Deterrence By Savagery
“The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.”
― Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996)
Western colonialism began in the fifteenth century and ended, with a few exceptions, in the mid of the 20th century. It was enabled by the development of technologies and fast population growth. The West then changed to a new model of ruling the world. It talked about human values and human rights and certain rules that would allegedly enable everyone to enjoy those.
The facade did not hold up well. The West, and especially the U.S., abused the 'rules based order' by circumventing international law whenever it did not fit its interests. It continued to apply 'organized violence' under dubious circumstances. The wars against Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq were supposed to demonstrate that the West would uphold whatever rules it claimed to exist. But the wars were lost and the U.S. had to retreat from them.
The war in Ukraine is only the latest but most obvious demonstration that the 'rules based order' no longer exists:
Over the past several decades, the United States has continually placed Moscow in a position either to accept the fait accompli of NATO expansion at the expense of Russian security interests, or to escalate with force and suffer the consequences of increased economic and political ostracization. This disincentive to avoid escalation has been effectively removed. Explicating the altered state of international relations is not cheerleading for the Russian position — although it may be treated as such by those who disingenuously present any realistic assessment of the situation as “appeasement” — but rather illustrating how Moscow has insulated itself from Western ostracization, thus changing the entire balance of power in not only Europe, but the world.Now, it is Russia that has the West on the horns of a dilemma: It can either watch the Kremlin achieve its strategic objectives, guaranteed in a one-sided negotiated settlement or through the continued attrition of Ukrainian forces, or it can escalate with force. Putin’s statement regarding nuclear weapons was not mere rhetoric—it was the Russian president defining the limits of the current conflict from a position of authority.
Anything short of total Ukrainian victory is therefore an implicit admission that the “rules-based” economic and political order has been irreversibly altered.
This morning hypersonic weapons destroyed an SBU headquarter in Kiev just seconds after the air alarm was activated. Western air defenses had failed. Russia has destroyed the myth of the West's superiority in applying organized violence.
Others have taken note. The recent flare up in U.S. relations with Niger is a consequence of this:
The pressure brought to Niger reveals that Washington is supporting the war against Russia for reasons other than the right of Ukraine to choose its partners and join NATO, or that that right only applies when the partner being chosen is the United States and NATO but not Russia. The core principle, then, is not the right of a sovereign nation to choose its partner, but the right of a sovereign nation to partner with the United States.The American attitude toward Niger and Russia reveals a second lesson. A key response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine was to isolate Russia and reinforce the U.S.-led unipolar world. It has not worked.
The United States has expressed concern that the “Russian Federation is really trying to take over central Africa as well as the Sahel.” Thurston told me that the U.S. is “very worried about Russian influence throughout the Sahel, and it has a particular sting in Niger given the previous closeness of the relationship.”
He added that the United States “seems to regard competition with Russia in Africa as zero-sum; whereas, most African governments don’t see things that way.” And that is the hallmark of the emerging multipolar world that the U.S. is trying to hold back. Saudi Arabia has said “we do not believe in polarization or in choosing between sides.” India’s Minister of External Affairs, S. Jaishankar, in his book, The Indian Way, describes the new multipolar world as one in which countries deal “with contesting parties at the same time with optimal results” for their “own self-interest.”
Having lost its two main sources power, the rules based order as a (somewhat) soft power instrument and its military hard power superiority, the West is in need of a new instrument of deterrence, a new tool that allows it to press its interest against the will of other powers.
It found that in demonstrating utter savagery.
The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide. That it will do everything to prevent international organizations to intervene against this.
That it is willing to eliminate everyone and everything that resists it.
Those nations who commit themselves to multi-polarity should steel themselves for what might be visited on them.
Posted by b on March 25, 2024 at 17:02 UTC | Permalink
next page »Ancient Egyptians held Cats in the highest esteem, cats were praised for killing venomous snakes, rodents and birds that damaged crops and protecting Pharaoh since at least 1st Dynasty (3100-2900 BC) of Egypt. Cats were also represented in social and religious scenes dating as early as 1980 BC. Skeletal remains of cats were found among funerary goods dating to 12th Dynasty (1991-1802 BC). Protective function of cats is indicated in Book of the Dead, where a cat represents Ra and benefits of sun for life on Earth. Cat-shaped decorations used during New Kingdom of Egypt indicate that domesticated cat became more popular in daily life. Cats were depicted in association with name of Bastet.
Mafdet was first known cat-headed deity in ancient Egypt. During 1st Dynasty, she was regarded as protector of pharaoh's chambers against snakes, scorpions and evil. She was often also depicted with head of leopard (Panthera pardus) or cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus). She was particularly prominent during reign of Den. Deity Bastet is known from at least 2nd Dynasty (2890-2686 BC) onwards. At the time, she was depicted with a lion (Panthera leo) head. Seals and stone vessels with her name were found in tombs of pharaohs Khafre and Nyuserre Ini, indicating that she was regarded as protector since mid 30th Century BC, during 4th-5th Dynasties. A wall painting in 5th Dynasty's burial ground at Saqqara shows a small cat with a collar, suggesting that tamed African wildcats were kept in pharaonic quarters by 26th Century BC.
Amulets with cat heads came into fashion in 21st Century BC, during 11th Dynasty. A mural from this period in tomb of Baqet III depicts a cat in hunting scene confronting a rat-like rodent. From 22nd Dynasty at around mid 950s BC onwards, Bastet and her temple in Bubastis grew in popularity. She was later shown only with small cat head. Domestic cats were increasingly worshipped and considered sacred. When they died, they were embalmed, coffined and buried in cat cemeteries. Domestic cat was regarded as living incarnation of Bastet who protects household against granivores, whereas lion-headed deity Sekhmet was worshipped as protector of pharaohs. During reign of Pharaoh Osorkon II in 9th Century BC, temple of Bastet was enlarged by a festival hall. Cat statues and statuettes from this period exist in diverse sizes and materials, including solid and hollow cast bronze, alabaster and faïence. The penalties of injuring a cat were severe and killing a cat leads to capital punishment. When the cat dies it is the duty of the owner to gave them proper burial along with rituals and shave their head, eyebrows or beard to show their grief and even conduct after life rituals for their cat in order to gain blessings from Goddess Bastet.
In mid 5th Century BC, Herodotus described, annual festival at Bubastis temple, attended by several hundred thousand pilgrims. During Hellenistic period between 323-30 BC, cats were systematically bred to be killed and to be mummified as sacrifices to gods. As described by Diodorus Siculus, killing a cat was regarded as a serious crime. During 60-56 BC, outraged people lynched a Roman for killing a cat, although pharaoh Ptolemy XII Auletes tried to intervene.
Cats and religion began to be disassociated after Egypt became a Roman province in 30 BC. A series of decrees and edicts issued by Roman Emperors in 4th-5th Centuries AD, gradually curtailed practice of paganism and pagan rituals in Egypt. Pagan temples were impounded and sacrifices prohibited by 380 AD. Egypt has since experienced a decline in veneration once held for cats. They were still respected in 15th Century AD, when Arnold von Harff travelled to Egypt and observed mamluk warriors treating cats with honour and empathy. Gentle treatment of cats is part of Islamic tradition.
Posted by: Camu | Mar 25 2024 17:11 utc | 2
Aleks, from BMA wrote a great piece about it. Describing the events in detail.
Great post B
I would go further and say the video of the 4 lads shooting and slashing innocent Russian people in broad daylight is another example of how far our sadistic rulers are willing and always have been willing to go.
Since the farce of nineeleven and the utter brutality against our supposed own people, the rules based order wermacht have been on overdrive and they won't back down.
Their deliberate ransoming of the world by rules based ss in Jerusalem is their final act, 90 or so nuclear war heads in the hands of 'out of control Netenayou' is all they've left.
God help us all.
Posted by: Eoin Clancy | Mar 25 2024 17:17 utc | 4
Gosh you mean there's hypocrisy and lies at the center of international diplomacy?
I'm shocked I tell you, shocked.
Multi polarity only exists because of a balance of power in Eurasia, which is unlikely to change. If any pole did acquire the equivalent of guns to effortlessly destroy their rivals they would, its just not true right now or likely to happen in the short to medium term either.
Regardless the US as defined today will always be the most powerful nation. In order for true multipolarity to be sustainable the US will need to divided into at least three parts, possibly more depending on how well the east coast is able to hold the Mississippi basin area.
In short let's not carried away with who's good and bad. True the west isn't a force for good right now but any group with excessive power is a danger.
Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Mar 25 2024 17:21 utc | 5
B. Great insights. Thank you.
I’d only add that once someone has seen the light in one area ( aka red pilled ), they never again accept Washington’s lies. What this means is over time more and more Westerners are red pilled.
Posted by: Exile | Mar 25 2024 17:22 utc | 6
Thank you for this B, I shudder to think what the future could hold.
Posted by: Canuck Sanko | Mar 25 2024 17:27 utc | 7
Indeed, b. One might argue that Russia is winning the industrial war in Ukraine, but what if the West doesn’t accept the “industrial war theater” and tries to move the conflict to a theater where it hopes to prevail: cyber, nuclear, space, or indeed “savagery”?
Posted by: Marvo 2 | Mar 25 2024 17:32 utc | 8
‘Working with people who confuse Austria & Australia is hard’
– Putin on US establishment
I DON'T KNOW IF HE ACTUALLY SAID THAT BUT IT MATCHES CERTAIN REALITIES.
Posted by: MD | Mar 25 2024 17:34 utc | 9
Thanks for the posting b.
I am reading lots of distractive comments already which speaks to the veracity of your words.
Can our species evolve beyond barbarism? That barbarism is used to maintain the God Of Mammon cult of global private finance that exists at the core of the social contract in the West.
The SMO in Ukraine is a proxy war of God Of Mammon rule
The genocide in Gaza is a proxy war of God Of Mammon rule
Humanity is in a civilization war about how finance is run as part of the social contract.....by sovereign governments as a public utility for citizens or, as now in the West, to instantiate and maintain a class based social order with ongoing inheritance and accumulation of wealth/power.
Our civilization war is not about capitalism, socialism, communism, Marxism, or other isms or religions, its about how the social contract is structured.....you know, that REALITY thing instead of myth.
Posted by: psychohistorian | Mar 25 2024 17:34 utc | 10
The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide. That it will do everything to prevent international organizations to intervene against this.
That it is willing to eliminate everyone and everything that resists it
Which means that someone, or something, will have to intervene in order to stave off Empire's use of nuclear weapons.
Posted by: john | Mar 25 2024 17:34 utc | 11
"This morning hypersonic weapons destroyed an SBU headquarter in Kiev just seconds after the air alarm was activated."
Excellent!
The Huntington quote put me off a bit, but your explanation after it seemed to get at what bothered me. Just because the west has become a late imperialist monstrosity does not erase it's historical and intellectual value. Western capitalist ascent and dominance was a period of change that was essential to global development and it requires study. The constructive element of that period passed long, long ago, but it did exist and merits study.
To judge all of Western society on the conduct of the current oligarchical regime that sits atop it is an error. These creatures do not represent the west, it's history or values. They represent only themselves and their billionaire masters.
In the heart of the people many progressive elements of western history and values live on: the enlightenment, the American Revolution and Civil War, the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution. You see that in the comments of all the western posters here at MOA.
I would say the best of the western heritage is carried forward today by Russia in it's undying opposition to fascism and the monstrosity of US imperialism.
Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Mar 25 2024 17:36 utc | 13
Posted by: Don Firineach | Mar 25 2024 17:35 utc | 13
Beware the beast Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone among God's primates, he kills for sport or lust or greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him; drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of death.
The Lawgiver, (as spoken by Cornelius in Planet of the Apes)
Posted by: lex talionis | Mar 25 2024 17:43 utc | 14
The psycho is wearing a bomb belt and is willing to kill everyone at the party if the band doesn’t play the tune he wants to hear and he cannot say who gets to dance with whom.
It’s a tough situation that humanity finds itself in.
Posted by: William Gruff | Mar 25 2024 17:45 utc | 15
An excellent quote to start with b. So few in the west understand this.
“The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.”
― Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996)
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 17:46 utc | 16
characterizing western nation state foreign policies in terms of "applied violence, organized to accomplish strategic private-party elite gain" helps to explain the division existing inside of the Western nations [the halves vs the have nots].
This divide is easy to recognize.. 99% of the wealth is allocated to 1% of the populations of the Western nation states, while 1% of the wealth is allocated to the masses (99% of the population). Wealth disparity is accomplished by rule of law.
In addition to wealth as a dividing line, is the outward reach of the nation state beyond the boundaries of the nation. Here too the wealthy 1% get 100% of the benefit while the rest of the world get 100% of the cost of the outreach (blood, dollars, lost infra-structure, and torn apart nations).
I don't think the nations who "commit themselves to multi-polarity" are strong enough to defend themselves from the 1%(private wealthy interest who copt national governments for private gain) nor are these multi polar nations strong enough to impose equality; instead it it going to take the whole of the masses (the 99% so to speak) to come together as one strong, single minded body, before the wealth can be redistributed and the cost reward benefits can be fairly distributed among those who are the governed.
Worse, I fear, is that those who do the work are being replaced by robots and automatons.. so the 99% will be even less able to defend themselves and their weaken situation will further weaken their government's ability to help the 99%.
I think Israel has shown the world what this new force (tool) you speak of likely is: bute force! Genocide is on the rise because the 1% intend to use the nation states they control, to wipe out, eradicate, and eliminate any and all competition to its monopoly powers. Gaza has proved that nothing will or can stand in their way.
Push the Gaza-ians out to enable oil and gas profits.
Posted by: snake | Mar 25 2024 17:47 utc | 17
Well, one thing is clear to everyone?
A dying system is a very dangerous opponent!
Since HE/IT has nothing to lose but his power!
Why do millions or even billions of deaths matter?
Justice is twisted until it suits, terror becomes legitimate and a heroic act,
Anyone who expects otherwise should continue to dream and hope for the “BEST”, usually with that thought in mind before going to sleep
"It won't get me"
Incorrect !!! Logic is switched off when it comes to supremacy and power and the opponent appears too strong!
Posted by: ossi | Mar 25 2024 17:50 utc | 18
Thanks b, and quite right too. Never ever underestimate the lengths any ruling class will go to maintain its position. The more pressure it's under the dirtier, the nastier and the more brutally it will play. But the Russians have been on the receiving end of this before. In many ways they are the only nation on the planet who has dealt with this savagery before—and prevailed. May god give them the strength to wake us all up from this nightmare.
Posted by: Patroklos | Mar 25 2024 17:50 utc | 19
@Neofeudalfuture #6
In my view, you are making a false equivalence as well as a false assumption.
The British did not turn to a program of terrorism against the United States as their empire was supplanted by the US. The Dutch did not turn to terrorism against the British as they lost their conflict. The Spanish did not turn to terrorism as their empire declined. Savagery definitely occurred in every instance but it was never actual state policy.
I suggest looking up a recent video by the Asia Society where a neocon knucklehead keeps trying to score ideological points on an Indian descent Singaporean named Kishore, who in turn responds with urbanity, knowledge and wisdom.
Posted by: c1ue | Mar 25 2024 17:59 utc | 20
Bassirou Diomaye Faye has won the Presidential election in Senegal.
One more nail in the coffin of French neocolonialism in Africa.
Posted by: Siddhartha | Mar 25 2024 18:02 utc | 21
And yet has savagery not always been the dark matter of historical capitalism? Engels and Rosa Luxemburg were right in this: "Bourgeois society stands at the crossroads, either transition to socialism or regression into barbarism."
The future seems to me darker than brighter unfortunately. A new deluge is coming.
Posted by: Patroklos | Mar 25 2024 18:06 utc | 22
US became first terrorist nation when globalist US Pres. Harry Truman dropped two nuclear bombs on civilian targets 3 days apart, Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9, 1945. Winston Churchill lauded Truman for his great "victory," and said how great it was that US and UK controlled the bomb because they'd use it for good. Truman wanted to enslave US taxpayers in perpetuity to US global projects, so he loaded up Europe with US military presence. US now has 800+ military bases worldwide. Truman also rushed US taxpayers into subservience to UN and various global and regional "treaties." US has long wished to be rid of its own population, language and culture, and it has done so by closing Ellis Island, passing the 1965 Immigration Act, erasing the US 2000 mile southern border, and secretly flying thousands of homeless, jobless, non-English speaking border crossers often with TB and other diseases into towns across the US and dumped on the backs of already stretched local taxpayers. Together these actions are defined as genocide by Rafael Lemkin and are perfectly fine with 100% of the political class. If the Russian Federation can't stop the US mob it's likely that formal breakup of US is the only way to stop it, as #6 suggests. For example, California and southwest states could merge with the terror state of Mexico.
Posted by: Susan Mullen | Mar 25 2024 18:12 utc | 23
It found that in demonstrating utter savagery.
The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide. That it will do everything to prevent international organizations to intervene against this.
That it is willing to eliminate everyone and everything that resists it.
Those nations who commit themselves to multi-polarity should steel themselves for what might be visited on them.
In other words, modified Nazism where monetary debt is the blood that's slowly removed from citizens instead of being worked to death in a "camp," while those in nations that do their best to prevent such an invasion are/were subjected to force of arms to force compliance. And no, this isn't the first time such actions were employed by the Outlaw US Empire.
As we've seen, EU/NATO is now a colony of the Empire. Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the start of the illegal war on what remained of Yugoslavia, which prompted TASS to interview Lavrov about that incident and how it impacts today's climate, "25th Anniversary of NATO's War on Yugoslavia: Lavrov Interview" is where it can be read.
I see the lack of any activity on the Kremlin website confirming Putin holding private meetings at his Moscow region dacha with his security team. IMO, the SMO's pace is going to change to close all possible chances for the West to further delay the liberation of Great Russian lands.
Neoliberal Parasites see themselves as Exceptional due to their ability to financially plunder and have become a Class unto themselves differing little in their outlook from Nazis--All are to bow down to them and become their slaves in a somewhat more civilized manner--you get to remain alive. This Class has allies at the top of corporate conglomerates, particularly BigPharma, Telecoms, Big Oil/Energy, and Tech. Those in turn are allied with the Deep State. This alliance system predates WW2 and is where the top American Fascists resided that Henry Wallace warned about in 1944. And yes, the current conflict is global.
I don't think the nations who "commit themselves to multi-polarity" are strong enough to defend themselves from the 1%(private wealthy interest who copt national governments for private gain) nor are these multi polar nations strong enough to impose equality; instead it it going to take the whole of the masses (the 99% so to speak) to come together as one strong, single minded body, before the wealth can be redistributed and the cost reward benefits can be fairly distributed among those who are the governed.
Posted by: snake | Mar 25 2024 17:47 utc | 20
Russia and China are quite strong enough to do that. Russia alone can destroy the entire west if required. Putin does not bluff and will not back down. The so called west can go out easy or it can go out hard.
We see the anglo Americans resorting to straight out terrorism. Like teenage kids lashing out blindly with vandalism and so forth. That too will be defeated.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:17 utc | 25
What's happening in Gaza is to show the whole western world (and the whole planet for that matter) what's going to eventually happen to everyone who tries to refuse the digi-ids, vaccines, gmo shit, lockdowns, lgbt, loss of privacy, etc. The automatic gun towers, surveillance, crowd control and other satanic technology developed by israel is going be highly desired by every fascist government.
Posted by: Michael A | Mar 25 2024 18:19 utc | 26
I would doubt myself that the West is running the savagery in Gaza. It's more that Israel is out of control, and won't listen to US desires, while the US and Europe are unable to say no, as governments and legislators risk being thrown out if they give trouble to the Lobby.
But it is true that the US and EU powers feel entitled to keep their world hegemony, and only know how to resort to military force to maintain it, when that is not in fact a workable route to success. I don't think they have a workable policy, and savagery won't be it.
Posted by: laguerre | Mar 25 2024 18:19 utc | 27
I forget who said it (Cheney perhaps?) but the US position is perfectly put as "needing to throw some shit country against the wall now and again to show we can and will". Pure Mafia stuff, just like Escobar's "lead or gold" offer. You submit your country to us or we destroy you and your country.
This is why Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Iran, Russia and China exasperate them so much, as they have been unable to destroy them. Now, with the latter three seen as regional/global rivals that cannot be destroyed or cowed. There was never any gift of "European civilization" just "might makes right" and the "lead or gold" co-opting of local elites.
Israel is simply demonstrating this reality in its most blunt form. The US didn't blink in the 1960s when the Indonesian Army that they were so friendly with (including Obama's mother) slaughtered about 1.5 million ethnic Chinese. What about the many millions of Vietnamese who died, with many more still dying and crippled from the bombs, mines and chemicals dropped there by the US? The East Timorese? The Guatemalan indigenous? What about the Belgians with half of the population of the Congo? The British with the Irish and Punjabi man-made famines and the Kenyan Mau Mau atrocities? The Germans with the South-West African genocide? The French in Algeria? The Dutch in Indonesia?
Genocide of the Other has always been in the US (and UK, and European) civilizational DNA. The problems that the US elites are having with the Zionist genocide shows how much their power has already lessened.
Ukraine have privatizied the financing of small and medium farms to tue Usa
UKRAINIAN FARMERS HAVE AN ALTERNATIVE WAY TO CASH RESOURCES – USAID AGRO
Ukrainian Agricultural Sector can use an alternative approach to obtain monetary resources, to quickly provide funds for current activities. "The USAID AGRO Program and the Activitis Financial Company have launched a joint project to develop and implement non-bank financing instruments for the agricultural sector called WEAGRO. The project provides for the creation of agricultural installments for micro, small and medium-sized agricultural producers," the report USAID AGRO.
Even if tue farms are to small for BlackRock, they still are going to tåke it
Posted by: Paul from Norway | Mar 25 2024 18:20 utc | 29
c1ue | Mar 25 2024 17:59 utc | 23--
Terrorism already prevailed in those Empires, both in their Colonies and domestically. What was the Inquisition, for example, and just how far was it employed in Europe? What of Enclosure? What of the Feudal Lord's legal right to rape and kill at will? What of Christendom's declared Exceptionalism that gave its adherents the right to kill and plunder any non-Christian?
This revolves around the recent act of terrorism in Moscow and Moscow's strike on SBU headquarters, but another aspect is the raid on the training camp in Turkey. Apparently based on Russian information.
Russia is following back along every aspect that led to the actual event. As Medvedev said we will trace it all and kill them all. Those captured, no matter where they are, do not have a good life expectancy.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:25 utc | 31
I was interested in Alastair Crooke's piece on the Napolitano show today, where he said in his conversations at the time around the Iraq invasion of 2003, an American, I think it was, actually said that the destruction of Iraq was intended as a lesson to the Palestinians to stay quiet, or they would be destroyed like Iraq. Incredible that a country would be wrecked for that purpose, but I suppose it is evidence that supports b's thesis.
Posted by: laguerre | Mar 25 2024 18:25 utc | 32
Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Mar 25 2024 17:36 utc | 13
################
Among the things that the West has done exceptionally well is narrative formation/control and financialization.
I leave it up to the reader of this comment to determine the positive social value of those domains.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 18:28 utc | 33
"Genocide of the Other has always been in the US (and UK, and European) civilizational DNA."
---
Western Mental Software is a fusion of Roman imperial ideology and bloody Aramaic fantasies: the Book of Joshua and the Book of Deuteronomy.
The so-called Christianity (1033-) has been replaced very easily by Zionism (1963/67-) as the official religion of the Empire.
Posted by: Simon | Mar 25 2024 18:30 utc | 34
"Genocide of the Other has always been in the US (and UK, and European) civilizational DNA."
---
Western Mental Software is a fusion of Roman imperial ideology and bloody Aramaic fantasies: the Book of Joshua and the Book of Deuteronomy.
The so-called Christianity (1033-) has been replaced very easily by Zionism (1963/67-) as the official religion of the Empire.
Posted by: Simon | Mar 25 2024 18:31 utc | 35
To #29, Karlof re: Henry Wallace in 1944. If it's the same Henry Wallace, he was was removed as FDR's VP by insiders at the 1944 Democrat Convention and replaced with then little known Harry Truman. The point was, they all knew FDR would likely die in early 1945 so his VP would automatically be appointed president. They wanted Truman to be president. Apparently Wallace was too nice a guy to drop atom bombs.
Posted by: Susan Mullen | Mar 25 2024 18:39 utc | 36
It is not as new as the mid-20th Century (or may be just for the U.S.). Throughout the 19th century the British - at least the populace bought into the narrative - that the empire was bringing civilization and better standard to the world.
Posted by: GS | Mar 25 2024 18:40 utc | 37
Posted by: Susan Mullen | Mar 25 2024 18:12 utc | 28
I beg to differ. The USA became a country as a product of theft and genocide, by murdering in cold blood more than 20 million indigenous people inhabiting the continent and unscrupulously stealing their lands in the process. (No wonder 'Murican "elites" are enabling the current genocide in Gaza and never supported a two-state solution for the Palestinian question, for you it comes as tradition!)
On a metaphysical, karmic level, it means that your destiny is already predetermined. You will disappear in the same manner that you once came to be. Without ceremony, second thought or remorse...
Posted by: ThirdWorldDude | Mar 25 2024 18:40 utc | 38
Patrick | Mar 25 2024 18:36 utc | 43
I see you sort of scum both in real life and acting as trolls on the internet. Scum is scum wherever it is found.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:41 utc | 39
Posted by: Roger | Mar 25 2024 18:19 utc | 34
"needing to throw some shit country against the wall now and again to show we can and will"
------
Just FYI, that quote is from neocon, Straussian asshole, Michael Ledeen. https://historynewsnetwork.org/blog/6772
Posted by: john brewster | Mar 25 2024 18:41 utc | 40
The US crossed all lines during its conquest of Falluja. Then again in Mosul. Despite Putin repeating Ukraine joining NATO was a line that could not be crossed, the US ignored the warnings. The savagery in Gaza is a reproduction of the savagery the US enacted in Iraq and probably in Africa.
Posted by: Wilikins | Mar 25 2024 18:45 utc | 41
Savagery doesn't calm the conflict. It only inspires more of it.
The elites (however you want to identify them) want conflict so they can profit from it.
It's like Bibi. As long as the action in Gaza continues, he won't be impeached. He has no incentive to seek a truce or even victory. The sooner Bibi wins, the sooner he's potentially going to jail.
If the profit lies in war, brutality, or slavery, then people will find a way to do those things on an industrial scale.
So happy to see a reference to what is happening in the Sahel. With a mostly Western audience, I doubt many patrons follow African news.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 18:46 utc | 42
Posted by: Patroklos | Mar 25 2024 18:06 utc | 25
Jeez. We have been at this crossroads for quite a while. I guess we're waiting for the light to turn red.
Posted by: lex talionis | Mar 25 2024 18:46 utc | 43
c1ue | Mar 25 2024 17:59 utc | 23
I have found a difference can be seen between the internecine fights within the Holy Roman Empire and how they treated those outside it. The conduct of...
The mindset of Borrell and the garden and the jungle. Civilized people inhabit the garden, savages inhabit the jungle.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:49 utc | 44
UNSC resolution for immediate cease fire during Ramadan.
Posted by: biochar | Mar 25 2024 18:53 utc | 45
[email protected] his target audience was the west and US, best not to confuse them with simple geography, better to use terms like "don't know shit, from Shinola."
Cheers M
Posted by: sean the leprechaun | Mar 25 2024 18:54 utc | 46
So happy to see a reference to what is happening in the Sahel. With a mostly Western audience, I doubt many patrons follow African news.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 18:46 utc | 51
Not center theater but certainly part of the greater war. Death by a thousand cuts type thing. But Ukraine still appears center theater. The survival or destruction of the American empire and with it half a millennia of European superiority over the world.
As Montgomery said - "never march on Moscow" or something like that.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:58 utc | 49
Related:
Imperialism: parasitic, decadent, and doomed (80 min)
Garland Nixon interviews a British communist about the increasing repression in western states, the abject defeat of Nato in ukraine & Africa, and the rising anti-imperialist global coalition.
https://youtu.be/watch?v=wlV0Qscxd-o
Posted by: Browser | Mar 25 2024 19:01 utc | 50
E | Mar 25 2024 18:58 utc | 61
A new name, another echonomics....
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 19:01 utc | 51
Terror is a tactic employed by the weak. It only acquires any military or political significance when it becomes exemplary action. If it is imitated by others or inspires organization of something more than mere slaughter.
When Great Powers use terror it is an admission of weakness. And an admission that the sponsors of terror have no redeeming virtue. Zombies and ghouls.
I keep seeing discussions of the guerilla war to come in Ukraine. No. To come up with operatives for the action in Moscow the organizing committee had to throw the net as far as Tajikistan and employ desperate losers ready to kill en masse for a couple thousand dollars. Losers who would spill the beans. Losers who would stand as example that working for the West leads to nothing and worse.
The organizers can still up the ante a few more times. Each time they will display the emptiness within. The end game may be very ugly. It will come to an end.
Posted by: oldhippie | Mar 25 2024 19:07 utc | 52
A terrorist attack is a weapon not only of the weak, already defeated, but also of the vile. The weak and vile cannot win and they wont.
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 19:13 utc | 53
Peter [email protected] didn't they already blowed up the SBU headquarters....or they built a new one? And really, it's war, and that place been there since....dead horse, I won't bother flogging it, mind you, the safest places in 404 are clearly under bridges. By now Ukie should be being forced to 'air drop' supplies to field troops, well if the bridges were gone they'd have to, I still don't buy the BS about getting it to the front, making it easy to take out but with big terror attack in Moscow, nuttin' gonna be easy from here on out. Biggest refinery, gas bar in 404 just got tapped.....that reeks to high old heaven.....over two years, nice man Putin and his oligarch click, let EU fill all their tanks to the brim...wonder if any posters could venture a guess of how much money was made by letting that gas farm function for the past two years. Maybe we could put a human life value on it.....can't do that, they're worthless.
Cheers M
Posted by: sean the leprechaun | Mar 25 2024 19:13 utc | 54
karlof1 @36
You are reminding me of Marx's account of the primitive accumulation. It was not gathered slowly by industry and application. It was plunder and rapine. As much as I despise Marxian eschatology he read the history correctly. Mostly. The pirates and the East India Company and the rest of the vermin were all aristocrats. Same hereditary fiends who have ruled us forever. In any event it is good to read these comments and see the focus shifting to the pure evil at the core of modern history. Putin's "vampire ball".
Posted by: oldhippie | Mar 25 2024 19:16 utc | 55
One might be tempted to see the neoliberal era as an avatar of colonialism. Actually, the main principles underlying the fiscal and monetary paradigm of the neoliberal era (1980 – 2021) is
sound finance,
regressive taxation systems,
central bank independence,
and the direction of the credit system by oligopolistic banks
Were already applied in the European controlled colonies. Money Scarcity was the key and front and centre of the US rules based order today.
Just look at the fools who call for this today and say that they oppose the globalists. Conservatives always talk out of both sides of their mouths saying different things. The monetary paradigm of the neoliberal era (1980 – 2021) is what is happening in Argentina today.
In the neoliberal era, sound finance, as a principle of macroeconomic management, is based on the idea that governments should avoid fiscal deficits and should even aspire to fiscal surpluses. This view is based on the misleading analogy between a household and a governing currency-issuer. Indeed, while it may be desirable for households to build up net savings, a government that issues its own currency may not always have an interest in running a balanced budget or even budget surpluses. For its fiscal deficit has as its exact counterpart the financial surplus of the non-government sector. If the government sector wishes to have a balanced budget, this means that the domestic private sector (households and businesses) will only be able to achieve a financial surplus if the rest of the world is in a deficit position vis-à-vis the domestic economy. So they have to run trade surpluses.
During colonial times, sound finance ( money scarcity) had much more basic and transparent justifications than it does today. As an imperial doctrine by essence, it amounted to saying that the metropolis did not intend to participate financially in the colonial enterprise, which was supposed to be self-financing. The “colonial self-sufficiency policy,” as historians call it, implied that the colonized territories had to pay for the costs of military conquest, the current expenditures of the colonial administrations as well as their investment expenditures, which were often oriented towards infrastructure projects that favoured the profitability of private metropolitan capital. The metropolis was just supposed to intervene sporadically, by granting subsidies or loans, when the financial situation of the colonies required it.
Since metropolitan governments ruled the monetary operations of their colonies, they managed through the colonial administrations to gradually impose a unit of account in which taxes would be collected. This meant, as MMT teaches, that they had no intrinsic financial constraint. In principle they did not depend on taxes to finance their local expenditures. The possibility to expand their fiscal space was not used, however, owing to the extractive orientation of colonial economic policy.
The choice to run balanced budgets implied that the colonial government did not usually create net financial wealth for the bin government sector (and in particular for the indigenous private sector). The accumulation of financial wealth by the private sector—and thus growth of domestic income and tax revenues—was made dependent on the external financial balance and trade surpluses.
Just look at the fools who call for that today the money scarcity crowd who say they fighting against neoliberalism and the globalists.
The blueprint of the American Colonies. The American colonial governments were always short of British coins (but prohibited by the Crown from coining their own). The only way to get their hands on the coin they needed was by exporting goods back to their masters.
So they each came up with their own money of account (for example the Virginia pound), imposed taxes in that money of account, issued paper notes in the money of account, spent the paper notes, collected those notes in taxes, and then burned their tax revenue. Which the money scarcity crowd now call Marxism or woke or WEF. Or some other soundbite they have been house trained to bark like little puppy dogs.
When it was actually one of the bravest libertarian things they did inventing their own money of account to break free from money scarcity.
This extractive orientation was accentuated by colonial monetary arrangements and by the behaviour of the banking sector, dominated from the outset by oligopolistic banks. In parallel with fiscal austerity, the fixed parity between the colonial and metropolitan currencies in a context of free capital mobility between the colonies and the metropolis and the obligation to cover the money supply entirely with foreign exchange reserves (as with the currency boards in the British Empire) gave a highly restrictive character to monetary policy.
Just look at who loves the idea of that today. The idea that private banks should organize the credit system with some freedom—the freedom not to finance productive activities as opposed to extractive activities—while colonial governments should maintain balanced budgets was part of the imperial credo.
The conservative doctrine, the ancient religious texts that are still the core of Conservatism today. The money scarcity crowd.
Nowadays, under neoliberalism, for many countries of the Global South, the priority given to balanced budgets and exports, the over-accumulation of foreign exchange reserves in a context where their local resources are under-utilized, the dominant role of foreign banks and financial institutions, the under-financing of the “real” economy, etc., all represent elements of continuity with the colonial period.
Neoliberal economics, it could be argued, is an iteration of the logic of colonial economics in a context where trade and financial flows are less and less hampered by the barriers once created by the coexistence of formal colonial empires. With neoliberalism, the latter are replaced with the networks and agencies of globalized capital. In the Global North, this pursuit of colonial economic logic entails an undermining of the previous socioeconomic and political achievements of working classes and hence a widening of within-country inequalities. In most of the Global South, next to the weakening of working classes power, neoliberalism has consisted in suppressing nations and peoples right to self-determination through the imposition of deflationary policies, forced “free trade,” privatization and financial liberalization. With deficit and debt rules imposed on them.
Sound familiar ?
https://moneyontheleft.org/2021/06/14/neoliberalisms-colonial-origins/
Conservatives aren't the solution their doctrine and ancient texts are the problem. Conservative voters are too stupid to notice and speak out of both sides of their mouths saying different things.
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:20 utc | 56
Isn't America utterly unprepared for a competition based on savagery? The COVID disaster that was teh American experience revealed that America was unprepared for infectious disease pandemics whereas China sloughed it off socially and economically. Why did we promote man made virus? With respect to savagery, America has mass casualty target sporting events that appear to me to be virtually indefensible every Sunday all over the country...why would we agree to have a competition when we are so vulnerable to revenge? We should push the competition into arenas where we can excel: fast food cook offs or "what can you do with a high school diploma" or beauty contests for trannies....
Posted by: john j fritsch | Mar 25 2024 19:21 utc | 57
"If tigers could kill
it would have been
Us instead of themmm."John Lennon
Posted by: BroncoBilly | Mar 25 2024 19:22 utc | 58
sean the leprechaun | Mar 25 2024 19:13 utc | 66
From what I saw, at one point Russia did strike SBU buildings. Damage was very minor. More a warning strike. This time, it appears the buildings were completely demolished with little chance for any inside to survive.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 19:26 utc | 59
Infact, If I was in charge I would line up the money scarcity crowd against a wall and shoot the lot of them.
Nobody will complain, after all their fascists killed thousands in Chile and Italy and a hundred other places the money scarcity crowd planted their flag. Under the Orwellian names of freedom and liberty and democracy.
Kill all of them is what I say. They are all dumb anyway and won't be missed.
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:29 utc | 60
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 18:58 utc | 60
##############
In my experience, white people like to read about white people.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 19:32 utc | 61
There is ~ 1.3 million people in Estonia, out of which ~ 350,000 are ethnic Russians. What if Russian forces cross right across Estonia to Baltic Sea sometime in this year? And, cross all 3 Baltic countries at the same time? Blocking Lithuania is not much of a problem, as it really doesn't have a port. Blocking the Baltic Sea by the Russian Baltic Naval Fleet is not much of a problem too. Any enemy ship stationed in the Baltic Sea can be targeted and knocked off. Even all the civil and naval ports in the so-called NATO countries can also be targeted, if the need arises. Except few ethnic Russians living in the 3 Baltic countries, none of the other countries in the Baltic Sea are Slavs. (Polish are actually Slavs, but they opt not to consider that fact.)
What's going in Ukraine is a civil war, except for few, it is brothers fighting brothers. It is not even a civil war, but a special military operation. But, if a war happens in, against the countries around the Baltic Sea, will they be treated as Ukraine? So, will NATO ever really attack RF directly, knowing all that?
Posted by: ostro | Mar 25 2024 19:34 utc | 62
Putin said it. The Ukies are innocent.
https://sputnikglobe.com/20240325/putin-says-we-know-that-terrorist-attack-in-crocus-was-carried-out-by-radical-islamists-1117546160.html
Posted by: Surferket | Mar 25 2024 19:35 utc | 63
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:20 utc | 69
I might have said this before, but you're like that one barber on YouTube who has a thousand or more videos on "layered haircuts" and is always really upset that no one understands what the fuck he means by a layered haircut.
No amount of wordy repetitive slop helps when you just don't have the skill (or the brains) to explain even the simplest thing.
Posted by: Michael A | Mar 25 2024 19:41 utc | 64
When people talk about bubbles and geopolitics do they understand this ?
Yet, another free market tooth fairy conservative shit show.
https://www.crisesnotes.com/its-the-index-stupid-our-new-not/
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:41 utc | 65
Susan Mullen | Mar 25 2024 18:39 utc | 44--
Yes, Henry Asgard Wallace, a fervent member of the Social Gospel Movement would never have dropped the bomb nor engaged in a Cold War with Russia. Hindsight thus informs us of the intentions of that Era's Deep State, which continue today.
LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 18:46 utc | 51--
Much activity is occurring vis-a-vis Africa judging by MFA events, which unfortunately are only documented by brief boilerplate read-outs. Judging from Imperial Media, the Empire considers Africa as "its", meaning "it has it to lose" which isn't the case whatsoever. Russia's Africa strategy is stellar as is China's, and the Empire's whores are dwindling there. Of those the Kremlin chose to note having called Putin with their condolences, Egypt's Sisi was one of the chosen few.
Posted by: Surferket | Mar 25 2024 19:35 utc | 78
Is reading for comprehension in English difficult due to not being a native speaker, or are you being intentionally disingenuous to troll the thread. No, he did not say "The Ukros are innocent" by any stretch of the imagination.
He said that radical Islamists carried out the attack, but that they don't know yet who masterminded it, and will need to keep looking to see who thought they might benefit.
Putin is KGB as well. It doesn't necessarily mean anything if he said Osama bin Laden did it, and in fact might even help to let the Ukros/CIA/MI6/etc. think he may be off their trail.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 19:43 utc | 67
@ Posted by: oldhippie | Mar 25 2024 19:07 utc | 64
At some point in time then, Russia will start eating spaghetti.
I count 23 strands between the US and Europe.
Baltic states only have 2 each.
North Sea 5 or 6.
Getting to them in the channel may be a little tough, but certainly not out of the question.
Russia can't "take down the internet", but it can sure slow it down.
https://www.submarinecablemap.com/
Posted by: BroncoBilly | Mar 25 2024 19:43 utc | 68
I am rather sceptical that savagery is an instrument consciously chosen by the West. I believe that the issue is more fundamental i.e. one of postmodern culture that has modified the behavior of westerners to the point where they can relativize anything, including savagery, as long as it is in function of defending their freedom to feel as emotionally sovereign individuals. This is seen as the absolute highest achievement in western society, replacing old moral norms.
This individual freedom to satisfy each emotion, like a junkie really, - whether it is lust for material riches or a wealth of identities to choose from - is in fact what is meant with “defend freedom & democracy in Ukraine”. Democracy has little to do with it, nor emancipation or inclusivity, simply the freedom of pursuit of individual desires and nowadays even to the point of absurdity. In societies like Russia, China, India etc. where the postmodernistic virus hasnt spread there is common morality that sits in the way of this absolute individual freedom.
It is how Germany was right before Hitler and in fact was the reason they emerged.
An example. In practice, there is more freedom for women and emancipation in Russia than there is in the West. Westerners simply dont know how to handle this so they need feminism and all its “empowerment” derivatives. In practice they however devolve in an excuse for the real thing which is rotates around any grievances and rule-based entitlements.
For the western population to understand the philosophical error they threw themselves in will be a miracle.
Posted by: alek_a | Mar 25 2024 19:45 utc | 69
Posted by: Surferket | Mar 25 2024 19:35 utc | 78
Stop spreading FUD. He said something completely different. In fact, the opposite of what you are lying about. Ukies are on the bill, but Putin is suggesting that Russia is after the bigger terrorist scum, namely MI6 and CIA
Posted by: Boo | Mar 25 2024 19:46 utc | 70
Posted by: Michael A | Mar 25 2024 19:41 utc | 79
I Might of said this before, personal attacks don"t bother me in the slighest. They are the sign of a weak mind. The DNA of an ideologue. Who project their flaws onto others.
Debate it. Debate the parts you don't agree with pmsl. There's plenty to choose from.
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:48 utc | 71
LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 19:32 utc | 76
At one point it seemed Palestine would become center stage. But that is up to the Muslim/Arab world to take the lead. Most of that though seems to revolve around Jerusalem and the mosque rather than the Palestinian people. And so center stage of the war against the anglo american empire has stayed in Ukraine where Russia is taking the war directly to or against the empire.
Posted by: Peter AU1 | Mar 25 2024 19:49 utc | 72
Posted by: Susan Mullen | Mar 25 2024 18:39 utc | 44
They wanted Truman to be president. Apparently Wallace was too nice a guy to drop atom bombs.
--------
*** sorry, this got stuck in my queue. I'm posting it about an hour after I wrote it. ***
That's a just so story. If Truman didn't know about the bomb until after FDR died, how did TPTB know that almost a year earlier?
The real story is that Wallace was as close to a socialist as you could get in America at the time; and, like FDR, an anti-colonialist. He was also against segregation. A real trifecta. The anti-FDER PTBs took their cues from the Brits. They wanted the US to take over Britain's role as a colonial power, which it did under Truman with strong advice from James Byrnes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_F._Byrnes
It was easy to get rid of Wallace. He was a flake whose correspondence with Nicolas Roerich contained references to the esoteric doctrines of ariosophy. Deadly stuff in the middle of a war in the 1940s.
Posted by: john brewster | Mar 25 2024 19:49 utc | 73
Western colonialism began in the fifteenth century
That would have come as a surprise to the Greeks during the Classical Age. Or the Romans, for that matter.
Posted by: JackG | Mar 25 2024 19:50 utc | 74
Posted by: Thomas | Mar 25 2024 17:13 utc | 3
An interesting perspective from Aleks at BMA.
Posted by: anon2020 | Mar 25 2024 19:52 utc | 75
Ahenobarbus 13
The genocide against Palestine has changed me from your standpoint, the values of Christian civilisation, to the values of the recipients of former Colonial violence who never saw those values in Western colonisers.
The current genocide against our fellow Mediterranean peoples has roots in Nazism that was transferred from Europe to the US My generation of Brits were protected from that scourge by the sacrifices of the Soviet Union. The US has now brought that European Nazism back to Ukraine and from Ukrainian Nazis in Israel to
the Mediterranean.
I have been in Islam.for 25 years and this is the first time I have seen them West as my South Asian brothers see us. We will not forgive or forget who brought this Nazism back to the cradle of Civilisation .
The Bitish Empire2 Conservatives who want another run at Empire and the Great Satan. Who do you think you are kidding , Mr Cameron?
Posted by: Giyane | Mar 25 2024 19:53 utc | 76
The DNA of an ideologue. Who project their flaws onto others.
Debate it. Debate the parts you don't agree with pmsl. There's plenty to choose from.
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 19:48 utc | 86
I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying that you're boring and unskilled at explaining anything. No idea what you mean by "ideologue".
Posted by: Michael A | Mar 25 2024 19:53 utc | 77
https://ria.ru/20240325/terakt-1935765034.html
Putin on the terrorist attack at Crocus.
The attack on Crocus City Hall was carried out by radical Islamists, but Moscow is interested in the customer..
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 19:54 utc | 78
As I said yesterday the customer did not expect that the performers would be “taken alive".
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 19:57 utc | 79
oldhippie | Mar 25 2024 19:16 utc | 67--
Thanks for your reply. Before the Western Hemisphere was accidentally "found" all Feudal heads were turned to the East to gain their plunder. And we mustn't forget the combination of ineptitude and weather that defeated the Spanish Armada, something rarely studied today. Not long thereafter Bacon wrote his "Advertisement for Genocide" to deal with the masses--the Hydra as he saw them. And he' remains esteemed by Academia. And all that reminds me that Hudson has announced the publication of his latest collection of essays. Here's the note I received from him:
"I've just published my collected essays on the Sumerian and Babylonian origins of money, interest-bearing debt, land tenure and enterprise from c. 2500 BC to 500 BC, as well as my article on Alexander Marshack's Ice Age notation. I've priced the 544-pge book just below $30 for paperback and $40 for hardback."
Truely an affordable price. The third volume of his Trilogy on debt ought to be available by year-end.
Russia's Africa strategy is stellar as is China's
Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 25 2024 19:42 utc | 81
Completely delusional and in complete denial. Wishy washy bull shit in otherwords.
Have you even travelled across Africa whilst you project your denial onto others ?
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 20:00 utc | 81
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 19:54 utc | 93
But that's my whole point and I hope Putin isn't getting sloppy. "Islamists" refers to a very specific type of belief(s) and a very specific modus operandi.
"Islamists" do not sell themselves out to hire as mercs in a scheme that doesn't involve said "Islamists" country or state directly. Russia is not active in Tajikistan.
These shooters blurred and covered (then uncovered) their faces, didn't yell anything remotely religious "Allah Akhbar!" (don't know if I got that right), and attempted to flee to Ukraine with their lives. Further there is NO EVIDENCE that any of those men are deeply religious and a photo of one of them came up shopping at that same Crocus mall a week before dressed up like a typical Tech Bro.
I'm not buying the Islamophobic "Islamist" take for the moment.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:02 utc | 82
The candidate who wants to improve relations with Russia won the elections in Senegal. The collapse of France's colonial empire in Africa continues. The little man is now a danger to European peace.
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 20:05 utc | 83
I think savagery is a way of business of the educated west.
But showing tortured people by Russia is also savagery to my opinion. Even if they are terrorists.
It reflects limitations of Russia, the limited escalation possibilities. Russia can show this 4 tortured poor idiots and killers, but cannot show how it destroys one US drone over Black see (in fact they destroyed one in 2022.)
Why do we have to absolutely agree here and adore every Russian step.
Posted by: vargas | Mar 25 2024 20:06 utc | 84
Dedollarization is under way and will weaken the US more than any thing else.
Posted by: Cycling Nut | Mar 25 2024 20:07 utc | 85
Patrick J. Buchanan, the political columnist and speech writer for President Nixon, warned in 1992, that NATO expansion into the eastern portion of Europe was encroachment into Russia's sphere of influence.
He specifically warned against membership for the Baltic states and the Black Sea states, and he took his campaign into the Republican primary against President HW Bush (a former CIA Director by the way).
His warnings were totally ignored by the Bush dynasty and the Clinton dynasty. They loyally cast their lot with WEC/NATO plan to destroy Orthodox Christian Russia and install a secular humanist Orwellian state.
They aggressively launched attacks against Russia's Balkan ally Orthodox Christian Serbia in the period 1995-99(in which the Serb Republic of Krajina was destroyed and thousands of civilians murdered, and the Serb Republic of Bosnia was also attacked but survived after Serb and Slavic volunteers defeated the Jihadis near Sarajevo), and then recruited all neighboring states surrounding Serbia to joint the WEC approved NATO alliance, including Croatia, Slovenia, North Macedonia and then staged a fake election and coup to remove Montenegro from the Serb federation in order to deny Serbia access to the sea.
What we witness today is a decades long drive to destroy all Christianity in the Slavic world, and substitute an approved Orwellian WEC style hegemony.......
Posted by: Tobias Cole | Mar 25 2024 20:07 utc | 86
On Niger didn't the US try to warn Niger that it wasn't happy with its friendship with Iran and Russia, and the Nigerien Junta told the US to mind its own business and start packing to get out of Niger.
Gaza has shown the Western official bodies UN EU Nato etc for what they really are the mask has finally come off, and what's underneath is very ugly indeed.
On Gaza we may have some half decent news on a ceasefire.
"With the United States abstaining, the United Nations Security Council has finally adopted a long-awaited resolution that demands an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
The resolution was put forward by the 10 non-permanent members of the Security Council. It received unanimous support from the remaining 14 members on Monday.
Washington had already vetoed similar bids three times since Israel started its brutal campaign in Gaza in early October."
Posted by: Republicofscotland | Mar 25 2024 20:13 utc | 87
@Tom_Q_Collins 98
Putin is never sloppy when it comes to his words.
Russia has been very careful in its language in regard to implicating Ukraine so far but if they find a Ukrainian link then I believe Russia will declare war on Ukraine. If they don't find proof they can move on.
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 20:15 utc | 88
Thinking out loud here, and I avoid those "think tank" reports (ex. The Rand one about destabilizing Russia) like the plague, but I was wondering if anyone ever decided to collect and collate all of them from the, say, top 5 US geostrategy, foreign policy, monetary policy, and "defense" stink tanks, would a larger picture emerge wherein the US is plotting to 1) destabilize the Russia n Federation, deindustrialize Germany and whatever is left of Europe, support Israel in provoking a larger war in the ME region - up to and including Iran,keeping India and Pakistan apart (and relatively stable) with their own spats, and Africa disempowered with the end goal of creating a large ground war on the Eurasian continent that Uncle Scam and his financial overlords would mostly sit out and swoop in once again toward the end to reap the spoils.
Wouldn't surprise me at all if the collective hubris to think such a plan would work again is rampant among the bubble chamber stink-tankers and unelected deep state functionaries and bureaucrats who seem to pop back up like Whack-a-Mole in every (or every other) presidential administration. Not even Trump was immune and in fact he did his part to destabilize Latin America and provoke Iran.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:18 utc | 89
This atrocity may be only a link in a whole series of attempts by those who have been fighting our country since 2014 at the hands of the neo-Nazi Kyiv regime. And the Nazis, as is well known, never disdained to use the most dirty and inhumane means to achieve their goals.
Vladimir Putin
Posted by: ostro | Mar 25 2024 20:23 utc | 90
Russia will declare war on Ukraine. If they don't find proof they can move on.
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 20:15 utc | 104
Were you being facetious or did you mean TOTAL war on Ukraine? And as I stated in response to the concern troll on page one of comments, Putin is ex-KGB and yes, he chooses his words very carefully, often choosing to play his cards close to the chest.
Let's look again at Putin's actual words from the link the CT left on page 1. Emphasis is mine.
"In the course of the joint work of our special services and law enforcement agencies, it is necessary to get answers to a number of questions, for example, whether radical, even terrorist-minded Islamic organizations are really interested in striking at Russia, which today stands for a just solution to the escalated Middle East conflict," Putin said at a consultation with Russian authorities on measures taken after the terrorist attack.-and-
"The horrific crime committed on March 22 in the capital of Russia is an act of intimidation ... and the question immediately arises: who benefits?" Putin said. "This atrocity can only be an element in a whole series of attempts by those who have been fighting our country since 2014 with the hands of the neo-Nazi Kiev regime."
-and-
"Of course, we also need to answer the question of why the terrorists tried to leave for Ukraine after committing the crime and who was waiting for them there," Putin underlined during the conversation with Russian authorities on security measures taken after the terrorist attack.
-and (in my mind the money shot)-
"We see how the US is taking to various channels to convince its satellites and other countries that according to the data from its intelligence, there is allegedly no Ukrainian trace in the Moscow terrorist attack and that the bloody terrorist attack had been carried out by those professing Islam — members of IS, an organization banned in Russia. We already know by whose hands this atrocity against Russia and its people had been carried out. Now we want to know who the mastermind is," Putin said.
So clearly, Putin is not absolving Ukraine or the frequent US/UK/NATO/Israeli intelligence service handlers of "Islamist" mercenaries. He seems to be simply following the prevailing narrative among idiot Western "intelligentsia" and readers of Western media. IMO it is important to note that he first asks why in the world any so-called Islamic terrorists would even want to target Russia (I suppose the notion of revenge for Syria is possible, but Tajikistan?). To my earlier comments as well, the attack at Crocus was not in line with almost any previous "ISIS" or "ISIL" modus operandi. This was NOT a religion-based attack.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:26 utc | 91
Not even Trump was immune and in fact he did his part to destabilize Latin America and provoke Iran.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:18 utc | 105
Trump is just another criminal who wants his turn as the front man for the elites in biden's place. Same elites, same satanism, same visits to epstein, same israel worship, same politics.
Posted by: Michael A | Mar 25 2024 20:28 utc | 92
Russia's Africa strategy is stellar as is China's
Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 25 2024 19:42 utc | 81
Completely delusional and in complete denial. Wishy washy bull shit in otherwords.
Have you even travelled across Africa whilst you project your denial onto others ?
Posted by: Echo Chamber | Mar 25 2024 20:00 utc | 97
How so, Echo? Sort of a blithe dismissal of a beloved regular around here...
Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Mar 25 2024 20:28 utc | 93
It isnt that murky, I dont think. You can post this on a wall and start drawing straight lines to just about everything and everyone that has happened since. Everything else will connect somewhere close. Maybe not Donald Trump, he was a wild card, or more precisely, the screwed up trusting that American voters would play along. They wont make that mistake again.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century
Posted by: Not Ewe | Mar 25 2024 20:29 utc | 94
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:18 utc | 105
Sorry, I forgot to keep my numbering going. Meant to say:
1) destabilize the Russia n Federation,
2) deindustrialize Germany and whatever is left of Europe,
3) support Israel in provoking a larger war in the ME region - up to and including Iran,
4) keeping India and Pakistan apart (and relatively stable) with their own spats, and
5)Africa disempowered,
6) with the end goal of creating a large ground war on the Eurasian continent,
7) that Uncle Scam and his financial overlords would mostly sit out and swoop in once again toward the end to reap the spoils.
And for fun, Stink Tankers like to think in groups of 7 too. 7 countries in 5 years...
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Mar 25 2024 20:31 utc | 95
Among the things that the West has done exceptionally well is narrative formation/control and financialization.
I leave it up to the reader of this comment to determine the positive social value of those domains.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Mar 25 2024 18:28 utc | 40
You're right, but again we are talking about the overlords, not the people or the history of the west.
I think the term "the west" is just too abstract. It can be taken to mean anything that ever existed in every western country.
Our ruling class likes this term for just this reason, it obscures all class content, power relations, etc within "the west". Perfect terminology to dehumanize half the world and prepare "the west" for a global nuclear war with some other abstraction like "the east" or "the rest of the world".
I prefer more precise language when speaking about important topics so I refer to imperialism, the ruling class, etc.
Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Mar 25 2024 20:40 utc | 96
Russia will declare war on Ukraine. If they don't find proof they can move on.
Posted by: Old Sovietologist | Mar 25 2024 20:15 utc | 104
---------
No it won't.
People, who live in the Ukraine are brothers, not some, but most. So, war will noty be declared. But, there's an undeclared war on the Nazis and the Banderites, and most probably against the NATO.
Posted by: ostro | Mar 25 2024 20:42 utc | 97
BroncoBilly | Mar 25 2024 19:22 utc | 71
If tigers could kill
it would have been
Us instead of themmm
Tigers can kill. The word you're looking for is 'looks'...
If looks could kill, it would have been us instead of him(John Lennon)
Get it?
Posted by: john | Mar 25 2024 20:44 utc | 98
TASS, at the time of this post:
"Who waited for terrorists on Ukrainian side is question that needs answer — Putin"
Some people just don't get it.
Posted by: Elmagnostic | Mar 25 2024 20:48 utc | 99
"Western colonialism began in the fifteenth century and ended, with a few exceptions, in the mid of the 20th century."
b
I have a quibble with that sentence.
Yes , modern Western colonialism was indeed born in the 15th century but the Western tradition was but copying what Rome or Greece had done in antiquity; what the Etruscan had done to Rome; what Babylon had done to the Jews- and so on and so on.....
The comments to this entry are closed.
The savagery is a losing card.
By playing it the US and the West are undercutting every ideological, normative and institutional modality of legitimacy and influence. It is a sign that they couldn't even win militarily, as Hamas, Ansarallah and Hezbollah have won by surviving and waging strategies of denial and guerilla warfare. Israeli objectives have not been realized, and the US looks more isolated and extreme than ever.
It won't be forgotten and there are now alternatives.
Posted by: Wilbur | Mar 25 2024 17:11 utc | 1