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Is Putin bringing Medvedev back and why?

Putin again introduces Medvedev into a big game

The new post of first deputy chairman of the Military-Industrial Commission, which will be taken by the deputy head of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev, allows him to join the main thing – the “arms race”, said Ilya Grashchenkov, president of the Center for Regional Policy Development.

His point of view, writes ” Politics Today “, the expert argued that the key for Russia now is the issue of transferring the country’s economy to a military footing.

“But not in the sense that “everything is for the front, everything is for victory,” but in the sense that it was weapons that became the missing element of the mosaic of success in import substitution. It turned out that a lot of things need to be created, so Medvedev’s involvement is a resource position,”

 – says Grashchenkov.

The expert agreed with the opinion that today Medvedev is “the number one successor.” Firstly, he noted, President Vladimir Putin himself feels that way. He has a special relationship with Medvedev. At one time Medvedev supported the “tandem castling”, giving power to Putin and taking the post of prime minister, which confirmed his negotiability.

Medvedev has experience as a president

“Secondly, Medvedev is a person with experience as a president. There are no others like him. Third, despite his poor ratings in the past, many remember Medvedev’s period from 2008 to 2012 as golden times, stability, wealth. It is possible that the ratings can be improved on this nostalgia, ”

 Grashchenkov said.

Recently Medvedev has taken a “hawkish position” on a number of issues. He also began to write rather harsh posts on social networks.

“Medvedev’s position remains very good, and the new position really returns him to the position of succession,”

New position

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on the creation of a new position – the first deputy chairman of the Military Industrial Commission. It will be occupied by Dmitry Medvedev. He since 2020 is also the Deputy Head of State in the Security Council. Medvedev will have the right to independently hold meetings of the commission in Putin’s absence. His duties will include the creation of councils and working groups that will consider issues within the competence of the body and prepare proposals for their solution.

This position appeared in Russia for the first time. The subject of the military-industrial complex is well known to the former president of the Russian Federation. On behalf of Putin, Medvedev already controlled the work of the military-industrial complex. It is including the production of military equipment and its supply to the troops. It was through the Security Council.

“The decree structures the work that was carried out by the control group of the Security Council under the leadership of Dmitry Medvedev. Control measures will be continued within the framework of the work of the Military-Industrial Commission,”

 Osipov explained.

This appointment of Medvedev caused controversy in the pool of experts. Some felt that the politician was never given a new job. They only transferred the old duties to another department. However, others point out that the dual status of the deputy president in the Security Council and the military-industrial complex is a “huge power resource”. It is allowing him to become the main candidate to succeed Putin in the run-up to the 2024 elections.

The leader of the ruling United Russia party

The former president still leads the ruling United Russia party and is one of Putin’s most trusted allies.

Another confirmation of this is Medvedev’s recent visit to Beijing. He met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who traditionally conducts negotiations at the highest level. That is, with heads of state. This time the conversation was held between the leaders of the two political forces. That secured the special status of the Russian politician.


“You have to understand that, in addition to writing posts in Telegram, Dmitry Anatolyevich does a lot of work, which is not very advertised, but which is very important. In particular, recently they began to show its functionality to accompany the reconfiguration of the military-industrial complex,”

What do Russians need to know about Ukraine?

Do not be seduced by the illusions made by the Bolsheviks!

Soviet and Russian propaganda for a long time and stubbornly hushed up uncomfortable facts about the “fraternal people” – now we are getting burned on this

By Alexander Shirokorad

In Soviet times, we were told daily about the great friendship between the Russian and Ukrainian peoples. Yes, it was true to some extent. But in Ukraine, millions of Banderists hated Russians, as well as Poles and Jews.

In the special depository of Leninka, I saw several yellowed books published in the 1920s which spoke about the wildest crimes of the Petliurists. In the photographs, people are quartered, impaled, and burned alive. However, in the 1930s, all these books were confiscated and destroyed, and several copies were handed over to the special depository.

During the Great Patriotic War, only in Belarus, 17 police battalions formed from Ukrainians committed atrocities. They destroyed the village of Khatyn. Moreover, they did it on their initiative, without the sanction of the Germans. The participation of Ukrainians in the mass executions at Babi Yar in Kyiv was also concealed from us.

There were hundreds of thousands of Bandera, and they got off with a slight fright for their terrible crimes. After 1936 and until 1950, the death penalty in the USSR was abolished. And all the acts of the Bandera agitprop hid from the Soviet people. Like, “someone here and there in Ukraine at times” was an assistant to the SS, but the entire population of Western Ukraine was partisan and hated the Germans.

After 1991

After 1991, agitprop, already anti-Soviet, utterly lied about the events in Ukraine. Everything connected with the Ukrainian SSR was cursed or consigned to oblivion. The press was filled with Russophobic articles. The monuments to Lenin were demolished after 1992. Several monuments to Suvorov and Kutuzov were demolished. Monuments to Bandera, Petlyura, and Hetman Skoropadsky were erected everywhere.

It reached the point that a monument was erected in Kiev to the “king of all Ukraine”, Vasil Vyshyvanny, nee Wilhelm von Habsburg. Alas, the Austrian henchman Vasil did not have to become king – the Kaiser slammed his fist on the table: “Our Hauptmann Skoropadsky and no kings should rule Ukraine!”

All this agitprop was kept secret from the people and, as before, chattered about the great friendship. Anti-Russia began to be created in 1992 – however, the term “AntiRussia” was first mentioned by President Putin only in June 2021.

Stalin made a mistake by annexing Western Ukraine to the Ukrainian SSR. It should have been left as part of Poland. As a last resort, it was necessary to completely clean up the region from all Bandera and their accomplices. This is exactly what the Poles did, completely “sanitizing” the lands inhabited by Ukrainians that remained in Poland. These guys professed the Bandera ideology, and the Poles sent some to concentration camps and some to the territories seized from the Germans.

2014 Coup

In 2014, the Kyiv junta was supported by the absolute majority of the population of Western Ukraine. But in the east, they were against it. In Sevastopol – 99.9% of the inhabitants, and in Crimea – about 90%. As a result, the peninsula returned without blood to Russia.

Since 1992, Kyiv has been preparing its troops in Crimea to suppress the uprising of the Russian population. By February 2014, about half of the special forces of Ukraine and the forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the SBU were based in Crimea. 

However, in the spring of 2014, most of the units immediately went over to the side of the Crimeans, and only a few units maintained hostile neutrality. Nobody dared to use weapons. Over 70% of SBU officers went over to the side of the Russian Federation. Whoever does not believe, let him look at the lists of these “traitor” officers on the website “Peacemaker” **.

In Donbas, most of the Ministry of Internal Affairs employees joined the junta’s opponents. In the spring of 2014, regular units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine did not want to fight for the LPR and DPR. Then, in April-May, the battalions Azov *, Donbass *, Aidar * and others were formed from zealous nationalists and criminals with the money of the oligarchs. They suppressed popular uprisings in Mariupol, Nikolaev, Odessa, Severodonetsk and others cities.

Post 2014

Since 2014, regular troops have also been involved in the ATO. Over the next 8 years, about 400 thousand Ukrainian soldiers passed through the ATO. Many marched involuntarily, but falling under the fire of the militias and intense artillery fire from the adjacent territory, they gradually began to consider both the Donbass and Russia as enemies. Each fighter had families who worried about their father or son and cursed the inhabitants of Donbass and the Russian Federation.

since 2014, the population of Ukraine has been subjected to massive processing by the propaganda apparatus of Kyiv from above, and from below, every day they heard the curses of two million refugees and participants in the ATO.

As a result, the same thing happened in Ukraine from 2014 to 2022 as in Germany from 1932 to 1939. The majority of the population of Ukraine managed to instil the ideology of Bandera and pathological Russophobia. Playing with wooden machine guns and killing Russians began to be taught in kindergartens. And again, agitprop framed the Russians, banning any information about the evolution of Ukrainian attitudes towards Russia.

It could be stopped in 2014

I will not be surprised that people in the Kremlin became victims of agitprop. In 2014, a landing on Kyiv and Odessa in a week would have led to the junta’s fall.

However, after eight years of Bandera propaganda, our troops faced stubborn resistance from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, most of whose servicemen hated Russia. In terms of durability, they can be compared with the Wehrmacht soldiers of 1943-1944. They do not desert in droves and do not surrender whole units, as was the case in 2014.

To defeat the Armed Forces of Ukraine, decisive strikes are now needed. Decisive victory and complete destruction of their military capabilities must be achieved. Only then can the psychology of the majority of Ukrainian citizens be reversed.

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China begins the “transformation of capitalism”

Is a new “cultural revolution” starting in China? For many days in the Celestial Empire, they have been discussing the article “Everyone can feel that a deep transformation is taking place” – about the new course of Xi Jinping .Here is the most striking quote from it:

“If we continue to have to rely on big capitalists as the main force in the fight against imperialism and hegemonism, or we continue to cooperate with the American industry of ‘mass entertainment’, our youth will lose their strong and courageous energy, and we will suffer the same collapse. like the Soviet Union, even before we get a real attack. “

The publication appeared on WeChat on August 28 on the personal blog of Li Guangman. He is a little-known journalist and former editor-in-chief of a small newspaper. But in the following days, the text was reprinted by various state media, including the People’s Daily and the Xinhua News Agency. That is, the theses of Guanman’s article received the highest support – and everyone began to perceive them as a signal of the upcoming radical transformations. Moreover, the article appeared 55 years after the beginning of the “great proletarian cultural revolution” – a turmoil that lasted for several years, during which Mao, relying on the extreme left, dealt a terrible blow not only to the Chinese nomenclature, but also to the entire way of life of educated Chinese.

And is there another storm of communist heights ahead?

Of course not. No matter how frightened the Chinese liberal Westernizers may be. No matter what they think up in the West. There can be no return to the practice of the “cultural revolution”. Nobody is going to curtail the reforms initiated by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, and the market economy is not going to be canceled. China’s goal remains to build a “society of common prosperity” by 2049, that is, by the centenary of the founding of the PRC.

But China is not going to give up the leading role of the Communist Party either – as well as the assertions that it is socialism with Chinese characteristics that is being built. The same Xi Jinping said at the celebration of the centenary of the CCP in July that “we must continue to promote the Sinification of Marxism, persistently combine the basic principles of Marxism with the concrete reality of China and with the excellent traditional culture of China.” 

But if socialism is Chinese, then the market economy, that is, capitalist, must also be Chinese. That is, a kind, national and consistent with Chinese values. It is precisely its change that Xi Jinping is engaged in. That is why the article of the blogger Guanman received such a resonance. What does Guanman write about? The fact that everything that has been happening in China in recent months is not separate events. It is part of a larger plan, which he calls “the deepest transformation” carried out by Xi Jinping.

Regulation of a very large IT businesses

First, Beijing tightened regulation of a very large IT business. Then restrictions were introduced on the activities of tutors (a huge market in China). And also access of schoolchildren to video games (no more than three hours a week). Now hands have reached show business – fines and bans on performances have been introduced for some stars. 

Moreover, at first there were warnings, and the main measures against the “cultural figures” were taken just after the publication of Li Guangman’s article – which, of course, added to the conspiracy theorists the confidence that the text about deep transformation appeared for a reason. Already on September 2, the management of the television and radio broadcasting announced a new strategy – limiting television programs and reality shows that cultivate youth idols. It is clear which ones, because at the same time we are talking about the need to establish the correct standards of beauty and expel “effeminate men.” 

Show business was offered to “deliberately abandon vulgarity, bad taste. And also to deliberately rebuff the decadent ideas of worshiping money, hedonism and extreme individualism. “Moreover, all the measures of the Chinese authorities have not only a market, but also a completely understandable moral dimension. Moreover, they are caused precisely by concern for the moral and ethical health of the nation. The financial costs are deeply secondary here. Because health, especially moral, cannot be bought. And then you cannot re-educate young people brought up on someone else’s matrix. And Xi Jinping is deliberately taking tough measures.

Li Guangman explains it as follows:

“This is a return from a group of capital to the masses of people and the transformation of a capital-oriented model into a model oriented towards the people. Thus, this is a political change, and the people again become the main organ of this change. Those who will prevent this change from being implemented in the direction of the people will be discarded.

This is also a return to the original intentions of the CCP. A return to the essence of socialism. “Moreover, Guanman promises that soon new rules of the game will come to the real estate and medical services sector. There the authorities intend to fight unnecessarily high prices. As a result, people will benefit from the reform of the education, medical and property sectors. It will lead to “shared prosperity.” The path to it lies through the reduction of social inequality. And it has become enormous in China.

“The capital market will no longer be a haven for capitalists who can get rich overnight. The cultural market will no longer be a paradise for sissy stars. News and public opinion will no longer worship Western culture. Therefore, we need control all cultural chaos and build a vibrant, healthy, courageous, strong and people-centered culture. “

Yes, this is the goal that Xi Jinping sets for himself. Chinese society over the past decades has gone through serious Westernization, the cult of consumerism and pleasure. The new CCP policy will not suffer defeat. Because with all the profound changes, with all the contradictions and problems, the majority of the Chinese still retained a sense of national unity and solidarity. And an understanding of justice.

Correction will be difficult and painful

The correction will be very difficult and painful. However, the CCP has another ally in this struggle. This is Chinese patriotism, and it is really massive. It is no coincidence that Guangman explaining the necessity and inevitability of a “deep transformation”. At present, China is facing an increasingly harsh and complex international situation. The United States is carrying out military threats against the country. It is conducting an economic and technological blockade, inflicting financial blows and conducting a political and diplomatic siege of China.

In addition, the United States. launched a biological and cyber war against us, attacks on public opinion in China. “That is, the “profound transformations” taking place in China in themselves are needed in order to “respond to the brutal and ferocious attacks of the United States. As well as to the current difficult international situation,” explains Guangman. 

The Chinese understand this very well – a weak and weak-willed China will become a victim of external expansion. As it was already in the 19th century. Hence the most important warning of Guangman: If China, in its confrontation with the West, relies on its capitalists and educates young people on global mass culture, then the fate of the USSR awaits it.

Resisting external challenges

It will collapse even before it is attacked. Indeed, such civilizing powers as China and Russia cannot be defeated from the outside. They can only be undermined from within. Split, take advantage of their internal mistakes, internal weakness, make them manageable. Take the future away from them, bring up new generations to be weak and devoid of national character, add opium, real or ideological. China understands this very well – including from the experience of Russia, which has already paid a terrible price for the collapse of the country. And both powers will do everything to ensure that their internal order meets the interests of the peoples and their civilizational code. That is, it is resistant to any external challenges.

US withdrawal from Afghanistan – Leonid Ivashov

A shameful flight or a move in a big game?

Leonid Ivashov and Igor Shishkin on what is behind the US defeat in Afghanistan. What are the consequences of the change of power in this country can have for Russia and the world. Why Afghanistan is called the solar plexus of Eurasia.

I. Shishkin: Leonid Grigorievich, this is the first question I have for you in connection with what happened in Afghanistan: the flight of the United States is very much reminiscent of what happened in Vietnam, they are talking a lot about this now, showing some footage, drawing parallels. And the question for you, in fact, as a specialist is to understand what is behind such an escape? Or they are deliberately doing this in order to provoke chaos in this territory, which will engulf its neighbors, China, Iran, Pakistan and Russia. Or, secondly, the United States really could not otherwise hold on to the situation. According to some experts, the United States has demonstrated by such a flight that it is a fading power, they say, there can be many ambitions, but not so many abilities.

Leonid Grigorievich Ivashov. Russian military and public figure, colonel general. Specialist in the field of geopolitics, conflict management, international relations, military history. President of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems.

L. Ivashov: Igor Sergeyevich, I generally exclude “flight” from my vocabulary when assessing the actions of the Americans. Let’s think about why the Americans are organizing their military presence, for some reason we think, since they have come, then they will put things in order there, make the population happy, stabilize the situation, and so on. Alas, Americans do not go anywhere for this purpose. They came there to take control of this very important geostrategic region. Afghanistan is the solar plexus of Eurasia, as it is called. Here is an access to powerful states, even civilizations, for example, like China. They once deliberately did this, their nuclear missile test site. Plus access to Pakistan, which has good relations with China lately. There is also an exit to India, then Iran, and so on.

In general, this is a very important region of the world, especially for Eurasia. The Americans built an airfield there, they came to influence the former Soviet, Central Central Asia, to influence Iran, India and so on from here. How to influence? Not only where to carry out some kind of military provocations or special operations, but to influence the maintenance of uncontrollable chaos. Let’s not forget that it was with the arrival of the Americans that drug trafficking increased, because this is the impact on your opponents through drug flows. Americans leave from wherever they go, they stay when they leave. 

So I, while still in the service for several years, noticed that they are campaigning, including among Afghans, in Russia, luring people to their territory in the United States. Moreover, there they are given appropriate education, training, and so on. The question is: what for? This is the preparation of the fifth column, or you can call it whatever you like. They stirred up, created this powerful Taliban movement and calmly leave, they were not even touched at the airport. And now, when they leave, they say, they say, you are going to clean up now. They armed, in fact, this population, everyone lives with some kind of weapon, created these warring groups and left. Further, we see that it is not the Americans who are alarmed now, but precisely the neighboring countries are alarmed. Therefore, to consider it a defeat or flight is, well, at least premature. that it is not the Americans who are alarmed now, but the neighboring countries are alarmed. 

I. Shishkin: This raises the following question then. You say that they came there not to make happy, not to deal with international terrorism, but they came in order to create a lot of trouble for their geopolitical opponents. But, doesn’t this mean that they were still unable to keep Afghanistan? After all, it was probably more profitable for them not to plunge into chaos, but to create powerful bases there, from which they could threaten China, for example, India and Russia, Central Asia and so on.

L. Ivashov:I think that all of this in the aggregate was at the same time and was planned. There is a continuous war, of course, the population is tired, the population wants peace, and I believe there will be peace. But, Americans, look where they just did not conduct these military actions, the same Iraq, Yugoslavia, in Libya. And then they calmly leave, therefore, did they try to stay there? Yes, of course, they would like to have military bases there, and so on, because they have already begun to build airfields there. It was not even Biden who decided this, it was even under Trump that it was decided that the troops would withdraw. 

You need to understand that the nature of this war has changed. And then, let’s see who’s coming there now? Turkey is paired with Qatar, it goes there. We are talking about the current moment, some of the Syrian militants were not accidentally transferred there, although the Afghans themselves are against the presence of other countries in general. China and Pakistan, for example, they also act in pairs, they were very interested in the Americans leaving. But, China is very powerful there, let’s face it. You can’t see it, nothing, but it is present, because China needs a stable and calm Afghanistan. But the Anglo-Saxons learned to do well, not to be present by military force, but to be present in a different way. 

Well, for example, we saw Syria, in Syria the Americans were little present, but look what movements they created there. They were in the shadows, but at the same time they created very powerful movements. We wish, of course, stability to be there. But, the question arises: will different groups of the Taliban start fighting among themselves tomorrow? And will they not create some other movements with American money that will fight against China and others, for example. they were very interested in the Americans leaving. 

I. Shishkin: Considering that the United States absolutely does not need “one belt, one road”, they are very interested in such a development of events.

L. Ivashov: Let’s see, God forbid, that this happens. But, experience suggests that the Americans, it seems, were not present somewhere militarily too strongly, but the states are gradually being destroyed. And it is not known how long such cases will last, because they are always and everywhere.

I. Shishkin: That is, to paraphrase the famous phrase that Great Britain has no eternal enemies, no eternal allies, but only eternal interests, then we can say that the Anglo-Saxons are guided by that there are no eternal victories and eternal defeats. After all, each victory will then turn into a defeat, but this defeat can be turned into a victory.

L. Ivashov: It was recorded that British intelligence spoke about its tasks, they say, that the Arabs should fight against the Arabs for our British interests.

I. Shishkin: One more question: nevertheless, the interest of the Americans is understandable, they are masters of organizing chaos in their own interests, but what about the regimes? They left Saigon, what they were creating collapsed instantly. They did not have time to leave Afghanistan completely, the regime they created collapses instantly. Vietnam still exists, for example, Cuba still exists, even though we left. It turns out that the regimes they create collapse instantly as soon as the bayonet disappears, and the regimes that we created exist and are very stable.

L. Ivashov: Well, they really consider Vietnam their defeat there. But, they know how to benefit from defeats, and then the same Middle East, stirred everything up there, brought some regimes that are unstable. As a result, the entire Middle East is unstable now, but here you must always look at what economic damage the Americans have suffered. Have they suffered any economic damage at all?

I. Shishkin: It seems that no.

Iran wants to join Eurasian Economic Union

Will Russia allow it?

There are some good reasons for Moscow’s lukewarm response to the possibility of Tehran’s admission to the EAEU. What are factors for and against Iran joining Eurasian Economic Union from Russian point of view?

By NIKOLA MIKOVIC

The Russia-dominated Eurasian Economic Union might soon be acquiring a new member: Iran. Boxed in because of its rivalry with other states in the Middle East, and laboring under US-imposed sanctions, Tehran believes it needs to strengthen ties with such neighbors as might be willing to accept it.

Iran appears to think that membership in the EAEU is a done deal. That is despite officials of the bloc denying they had received any formal request. When Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, Speaker of the Iranian parliament, visited Moscow on February 10, he declared Iran would “permanently join the EAEU in two weeks.” Apart from the fact that the date has passed, such optimism is extremely premature.

The response from Mikhail Myasnikovich, chairman of the board of the Eurasian Economic Commission, was telling. The Eurasian union wants Iran to have “a special view on cooperation with Eurasia,” he said. It hardly sounds like a warm welcome. Other EAEU officials have stressed that Iran must formally apply for membership. A veiled warning, perhaps, that Iran cannot expect to bypass procedures.

On the face of it, there are reasons for Tehran and Moscow to support Iran’s inclusion into the bloc. The economic area is an integrated market of 180 million people with a combined GDP of more than US$5 trillion. It encourages the free movement of goods and services and can formulate common policy in key areas such as energy, agriculture, transport, customs, and foreign trade and investment.

Iran already has had a free-trade agreement with the Eurasian union since 2018. In 2020, trade turnover between Iran and the EAEU increased by 2%, exceeding $2 billion.

Mutual benefits

Food products and agricultural raw materials accounted for most of that trade in both directions. 80% of the goods that the EAEU supplied to Iran and 68% of what Iran sent to the EAEU.

Joining the EAEU would improve Iran’s economic and political position globally and help to offset, at least partly, the cost of US sanctions.

On the Russian side, Moscow wants another pathway to the markets of the Middle East. That is why the Kremlin strongly supports the construction of the Nakhchivan corridor. It is a land route connecting not only Azerbaijan to its Nakhchivan exclave between Turkey and Armenia, but also Russia and Turkey and – crucially – Russia and Iran.

A future rail link between Russia and Iran, passing though Azerbaijan and Armenia, will undoubtedly enhance economic ties between the two countries as well as Iran’s trading relations with other Eurasian union member states.

However, how receptive Arab Middle East states would be to Russian goods transiting through Iran is another question altogether. This might be a reason for Moscow’s distinctly lukewarm response to the possibility of Tehran’s admission to the bloc.

In fact, there are several large questions hanging over inducting a new member into the bloc. Bloc consists of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, in addition to Russia. Uzbekistan, Moldova and Cuba have observer status.

Impact on Russian relationship with Israel and Arab States

It is not improbable that closer economic ties would lead to stronger military ones. The UN Security Council embargo on conventional arms shipments to Iran expired in October. It is no secret that Iran is interested in purchasing Russia’s S-400 anti-aircraft system. As well as Su-30 fighter jets. But such a deal would almost certainly ramp up tensions between Moscow and Washington and raise alarm bells in Gulf Arab states.

Then there is Russia’s relationship with Iran’s arch-enemy, Israel. The Russians have not prevented Israel from striking at Iranian targets in Syria, despite operating S-400 units in the area. Russia was the mediator in a prisoner exchange between its ally, Syria, and Israel that took place this month and there are rumors of further ongoing negotiations on humanitarian issues and even on wider geopolitical matters.

Speculation aside, what is known is that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed continued coordination between their two countries in light of developments in regional security. Was Iran also on the agenda?

Moscow, after all, must maintain its own delicate balancing act and guard its geopolitical interests. The normalization of ties between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and other Arab states has changed interest-dynamics in the region, tilting the balance further toward the Arab Gulf region’s anti-Iran alliance. How does Russia profit from the new Middle East?

Some other countries are already in the queue to join

Finally, there is the fact that there are others ahead of Iran in the queue to join the Eurasian union. Syria is one of them; 40 other countries also have stated their wish to develop trade and economic cooperation with the bloc.

As well as declaring that Iran would soon join the EAEU, Qalibaf said he had brought “a very important message” from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. It may well be that Moscow is composing its own, equally important message to send back to Tehran.

NIKOLA MIKOVIC

Nikola Mikovic is a political analyst in Serbia. His work focuses mostly on the foreign policies of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, with special attention on energy and “pipeline politics.” 

More by Nikola Mikovic

America’s Forever Wars Have Come Back Home

It’s no coincidence that, after years of fighting abroad, the United States is beset with paranoia, loss of trust, and increasingly bitter divisions

BY STEPHEN M. WALT

“Fortress America” is a derogatory term that usually refers to extreme forms of isolationism. Last week, however, CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria gave the idea a new and equally disturbing twist. In a thought-provoking column in the Washington Post, Zakaria described how excessive concerns for security are making the United States more “imperial” in appearance than the old colonial empires, with embassies, public buildings, and even the U.S. Capitol itself surrounded by barricades, moats, or fortifications. Instead of presenting a welcoming visage to the outside world and to the American people, one that conveys confidence, strength, and openness, America’s public face appears uncertain, vulnerable, fearful, and distant.

According to Zakaria, such concerns have also encouraged an excessive regard for secrecy, new layers of hierarchy and restriction, and a timid and sclerotic approach to public policy. In his words, “the U.S. government now resembles a dinosaur—a large, lumbering beast with much body and little brain, increasingly well-protected but distant from ordinary people and unresponsive to the real challenges that confront the nation.”

I couldn’t agree more, having noticed much the same tendency a few years ago. But the big question is: Why is this happening? Is it simply because the world has gotten more dangerous, or is there a connection between how the United States has been acting abroad and various threats to liberty at home?

I think there is. What follows is somewhat speculative, but there are several obvious ways in which America’s recent conduct abroad has led to greater insecurity, paranoia, loss of trust, and division within the United States, so much so that officials now have to erect barricades all over Washington (and in plenty of other cities as well).

Reason No. 1 is the familiar problem of “blowback.” During the “unipolar moment,” U.S. officials were convinced that a crusading foreign policy would be good for the United States and good for the rest of the world. As former President George W. Bush put it a few years before he took office, remaking the world in America’s image would usher in “generations of democratic peace.” Instead, we’ve seen a steady deterioration in democracy and eroding security at home and abroad. Whatever Americans’ intentions may have been, U.S. actions have sometimes caused enormous suffering in other countries—through sanctions, covert action, support for thuggish dictators, and a remarkable ability to turn a blind eye to the brutal conduct of close allies—not to mention America’s own far-flung military activities. Given the countries the United States has invaded, the bombs it’s dropped, and the drone strikes it’s conducted, it is any wonder that some people in other places wish Americans ill?

Bush used to say that terrorists came after the United States because they “hate our freedoms,” but there is a mountain of evidence—including the official 9/11 Commission Report—showing that what drove anti-American extremism was opposition to U.S. policy. Given what the United States had done—especially in the Middle East—it was entirely predictable that some groups would try to hit it back, and that a few of them would occasionally succeed. To say this is not to justify their actions or imply everything the United States has done was wrong; it is simply to remind us that U.S. actions are a key part of this story too.

Second, the vast sums Americans have spent trying to nation-build, spread democracy, or defeat all “terrorists of global reach” inevitably left fewer resources available to help Americans at home (including the veterans of the country’s protracted wars). The United States still spends more on national security than the next six or seven countries combined, and there’s little doubt that all that money has produced an impressive amount of military power. But the United States doesn’t have the world’s best primary and secondary schools; the best health care; best WiFi; best railways, roads, or bridges; or best power grids, and it lacks well-funded public institutions that can serve U.S. citizens’ needs in a pandemic or enable the country to maintain the technological edge it will need to compete with other countries for the rest of this century. Looking back, the over $6 trillion spent on what Bush dubbed the “war on terror”—including the money spent on unwinnable wars in Afghanistan and Iraq—could surely have been spent helping Americans live more comfortable and secure lives at home (or merely left in taxpayers’ pockets). Add to the list the decisions to promote rapid globalization and financial deregulation, which did significant harm to some sectors of the economy and led to the 2008 financial crisis, and you begin to see why confidence in the elite has taken a hit.

Third, running an ambitious and highly interventionist foreign policy—and, in particular, one that tries to manipulate, manage, and ultimately shape the internal politics of foreign countries—requires a lot of deception. To sustain public support for it, elites have to spend a lot of time inflating threats, exaggerating benefits, acting in secret, and manipulating what the public is told. But eventually at least some of the truth comes out, dealing another blow to public trust. And when actions abroad prompt blowback at home, government officials feel compelled to impose even more restrictions and start monitoring what ordinary citizens are doing, fueling suspicion and distrust of government even more.

To make matters worse, the architects of failure are rarely, if ever, held accountable. Instead of acknowledging their mistakes openly, even discredited former officials can head off to corporate boards, safe sinecures, or lucrative consulting firms, hoping to return to power as soon as their party regains the White House. Once back in office, they are free to repeat their previous mistakes, backed by a chorus of pundits whose recommendations never change no matter how often they’ve failed.

Why should ordinary Americans trust an elite that has misled them repeatedly, failed to deliver as promised, accrued an ever-larger share of the nation’s wealth, and suffered so few consequences for past errors? At this point it becomes easy to persuade someone that “the system is rigged” and that mainstream media is filled with “fake news.” Donald Trump didn’t learn how to lie in 2016—on the contrary, his career was founded on lies from day one—but he got elected president in part because Americans no longer believed anyone could be relied upon to tell the truth.

Weave these strands together, and you have a fertile environment for conspiracy theories, especially after Americans have been told over and over that a vast array of shadowy and ruthless adversaries were plotting to snatch their freedom away from them. In the 1950s, it was the fear of communist infiltration; after 9/11 it was the supposedly mortal peril of Islam, or immigrants, or a “refugee invasion.” Once you’ve been persuaded that the Islamic State posed an existential threat (as opposed to being a serious but manageable problem), it might not be hard to convince you that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was running a pedophile ring out of a pizza parlor. Too bad we didn’t spend more time worrying about some real dangers, like a new and highly contagious virus.

What I am suggesting is that America’s actions abroad helped create the dangers Americans now face at home. The United States set out to remake the world in its image, and when some parts of that world pushed back, it reacted the way that most societies do when they are attacked. Americans got scared, lashed out even more, stopped thinking clearly and strategically, and looked around for someone to blame. Instead of seeking out leaders who were genuinely interested in solving the real problems the United States faced, Americans ended up with the performative patriotism of a Ted Cruz or a Mike Pompeo—all swagger and no substance.

I’m not the first to point this out, of course, and the ideas sketched above are surely not the full story. Social media helped get us here, along with the emergence of the galaxy of media figures who figured out you could get rich being hateful, outrageous, and deceitful. I think Julian Zelizer is right to pin some of the blame on former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose desire for power alone did more than anyone to destroy the norms of bipartisan cooperation and compromise. And the Republican Party’s decision to pin its political future on gerrymandering, voter suppression, and mobilizing a shrinking base and not on trying to appeal to the median voter is surely part of the problem, too, along with the twisted soul of Trump himself.

But the connection between imperial adventures abroad and domestic turmoil at home should not be overlooked. President James Madison once warned that “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare,” and we would do well to reflect on his warning today. Endless campaigns abroad unleash a host of political forces—militarism, secrecy, enhanced executive authority, xenophobia, faux patriotism, demagoguery, etc.—all of them contrary to the civic virtues on which a healthy democracy depends. If President Joe Biden genuinely wants to heal America’s divisions on the home front, he needs to start doing less elsewhere. Otherwise, the United States is going to need some bigger walls, and I don’t mean on its borders.

Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University.

Eurasia-news-online comment:

This appears to be just another article showing internal divisions in United States. The fact is – Forever Wars started long before Trump became president. Another shocking fact is – Trump is the first USA president that did not start new war in forty years. Unfortunately – the only conclusion (based on this article) is that divisions in USA will get bigger and wider instead of smaller.

China will not fall into the ‘Thucydides Trap’ with India

President Xi Jinping projects China as a ‘benevolent power’ but at the Raisina Dialogue in Delhi the ‘Quad’ nations lined up against him

By Pepe Escobar

The West’s notions of history and geography between Europe and Asia, are drenched in myriad cultural implications and can be traced back to ‘The Romance of Alexander’.

This is a collection of essays mixing truth, epic drama and mythology, composed between the death of Alexander The Great in 323 B.C., and the fourth century A.D, and attributed either to Callisthenes, Aristotle’s nephew or to Alexander’s tutor.

During a 10-year period, Alexander forged an empire encompassing Asia Minor and what the West later defined as the Middle East, annexing the current lands of Turkey, Syria, Israel and Palestine, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, a slice of Pakistan and northwest India.

For more than two millennia, Alexander best embodied in the West the clash of these two lofty paradigms: East and West. Alexander’s conquests also helped India to enter the Western frame of mind in terms of geography and civilization.

We eventually learned that India was actually close to the Arab world – overland via Iran, and in naval terms via its direct connection to the Persian Gulf.

The exchange of goods, traditions and culture was always inbuilt in the Big Picture. Overland or seaborne, the ancient Silk Road – before arriving in China – went through India. Rome was already trading with India before learning about the Middle Kingdom, and vice-versa as the Chinese barely knew the Mediterranean existed.

Closer to the West

So, India was always closer to the Western mind than China.

In parallel, when Vasco da Gama reached southwest India in 1498, those ports for more than a millennium had been trading with China, Southeast Asia, the Arab world and the Mediterranean.

The historical case can be made that India’s royals, after trading for so long with Arab, Jewish and Chinese merchants, were fooled by the “peaceful” intention of the first European incursions, which eventually led to British domination of the subcontinent.

This background should be taken into account when we look at what happened during the latest international Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi. This was sponsored by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs and the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), an Indian think tank.

The theme of the Raisina Dialogue was “Managing Disruptive Transitions.” And the number one “disruptive transition” was identified as no less than China’s New Silk Road, otherwise known as the Belt and Road Initiative.

More than 200 million Indians are Muslims, which makes it the third largest Muslim nation in the world after Indonesia and Pakistan. So, it is no wonder that Premier Narendra Modi’s right-wing pro-Hindu BJP acts as the self-proclaimed defender of a multi-millennium civilization.

But when we dig deeper we find that modern Hindu nationalism – instead of worrying about the destiny of the Mahabharata – was actually born in the 1920s, infused with the theories of Mazzini, d’Annunzio and even one Benito Mussolini. Still, that was all about fear of the Hindu identity being swamped by Islam and Christendom.

Now, it is all about fear of China.

Belt and Road versus ‘Quad’

NATO was in full voice at the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi via Admiral Harry Harris, commander of US Pacific Command and named recently as US Ambassador to Australia. According to Harris, “the reality is that China is a disruptive transitional force in the Indo-Pacific, they are the owner of the trust deficit in the region.”

Significantly, the navy chiefs from the Quad nations – US, India, Japan, Australia – all agree on it. So does retired General David Petraeus, the former CIA director and mastermind of the surges in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Neocon ideologue Zalmay Khalilzad, a former US Ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan, also attended, and duly agreed that by trying to connect all of Eurasia via the Belt and Road, China would “change the international order.”

The Raisina Dialogue fully illustrated the scope of Washington’s terminological pivot from “Asia-Pacific” to “Indo-Pacific”, while detailing the prescription inbuilt in the new Pentagon Defense Strategy.

China – along with Russia – are “revisionist powers” bent on undermining the “international, rules-based order”, especially China with its “predatory economics” which will be fully developed through the Belt and Road program.

So, it was up to Quad to implement a new China containment strategy.

Geopolitically, in Beijing, China-India relations are regarded very seriously, second only in importance to China’s relations with the US. Lately, China-Russia relations have been in the ascendant – mutually exhorted as a “strategic partnership”.

China-Japan relations, meanwhile, may qualify as a distant fourth although vast swathes of the Chinese public appear to consider it the second biggest threat to President Xi Jinping’s “Chinese Dream”.

Yet once Beijing consolidates its influence over key maritime trade routes across East Asia, Japan will cease to be a problem. The real problem is if India ever decides to try to cut or at least interfere with China’s Belt and Road Initiative naval routes – and complex supply lines – across the Indian Ocean.

The key geopolitical question of the 21st century is how the ascension of China will “disrupt” American hegemony and arguably enable a Chinese – actually Eurasian – century.

China and India would have all it takes to be complementary. Both are members of BRICS, the group also comprising Brazil, Russia and South Africa. They are also part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), as well as top nations in the G-20. And yet New Delhi persists on treating Beijing not as a partner but as a threat.

Fear of the rising power

Xi Jinping, for his part, seems to take the Thucydides Trap seriously: when a rising power causes fear in an established power which escalates toward war. Xi has referred to it many times in his speeches.

So, closing the historical circle that started with Alexander, we now have an informed reader from the Middle Kingdom showing respect toward the most eminent historian of Ancient Greece

Xi is, in fact, warning the US, and by proxy, India, not to fall into the mistake that generated the Peloponnesian War, where every player lost.

The fear instilled in Sparta by the ascent of Athens rendered the war inevitable (replace Sparta by Washington/Delhi and Athens by Beijing). Athens was defeated as well as its model of democracy. In fact, the whole of Greece was defeated, its decline acting as a prelude for being conquered by Philip of Macedonia.

Inspired by the maritime expeditions of Admiral Zheng He, Xi’s point is that China is a benevolent power, with the New Silk Road – a massive trade route and a potential multiplier of wealth – developed as the archetypal globalization 2.0 “win-win”.

But, don’t count on India and the Quad to play along.

Source: http://www.atimes.com/article/china-will-not-fall-thucydides-trap-india/?utm_source=The+Daily+Report&utm_campaign=ec0ab36231-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_02_12&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1f8bca137f-ec0ab36231-21552319