been the best-selling threat delivered by the Pentagon not only to Congress, but also to NATO partners since the middle of the previous century.”

Carter’s repeated warnings of the “Russian threat” are echoed by a chorus of top commanders and military officials, who recently lamented what they called America’s unpreparedness to counter Russia or China at sea, land and in the air.

On Thursday, Army Chief of Staff General Mark Milley told the House that the military’s ability to counter any two out of China, Iran, North Korea and Russia at a time is depleted. “I think the cost, both in terms of time, casualties in troops, and the ability to accomplish military objectives would be very significant.”

Earlier in March, commanders of US forces told the Senate they needed more funding to procure “very expensive” ballistic missiles, as Russian strategic rocket forces “are the only foreign military threat that could imperil our nation’s existence.”

Russian and Chinese policies are seen by the Pentagon as a return to the Cold War era, therefore justifying the need for a giant military budget.

In 2014, President Barack Obama listed the “Russian threat” only second after Ebola virus. IS, which had been gaining momentum in Iraq and Syria, surprisingly was number three on the list. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Obama’s ranking of global threats looked bizarre: “That's the worldview of a country that has spelt out its right to use force arbitrarily regardless of UN Security Council's resolutions or other international legal acts in its national defense doctrine.”

This year IS appeared at the very end of the Pentagon’s priorities list. The terror group was eclipsed by China, Iran and North Korea respectively, all described as “aggressive” countries.

Retired US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski told RT that portraying Russia and China as top threats is a justification of supporting arms sales and corporate sponsors. “I do believe that this is a justification for us to continue the flow, the pipeline of taxpayer money into these major weapon systems and their corporate sponsors, which of course are heavily influential.”

[TsarSamuil]

Vid,
www.rt.com/usa/336501-trump-russia-relations-putin/

Trump: ‘I want to get along with Russia’

RT.com
21 Mar, 2016 23:23

Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner for the 2016 presidential nomination, said he favors better relations with Russia and the rest of the world. He also questioned the need to spend a “fortune” on NATO, advocating a non-interventionist foreign policy.

Trump held a press conference in Washington, DC on Monday afternoon against the backdrop of a hotel he is building at the Old Post Office just blocks from the White House, which he hopes to occupy come January 2017. He is scheduled to address the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference later in the day.

Asked by RT’s Caleb Maupin if he wanted a better relationship with Russia, Trump seemed open to the idea.

“I want a better relationship with everybody. And with Russia, yeah,” he said. “If we can get along with Russia, that’s very good.”

“[Russian president Vladimir] Putin says very nice things about me. I think that’s very nice. It has no effect on me, other than I think it’s very nice,” the Republican front-runner added.

On the subject of Russia’s military operation in Syria, which was scaled back last week after President Putin declared that its main objectives had been accomplished, Trump appeared a lot more enthusiastic than White House officials.

“If Russia wants to spend millions of dollars a day dropping bombs on ISIS, I’m OK with that,” he said, referring to the Islamic State terror group. “Some people don’t like it. They say ‘No, no, that’s our job.’ It’s not our job. Let Russia… if they want to do that, I’m all for it.”

Trump then digressed into condemning the US loans that were extended to China while that country was building up its military bases in the South China Sea, before concluding that under his leadership, the US would do better in the world.

“I want to get along with all countries. And we will,” he concluded.

‘NATO, military deployments costing US a fortune’

In an interview with the Washington Post on Monday, Trump revealed the names of his foreign policy advisors and his “unabashedly noninterventionist” approach to world affairs. He spoke against engaging in expensive nation-building projects around the world while the US infrastructure is disintegrating, and questioned the wisdom of conducting massive troop buildups in Europe and East Asia.

“We certainly can’t afford to do this anymore,” Trump said, later adding, “NATO is costing us a fortune, and yes, we’re protecting Europe with NATO, but we’re spending a lot of money.”

The billionaire businessman also had some harsh words for NATO’s European members concerning the conflict in Ukraine.

“Ukraine is a country that affects us far less than it affects other countries in NATO, and yet we’re doing all of the lifting,” Trump said. “Why is it that Germany’s not dealing with NATO on Ukraine? Why is it that other countries that are in the vicinity of Ukraine, why aren’t they dealing? Why are we always the one that’s leading, potentially the Third World War with Russia.”

Sending the Washington establishment into shock once again, Trump dismissed the idea that the US benefited from its military deployments all over the planet. “I think we were a very powerful, very wealthy country, and we are a poor country now. We’re a debtor nation.”

Trump’s foreign policy team is led by Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions and includes retired General J. Keith Kellogg, Walid Phares, George Papadopoulos, Carter Page, and Joseph E. Schmitz.

Papadopoulos previously worked at the Hudson Institute, a conservative think-tank in Washington that is often critical of Russia and its leadership, while Page was a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations focusing on the Caspian Sea region and the economic development in former Soviet states, according to the Post.

[TsarSamuil]

Vid,
www.rt.com/news/337828-russia-challenge-threat-hammond/

Relentlessly critical: UK’s Hammond brands Russia a ‘challenge & threat,’ rejects cooperation.

RT.com
31 Mar, 2016 04:28

The British foreign secretary has rejected cooperation with Moscow until it “respects” the rules of the international system, to which Philip Hammond said Russia continues to pose a challenge and threat.

“Russia ignores the norms of international conduct and breaks the rules of the international system. That represents a challenge and a threat to all of us,” Hammond said during a two-day visit to Georgia. “There has to be a way that respects the rules of the international system if we are going to be able to do business together.”

The foreign secretary went on to say that it is time for Russia to play a “constructive” role on the world stage and follow the rules, accusing it of “aggression” in Ukraine, but he acknowledged the common goal between Britain and Russia of fighting Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) in Syria and Iraq.

“I have no doubt that Russia is sincere in its desire to defeat Daesh [the Arabic name for IS] in Iraq and Syria,” Hammond told Reuters on Wednesday. “But we need to work together on these things and we can only work in partnership with countries which accept the international rules by which we all have to live. We can't be working in partnership with a country one day and find that it is doing just exactly whatever it wants.”

The latest criticism is not the first time Hammond has attacked Moscow and Russian President Vladimir Putin in particular. Earlier this month, he pointed the finger at Moscow for supposedly being the only country that wants Britain to leave the European Union.

“None of our allies wants us to leave the EU – not Australia, not New Zealand, not Canada, not the US. In fact, the only country, if the truth is told, that would like us to leave the EU is Russia. That should probably tell us all we need to know,” he said during a speech at the Chatham House think-tank.

The UK stance on Russia’s role in Syria seems strange, a number of experts have told RT, considering that even the Pentagon has acknowledged Russia’s “constructive role” in the Syrian peace process.

“It's clear that they have focused more of their military attention on ISIL. We think that is a good thing. We encourage that from the start,” Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said during a briefing on Tuesday. “They're playing a constructive role with regard to the cessation of hostilities,” he added.

“It’s very interesting to see the increasingly different approaches towards Moscow, [from] Washington in comparison with London,” British Conservative MP Daniel Kawczynski told RT. “I’ve never known such a divergence between the two capitals in their approach towards Russia.”

Kawczynski acknowledged that Hammond “unfortunately” is “reflecting the general mood” of the Conservative party and the House of Commons, which views Russia in a “somewhat cautious way and are very fearful about Russian motives.”

At the same time, the MP said the Foreign Affairs Selective Committee understands the “importance of Anglo-Russian relations...[and] it is our responsibility to hold the government to account on foreign policy.”

Michael Raddie, co-editor of BSNews, told RT that not too many people in the UK view Hammond’s comments seriously.

“He hasn't made sense since he has been in the job. So either commenting against Russia or not commenting on Syrian and Arab bombing and Russian achievements in their campaign against terrorists within Syria – it does not surprise me at all,” Raddie said.

The UK does not side with Washington in its assessment of the Russian achievements in Syria, especially liberating Palmyra from the jihadists, because London ultimately continues to pursue regime change in Syria, Raddie believes.

“It is really deplorable that there has been no government spokesman from the UK at least praising the liberation of that historic town,” Raddie said. “I know that Phillip Hammond in particular and Michael Fallon [have] been relentlessly critical of Russia and in particular President Putin.”

For geopolitical reasons the UK “still has a plan of regime change in Syria,” to defend London’s financial interests in the region, which he says include building a natural gas pipelines from Qatar, across Syria into Turkey.

“They [UK politicians] do not care what the Syrian people want. They don’t care what the Syrian people have voted for. Their idea of democracy is that we will impose who they deem fit to run the country,” Raddie said, calling it a trend that has dominated British politics for decades.

“The British government all the way back to the 1950s was colluding with radical Islam,” Raddie explained. “Our proxy armies in the region they’ve done us proud. The British government is very supportive of ISIL. Whatever they say publicly, we know they have been arming them, supporting them, financing them with their allies in the region like Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE. So it is a charade now. People are beginning to realize that whatever the British government say, you [may] as well just flip it around and the opposite is probably going to be the truth.”

-------------

Philip Hammond has a funny way of showing his commitment to ‘international norms’

Danielle Ryan, RT
31 Mar, 2016 11:27

Gone are the good ol’ days when Russia was only a ‘threat’ to countries on its periphery. Moscow now represents a threat to “all of us” according to British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond.

Speaking to Reuters during a trip to Georgia, Hammond said Russia was a threat to all countries on the basis that it “ignores the norms of international conduct and breaks the rules of the international system” — and this, he said “represents a challenge and a threat to all of us.”

The first, but most minor point to make here is that Russia’s allies would probably beg to differ. Hammond’s comments are a prime example of the flippant way in which leaders and representatives of Western nations make sweeping statements about “us all” or the “international community” when what they actually mean is “us and our friends.”

But, like I said, that is a minor issue in comparison to the outrageously hypocritical reasoning Hammond gave to justify his opinion.

International law, except not for us

In March 2014, Curtis FJ Doebbler, a professor of international law in the Faculty of International Relations at Webster University in Geneva wrote for CounterPunch that “like any source of law, a large part of the legitimacy of international law depends on its equal application to all.” This, demonstrably, has not been the case when it comes to the United States.

American lawyers and diplomats, Doebbler continued, have attempted to twist international law “into an instrument justifying the actions of the United States, while criticizing the actions of other States based misinterpretations or misapplication” of that law.

There simply can be no question mark here. It is incontrovertibly true. To get through all the examples of Washington’s blatant disregard for international law would take an eternity. But let’s do a quick recap of some of the more egregious examples:

∙ US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, illegal under international law: Civilian death toll up for debate, a Guardian report estimated that as many as 20,000 could have been killed in the first year of conflict alone.
∙ US invasion of Iraq in 2003, illegal under international law: Left one million dead, according to various reports.
∙ NATO intervention in Libya in 2011 violated the parameters of the UN resolution permitting NATO action, hence also illegal. The intervention left scores of civilians dead and hundreds of thousands displaced. Libya, once the richest country in Africa, is now a failed state.
∙ US bombing of Syria in 2014, illegal under international law. Washington has been given no authority to carry out airstrikes in Syria. Nor, by the way, has the United Kingdom (maybe someone should tell Hammond?)
∙ Ongoing use of drone strikes, killing hundreds of innocents, including children.
∙ Continued use of Guantanamo Bay for indefinite detention and torture of people ‘perceived’ as threats. In one of the grossest injustices, Shaker Aamer was held at Guantanamo for 13 years without trial or charge before finally being reunited with his family in the UK.

None of this is up for debate — and yet Hammond has not, to my knowledge, classified the United States as a threat to “all of us”. If breaking international law is the benchmark here, it would follow that he probably should.

What’s an invasion or two among friends?

Unfortunately, as Hammond has just displayed, Western nations often confuse ‘consensus among friends’ to mean ‘legal’. As such, they believe that none of their actions deserve to be scrutinized in the same manner as the actions of their declared enemies. This however, does not stop them from using the subject of international law as an “instrument of political rhetoric” to condemn other countries.

Washington has displayed such flagrant disregard for international “norms” and the “rules of the international system” so consistently and so appalling that the world has become desensitized to it. To acknowledge the sheer scale of the horror that has been unleashed by our collective indifference is too uncomfortable. Our best bet is to distract ourselves with a convenient bogeyman.

Hammond might be happy to bury his head in the sand, but it doesn’t make what he is saying any less ridiculous when all the facts are laid on the table.

What Hammond really means

And it’s not the first time Hammond has hugely exaggerated (or fabricated, if you prefer) the threat Russia poses to the UK. In March of last year, he said Russia could potentially pose the “single greatest threat” to Britain’s security. It’s unclear what kind of alternate universe you need to be living in to believe this, but what is clear is that Hammond has upped sticks and taken residence there.

The truth is, what Hammond and his neighbors in cuckoo-land really mean when they say these things is that Russia is a threat to Western dominance; the dominance that allows their own breaches of international law to go unchecked and unpunished and anyone else’s to be amplified a thousand-fold. Any threat or challenge to that hegemony in international affairs is unacceptable. And that, more than anything, is the threat which Russia represents.

The funny thing is, Hammond probably doesn’t think that’s what he means. He probably genuinely believes that Russia threatens the security of Britain. Whether he thinks this conflict might take the form of an invasion, an unprovoked nuclear attack, information warfare or something else, he has probably convinced himself that there really is cause for huge concern. After all, he has admitted that for “anyone over the age of about 50” fearing Russia is familiar territory. He is not an expert on today’s Russia, its political system or its foreign policy. All he really has to go on are his bad memories of the Cold War and whatever terribly misinformed advice he is being given.

But threat or no threat, if the “rules of the international system” are really that important to Philip Hammond, he’s got a funny way of showing it.

[TsarSamuil]

Pentagon chief seeks reforms, calls Russia ‘No. 1 strategic threat’

RT.com
6 Apr, 2016 05:35

Seeking to make the US military more efficient and better coordinated in the face of “strategic threat” from Russia, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter is looking for “practical updates” to the Pentagon’s organizational framework established in the 1970s.

Speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, DC, Carter said the reforms were necessary to make the US military more “agile” and able to address the five strategic challenges, which he named as “Russia, China, North Korea, Iran and terrorism.”

The current organization of the US military, from the territorial organization of Combatant Commands to the role of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff outside the chain of command, is a product of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act, signed into law in October 1986.

While the 1986 reform was driven by the lessons of Vietnam and the botched 'Desert One' hostage rescue in Iran, Carter said the updates were not driven by failure.

“I am deeply proud of how our people operated in Iraq and Afghanistan over the 15 years,” he said.

The changes, proposed by the Pentagon’s Deputy Chief Management Officer Peter Levine and Joint Staff Lieutenant-General Thomas Waldhauser after a months-long review, seek to give the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS) more authority to advise and coordinate between different services and commands, make the commands more efficient, and improve the acquisition process, among other things.

“Over the coming weeks, we will execute some of these decisions under our own existing authority,” said the Defense Secretary, adding that others may require legislative action.

The reforms envision expanding the authority of the CJCS to “help synchronize resources globally for daily operations around the world,” coordinating forces across the seams of combatant commands; provide military advice for current operations, not just future planning; and to advise the Secretary of Defense on military strategy and operational plans, taking into consideration possible “overlapping contingencies.”

Carter defended keeping the CJCS outside the chain of command, arguing this would ensure preserving his integrity as the principal military adviser to the civilian authorities.

Redundancies between the Combat Commands will be eliminated by integrating some of their functions at the Joint Staff level, Carter said. The DOD is committed to reducing headquarters management by 25 percent, while pouring $35 billion into Cyber Command over the next five years.

To ensure the service chiefs are more involved in the acquisition process, the reforms would give them a seat on the acquisition board. With the greater responsibility will come increased accountability, Carter warned.

“The chiefs themselves, and their military staffs, will need to sharpen this skillset, which in places has atrophied over the years, to be successful in discharging their new acquisition responsibilities,” he said.

‘Russia a threat to US world hegemony concept’

Gerry Sussman, professor of Urban Studies and Planning at Portland State University, explained to RT that Russia, just as the Soviet Union in the past, has become a “unifying theme” for US foreign policy strategists, allowing them to put together “a very disunified foreign policy around a common target.”

Without a coherent foreign policy strategy and with a lack of leadership on behalf of the current US president, Russia “serves as a unifying force to build a kind of a new Cold-War consensus to give some semblance of direction to American foreign policy where there really isn’t any.”

“The US has actually lost quite a bit of power over the years in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, and I think it’s just a way of creating an old boogeyman in the person of President [Vladimir] Putin and in Russia itself,” he argued, adding that to make matters worse, various US defense and intelligence agencies are in “disarray” over policy making.

The disproportionate attention given by the US media to Putin in connection with the Panama Papers leak – despite the fact that his name was not even mentioned in the batch – is the latest example of Russia’s demonization, according to Sussman.

“The main focus was on President Putin rather than some of the American allies, including Mr Poroshenko in Ukraine, who has been actually listed,” he said.

Responding to the question of what threat Russia could possibly present to the USA, the expert said that Moscow poses “a threat to American global interests…to its hegemony around the world” by challenging Washington’s concept of “hegemonic power that seeks global domination.”

It’s not by accident that terrorism was last on the Pentagon’s list of threats, Sussman said, calling it an “instrumental threat” which, however acute at the moment, is not much of a danger to the American superpower concept – unlike Russia and China.

Since Russia started playing the central role in fighting Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) in Syria, the Syrian Army has achieved major advances supported by the Russian Air Force, including the recent liberation of Palmyra. Such conduct, according to Sussman, directly interferes with the US image as the main anti-terror warrior and undermines its long-term interest of undisputed global power.

[TsarSamuil]

Vid,
www.rt.com/news/339796-russia-existential-threat-poland/

Russia more dangerous than ‘non-existential ISIS threat’ – Polish FM.

RT.com
16 Apr, 2016 05:08

Islamic State and other terrorist groups do not represent an existential threat to Europe, unlike Moscow and perceived aggression on its part, claimed foreign minister Witold Waszczykowski in the latest round of anti-Russian “nonsense” coming from Polish politicians.

“By all evidence, Russia’s activity is a sort of existential threat because this activity can destroy countries,” said Witold Waszczykowski, while visiting annual Globsec security forum in Bratislava.

When asked specifically about the threat of Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), when compared to Russia, the minister said that while being a very serious one, “this is not an existential threat for Europe.”

“We also have non-existential threats like terrorism, like the great waves of migrants,” he added.

Speaking on the future role of NATO in the global security context, Waszczykowski called for the resurrection of the alliance’s old Cold War function as a bulwark against Moscow. During his speech at the debate titled, “Future of NATO – Will Warsaw deliver?” the Foreign Minister presented Polish expectations for the July NATO summit in Warsaw, as he called for more troops to defend NATO’s eastern borders.

“The presence of troops from various NATO countries could be a symbol of determination to defend the eastern flank,” he said, Polish news agency PAP quotes. “We can discuss the scale of this deployment.”

The deployment of NATO forces in the region should not be considered as a provocation against Russia, Waszczykowski said but rather a decisive action so that Alliance would be able to deter potential aggressors: “Showing weakness is often seen as an incentive for aggression.”

Polish politicians are no strangers to using provocative anti-Russian rhetoric to portray Moscow as a global threat. Just last month the country’s defense minister Antoni Macierewicz accused Moscow of staging the Polish presidential plane crash over Smolensk in 2010, claiming his country had become the “first great victim of terrorism in the modern conflict.”

Russia’s 70th Victory Day parade in Moscow was dubbed by then-Polish President, Bronisław Komorowski, as a symbol of instability in Europe, despite the fact that it was the USSR that drove Nazism from Poland.

“Soon Red Square will turn into an armored square again. The divisions that recently attacked Ukraine in front of the whole world and in front of Poland will be demonstrating their strength,” said Komorowski at the time.

Interestingly enough, no one at the Globsec forum challenged the Polish Foreign Minister's claim that Russia poses an “existential threat” while the Islamic State group does not, despite the fact that numerous ISIS attacks in Europe have petrified the entire continent.

Since proclaiming its so-called caliphate in June 2014, Islamic State jihadists, according to a CNN tally, have conducted at least 90 terrorist attacks in 21 countries other than Iraq and Syria. Those attacks have killed at least 1,390 people and injured more than 2,000 others. At least 14 attacks occurred in Europe alone, including Russia.

Yet most have decided to jump on the Russia-bashing bandwagon, with the Czech defence minister calling for the strengthening of the alliance’s collective defense capability against Russia.

“Russia is testing our defense capabilities, attention and our commitment regarding the protection of air and sea space,” said Martin Stropnicky. He also noted that “many of our allies in the Baltic region, including Finland and Sweden became the subject of intense propaganda developed by Russia.”

The fact that NATO, despite promises not to expand, has long consolidated along Russia’s borders following the collapse of the Warsaw Pact was largely ignored at the security forum. It began as a pledge by the first Bush Administration to Gorbachev that in return for German unification there would be “not an inch” of NATO expansion. However, NATO went on to draft nearly the entire former “Warsaw Pact” expanding its membership by 12 nations.

Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic joined the organization in 1999, followed by the accession of seven central and eastern states: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia in 2004. The most recent members include Albania and Croatia which joined in 2009.

NATO continued to grow. In 2011, NATO officially recognized four aspiring members: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Macedonia, and Montenegro.

Yet speaking on Friday, minister Waszczykowski insisted that Russia is a threat and made it clear that NATO’s ability to effectively deter it depends on the geographical distribution of "defense capabilities." Commenting on the Polish NATO summit, the FM said: “We expect a decision that will change the status of security in the region.”

“There is only one conclusion: Polish Ministers exert an existential threat to common sense,” Russian Foreign Affairs Committee head, Aleksey Pushkov, said of the Polish statement on Friday. Commenting on Macierewicz’s statement last month, Pushkov recalled that even former president and solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa, “recognized” that terrorist allegations against Moscow are “nonsense”.

[TsarSamuil]

US Council on Foreign Affairs Unveils Absurdist Video Portrayal of Russia.

Sputnik
RUSSIA 02:10 27.04.2016

In preparation for a Cold-War-stoking bi-monthly edition of Foreign Affairs magazine, the council, opting for a lowest-common-denominator reflection of their editorial bias, represents one of the world’s most diverse societies with annoyingly bigoted cultural tropes, including vodka, bears, and unusual string instruments.

Last Wednesday, a leading publication for America’s neo-conservative war hawks, Foreign Affairs magazine, posted a video on their Facebook page to promote this week’s issue titled: "Putin’s Russia: Down But Not Out," featuring the musings of aging Cold-War-era policy analysts affiliated with the country’s top defense contractors.

​The bi-monthly publication is issued by a nonprofit 4,900-member think tank, the Council on Foreign Relations. The council has often been tied to allegations that the organization aims to establish their own elitist government and that its membership includes the “deep state” of American oligarchs who actually drive the country’s foreign policy.

The group did little to dispel these conspiracy theories, in posting an awkward and over-the-top anti-Russia propaganda video edited to dehumanize and caricaturize the country in a fashion not seen since the late ‘80s. Facebook users expressed disgust at the Russia-phobic depiction:

Video producer Sarah Foster will likely be looking for another job after users get a taste of the vodka-glass-themed video, accompanied by an old-time folk string instrument apparently aiming to be reminiscent of the theme song of a hit cable-tv series, "The Americans," which itself portrays a stylized, fantastical impression of Russian spies.

The video colorfully declares that Russia is a "basket case," an "imperfect democracy," and a "wounded bear," according to unnamed "experts."

The online advertisement finishes with a lot of vodka and a spinning vodka glass, perhaps depicting the fluid encouragement used by the producers to create the amusingly obtuse video polemic.​

[TsarSamuil]

Vid,
www.rt.com/usa/341179-pentagon-budget-carter-russia/

In pursuit of 2017 budget, Pentagon sees danger everywhere.

RT.com
27 Apr, 2016 21:53

Citing dangers to US military dominance, the Pentagon’s top civilian and military officials pleaded with Congress to give them almost $600 billion in funding for 2017. Russia and China topped the list of challenges, with ISIS bringing up the rear.

Testifying before the defense subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee on Wednesday, Defense Secretary Ash Carter and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford made the case for a budget of $582.7 billion for the 2017 fiscal year, including the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) fund.

Carter described the “five evolving challenges” driving the Pentagon’s planning and budgeting for the near future, naming “Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, and terrorism.”

In the Asia-Pacific, “China is rising, which is fine, but behaving aggressively, which is not,” Carter said, citing Beijing’s land reclamation efforts in the South China Sea. “China is investing in capabilities to counter third-party – including the United States – intervention during a crisis or conflict,” Carter added.

Money-wise, fighting Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorists in Iraq and Syria remains one of the Pentagon’s priorities, with the requested budget for Operation Inherent Resolve doubling to $7.5 billion in 2017. However, Carter requested only $250 million for “enabling Syrian anti-ISIL forces” – down from $600 million requested for 2016 for a program that lawmakers have described as a “total failure.”

On the other hand, the budget requested for beefing up US presence in Europe has been more than quadrupled to $3.4 billion. Carter said this was necessary to reassure NATO allies in face of what he called “Russian aggression” in Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova.

“We have a lot of concerns about Russia,” Carter said, citing Moscow’s alleged expertise in “hybrid warfare.”

Rather than giving the Russian aerospace forces credit for helping the Syrian government defeat IS in Aleppo and Palmyra, Carter accused Moscow of “pouring gasoline on a civil war, fueling the very extremism Russia claims to oppose.”

General Dunford gave Russia credit for “increasingly sophisticated military capabilities and doctrine,” and called it a “peer competitor” to the US in cyberspace. It was his explanation of the US military’s mission that put the fear of Russia – and China – into context, however.

The US armed forces “must be capable of simultaneously defending the homeland while waging a global counterterrorism campaign, deterring potential aggressors, and assuring allies,” Dunford told lawmakers, while possessing such overwhelming capabilities that US troops are never sent into a fair fight.

Billions and billions of dollars will be required to fulfill that tall order. However, unless Congress can head off the spending cuts mandated by the sequestration policy, the Pentagon might face $100 billion in cuts between 2018 and 2021, “which would introduce unacceptable risks,” Carter warned.

Carter also took a jab at the House Armed Services Committee’s markup of the defense budget, which seeks to divert about $18 billion from the warfighting OCO fund “and spend that money on programmatic items we didn’t request.”

[TsarSamuil]

David Cameron's moral sickness.

John Wight, RT
10 May, 2016 14:56

Associating Russia with ISIS when it comes to identifying global threats surely adds new meaning to perverse. To his ignominy and shame Britain’s David Cameron has done exactly that, evidence of the moral sickness that afflicts his government.

It says much about his desperation to forestall a growing tide of popular support within Britain for the country’s exit from the EU that its Prime Minister should talk up the threat of a “newly belligerent Russia” as the countdown to the country’s June referendum on EU membership continues. However, desperation gives way to disgrace when we consider the quote in full: “We see a newly belligerent Russia, the rise of the Daesh (ISIS) network to our east and to our south the migration crisis," Cameron said during a speech in London on behalf of the Remain campaign.

Making Cameron’s outrageous and deeply insulting comparison between Russia and ISIS even more significant is that it came just as Russia was marking its annual Victory Day commemoration, when the nation stops to remember the epic struggle the country and its people waged against the Nazi onslaught. It was a struggle won at huge, almost unbearable cost, attested to by the 27 million who lost their lives and the countless villages, towns, and cities left decimated.

One world leader who understood the enormity of the Russian and Soviet peoples’ sacrifice and role in defeating the Nazis was Winston Churchill, Britain’s Prime Minister during the Second World War. In a speech to the House of Commons in August 1944, Churchill reminded the British people that “it is the Russian armies who have done the main work in tearing the guts out of the German army. In the air and on the oceans we could maintain our place, but there was no force in the world which could have been called into being, except after several more years, that would have been able to maul and break the German army unless it had been subjected to the terrible slaughter and manhandling that has fallen to it through the strength of the Russian Soviet Armies.”

Wind the clock forward seventy years and we find Russia engaged in fighting the very ISIS terrorists that Cameron sees fit to equate with it. Just to remind the Prime Minister and others who view the situation as he does, Russia is an advanced industrialized nation of 145 million people with a history stretching back centuries, whose contribution to art, literature, science, and world civilization goes before it. ISIS on the other hand is a latter day death cult of medieval head choppers, currently embarked on a campaign of human and cultural genocide across Syria and Iraq. Without Russia’s “belligerence” it is a campaign which by now would have be well on the way to victory, rather than headed for defeat.

David Cameron and his team would benefit from spending just five minutes on the internet looking up the name Aleksandr Prokhorenko. Having done so, if there is any decency in him at all, Cameron should then get on the first flight to Russia and kneel at the feet of Prokhorenko’s family, begging their forgiveness for daring to insult a man whose heroism shames the British Prime Minister, along with the life of comfort and privilege he has only ever known.

Describing a country as “newly belligerent” for being willing to defend its borders is absurd. Victory Day in Russia is a stark reminder of the consequences the last time an invader came calling. It is a lesson the Russian people learned not in history books or in classrooms but in the crucible of total war. And failing to learn from history, as every sentient being knows, is to be doomed to repeat it.

Speaking of which, Russia’s recent history includes the demise of the former Soviet Union. The economic, societal, and cultural shock its people experienced as a result of its demise was bad enough. The attempt by the West to exploit this turmoil by reducing Russia to a neo-colony of Western financial capital turned bad into criminal. The ideological and triumphalist mendacity driving this effort is perfectly encapsulated in the words of Harvard University historian and Cold War security advisor, Richard Pipes, during the period. In response to the crisis that had engulfed Russian society, Pipes stated that it would be desirable “for Russia to keep on disintegrating until nothing remains of its institutional structures.”

Reading those words today confirms the Carthaginian fate that US neocons and their European allies had in store for Russia and its people in the early 1990s.

This is why when David Cameron criticizes Russia’s “new belligerency”, what he really means is “new recovery”. And when he seeks to equate Russia with ISIS, what he is really doing is projecting his own government’s inadequacy in failing to halt the march of this death cult onto the only country outside the Middle East that has.

Nobody knows how the British people will vote when they go to the polls in the country’s referendum on the EU in June. What we can say without any fear of contradiction, however, is that whatever the result – whether it is exit or remain – David Cameron is certain to go down in history as one of the most dishonorable prime ministers Britain has ever had.

Given the field of candidates in this category, it is no mean achievement.

[TsarSamuil]

'2017: War With Russia' Ex-NATO chief's fictional story of nuclear war becomes bestseller.

RT
May 29, 2016



NATO’s former deputy military chief in Europe says his book, a fictional story which describes a nuclear war with Russia over the Baltic nations taking place in 2017, is based on an 'entirely plausible' scenario.

[TsarSamuil]

Russians list US, Ukraine & Turkey as country’s main enemies in latest poll.

RT.com
2 Jun, 2016 10:58

The United States, Ukraine and Turkey top the nations that Russians see as most hostile to their motherland with Belarus, Kazakhstan and China traditionally seen as friendliest, a recent poll has shown.

According to the results of the research, conducted by independent pollster the Levada Center, reports that 72 percent of Russians identified the US as the country that is most hostile toward Russia. Ukraine was second with 48 percent and Turkey came third with 29 percent (researchers allowed every respondent to name several countries in response to this question). The opinion about the US remained approximately the same year-on-year, with 73 percent of Russians seeing it as the most hostile nation in 2015, but Ukraine’s image deteriorated, with a higher proportion than last year’s 37 percent seeing it as an enemy last year. Only 1 percent of the Russian public named Turkey as an opponent in 2015.

When asked about which nations they thought to be the friendliest toward their country, 50 percent of Russians identified Belarus, 39 percent named Kazakhstan and 43 percent said China. Also, Syria came relatively high in the rating of Russia’s perceived friends, with 10 percent of respondents, against just 2 percent last year.

When asked about their own negative sentiments towards foreign nations, 70 percent said that they disliked the US the most, 62 percent named the European Union and 63 percent confessed to negative feelings toward Ukraine.

The Levada Center’s deputy director, Aleksey Grazhdankin, said in comments with popular business daily Vedomosti that Russians’ attitude to the US and the EU hit a record low in early 2015 and after this the situation started to improve, but in May this year it started deteriorating again. Grazhdantkin blamed this on the celebrations of Russia’s victory in WWII, or more specifically on the fact that western nations did not acknowledge Russia’s leading role in the defeat of the Nazis. “There are no other factors,” the expert said.

Grazhdankin went on to explain the negative sentiments toward Ukraine by the fact that Kiev authorities cannot solve the conflict with the self-proclaimed republics in Donetsk and Lugansk. He also recalled the downing of the Russian jet by Turkish Air Force in Syria, saying the yet unresolved incident is the most likely reason of Russians’ negative attitude toward Turkey.

In August 2015, state-run research center VTsIOM studied the perception of the US in Russia and found that it had drastically deteriorated, with 59 percent of respondents thinking that the current Washington administration is extremely hostile toward Russia and its people. In February 2015, VTsIOM reported that about 68 percent of Russian citizens thought the likelihood of foreign military aggression towards their country has increased, but 49 percent considered the state of Russian military as good and capable of repelling any attacks.