UKRAINE:
What’s going on?
- Russia is NOT
preparing an invasion. Washington and its vassals are shouting ‘WOLF’
because that are panicked that the internal situation in Ukraine is
spinning out of control – and they’re setting up Putin
as the scapegoat in the event that the crazies in Kiev launch their own
assault on the secessionist Donbass provinces.
- Ukraine
is well on its way to disintegration as a state. Its President, Mr.
Zelensky, is a professional comedian who receives no respect – from the
hardline neo-Fascists who dominate in the security services
and in the street, the oligarchs or the populace in general. The
economy is on the brink of collapse thanks to incompetence, rampant
corruption, the rupturing of commercial ties with the successor states
to the Soviet Union, runaway inflation and the spike
in spot market oil prices it must pay after breaking long-term supply
contracts with Russia at the behest of the U.S., Brussels and ‘expert’
consultants from the UK.
Moreover, it soon will see a drop in the transit fees it
currently receives for the natural gas pipeline that runs from Russia to
the West because its dilapidated condition will accelerate the shift to
much more efficient Nordstrom II now on line.
- Ultra-nationalist
and neo-Fascist elements in Kiev are tempted to try a political ‘hail
Mary’ by attacking the Donbass. Preparations were made for such a move
last spring, with the encouragement of some in
the West, but the Ukrainians were forced to back down when Moscow sent a
blunt message that it would respond massively. That would mean the end
of post-Maidan Ukraine, the country’s fragmentation, and humiliation for
the West. For there is absolutely nothing
that the U.S., NATO or EU could do about it. The loudmouths in
Washington, Brussels (both ends), London, et al would have to eat crow
before a global audience.
- The West entered this strategic trap willingly and voluntarily; also, sealed in their own ignorance and hubris.
- The alternative is to reactivate the Minsk II accords which Kiev
has adamantly refused to
honor over the past 7 years with the backing of the US and its European
allies/vassals. The Biden administration rejects this diplomatic tack
as it rules out the obvious step of pressing
the Zelensky government to do so. Why? The powerful anti-Russian lobby
in Washington and Biden’s dread at being labelled an ‘appeaser.’
Instead, it has sent one senior American official after another to
Moscow (Blinken, Sullivan, Wendy Sherman, and finally
William Burns) to cajole Putin to bury the Minsk accords in favor of
some as yet unspecified plan that would spare Kiev the agony of
decision, keep Ukraine intact, and lure Russia into an all-party series
of meetings led by the United States. Nothing doing.
- Fears
have grown in Washington because their grip on Kiev decision-makers is
slipping. They now are sweating over the possibility of a Ukrainian
strike against the Donbass. A major objective of the Burns mission,
in addition to convincing the Russians to drop Minsk, was to extract a
pledge that in the event of such an assault Moscow would exercise
restraint and not respond with the promised massive military
retaliation.
- Despite
having failed at this futile mission, the White House still effuses to
rein in the Ukrainian red-hots. Hence, their desperate contingency plan
to blame it all on Russian aggression. That’s what all
the alarums about a Russian troop buildup are all about.
Conclusion
American leaders, and our political
class in general, are now facing the consequences of their living in a
comfortable and convenient fantasy world divorced from reality. If by
sheer luck, they avoid a catastrophe in Ukraine,
they still are on course for an even greater disaster in the Taiwan
Straits.
The country at large is complicit in this tragic indulgence of amateur theatrics.