Ray McGovern reviews key pieces of background that — thanks to the media — few Americans know about the widest war in 77 years that is now on our doorstep.
Jan. 16, 2017: U.S. Vice President Joe Biden traveling to Kiev. (U.S. Embassy Kyiv, Flickr)
Thanks to Establishment media, the sorcerer apprentices advising President Joe Biden — I refer to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, National Security Advisor Jacob Sullivan and China specialist Kurt Campbell – will have no trouble rallying Americans for the widest war in 77 years, starting in Ukraine, and maybe spreading to China. And, shockingly, under false pretenses.
Most Americans are oblivious to the reality that Western media are owned and operated by the same corporations that make massive profits by helping to stoke small wars and then peddling the necessary weapons.
Corporate leaders and Ivy-mantled elites, educated to believe in U.S. “exceptionalism,” find the lucre and the luster too lucrative to be able to think straight. They deceive themselves into thinking that (a) the U.S. cannot lose a war; (b) escalation can be calibrated and wider war can be limited to Europe; and (c) China can be expected to just sit on the sidelines. The attitude, consciously or unconsciously, “Not to worry. And, in any case, the lucre and luster are worth the risk.”
The media also know they can always trot out died-in-the-wool Russophobes to “explain,” for example, why the Russians are “almost genetically driven” to do evil (James Clapper, former national intelligence director and now hired savant on CNN); or Fiona Hill (former national intelligence officer for Russia), who insists “Putin wants to evict the United States from Europe … As he might put it: “Goodbye, America. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
Absent a miraculous appearance of clearer heads with a less benighted attitude toward the core interests of Russia in Ukraine, and China in Taiwan, historians who survive to record the war now on our doorstep will describe it as the result of hubris and stupidity run amok. Objective historians may even note that one of their colleagues – Professor John Mearsheimer – got it right from the start, when he explained in the autumn 2014 issue of Foreign Affairs “Why the Ukraine Crisis is the West’s Fault.”
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Historian Barbara Tuchman addressed the kind of situation the world faces in Ukraine in her book The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam. (Had she lived, she surely would have updated it to take Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Ukraine into account). Tuchman wrote:
“Wooden-headedness…plays a remarkably large role in government. It consists in assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs. It is acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by the facts.”
‘Nyet Means Nyet’
Vladimir Putin at an April 4, 2008, press-conference following the meeting of the Russia-NATO Council. (Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)
Thanks to U.S. media, a very small percentage of Americans know that:
- Fourteen years ago, then U.S. Ambassador to Russia (current C.I.A. Director) William Burns was warned by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that Russia might have to intervene in Ukraine, if it were made a member of NATO. The subject line of Burns’ Feb. 1, 2008, Embassy Moscow cable (#182) to Washington makes it clear that Burns did not mince Lavrov’s words. It stated: “Nyet means nyet: Russia’s NATO enlargement redlines.” Thus, Washington policymakers were given forewarning, in very specific terms, of Russia’s redline regarding membership for Ukraine in NATO. Nevertheless, on April 3, 2008, a NATO summit in Bucharest asserted: “NATO welcomes Ukraine’s and Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations for membership in NATO. We agreed today that these countries will become members of NATO.”
- Eight years ago, on Feb. 22, 2014, the U.S. orchestrated acoup in Kiev — rightly labeled “the most blatant coup in history,” insofar as it had already been blown on YouTube 18 days prior. Kiev’s spanking new leaders, handpicked and identified by name by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland in the YouTube-publicized conversation with the U.S. ambassador in Kiev, immediately called for Ukraine to join NATO.
June 2014: Left to right: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Ukraine’s post-coup President Petro Poroshenko, U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt Pyatt and Victoria Nuland, Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs. (State Department)
- Six years ago, in June 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin told Western reporters of his concern that so-called antiballistic missiles sites in Romania and Poland could be converted overnight to accommodate offensive strike missiles posing a threat to Russia’s own nuclear forces. (See this unique video, with English subtitles, from minute 37 to 49.) There is a direct analogy with the 1962 Cuban missile crisis when Moscow put offensive strike missiles in Cuba and President John Kennedy reacted strongly to the existential threat that posed to the U.S.
Armored vehicles from a U.S. regiment pull into the Romanian town of Brasov, May 14, 2015. (NATO)
- On Dec. 21, 2021, Putin told his most senior military leaders: “It is extremely alarming that elements of the U.S. global defense system are being deployed near Russia. The Mk 41 launchers, which are located in Romania and are to be deployed in Poland, are adapted for launching the Tomahawk strike missiles. If this infrastructure continues to move forward, and if U.S. and NATO missile systems are deployed in Ukraine, their flight time to Moscow will be only seven to 10 minutes, or even five minutes for hypersonic systems. This is a huge challenge for us, for our security.” [Emphasis added.]
- On Dec. 30, 2021, Biden and Putin talked by phone at Putin’s urgent request. The Kremlin readout stated: “Joseph Biden emphasized that Russia and the U.S. shared a special responsibility for ensuring stability in Europe and the whole world and that Washington had no intention of deploying offensive strike weapons in Ukraine.” Yuri Ushakov, a top foreign policy adviser to Putin, pointed out that this was also one of the goals Moscow hoped to achieve with its proposals for security guarantees to the U.S. and NATO. [Emphasis added.]
Dec. 7, 2021: U.S. President Joe Biden, on screen during video call with Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)
- On Feb. 12, Ushakov briefed the media on the telephone conversation between Putin and Biden earlier that day. “The call was as a follow-up of sorts to the … December 30 telephone conversation. … The Russian President made clear that President Biden’s proposals did not really address the central, key elements of Russia’s initiatives either with regards to non-expansion of NATO, or non-deployment of strike weapons systems on Ukrainian territory … To these items, we have received no meaningful response.” [Emphasis added.]
- On Feb. 24, Russia invaded Ukraine.
Unprovoked?
The U.S. insists that Russia’s invasion was “unprovoked.” Establishment media dutifully regurgitate that line, while keeping Americans in the dark about such facts (not opinion) as are outlined (and sourced) above. Most Americans are just as taken in by the media as they were 20 years ago, when they were told there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. They simply took it on faith. Nor did the guilty media express remorse — or a modicum of embarrassment.
The late Fred Hiatt, who was op-ed editor at The Washington Post, is a case in point. In an interview with The Columbia Journalism Review [CJR, March/April 2004] he commented: “If you look at the editorials we wrote running up [to the war], we state as flat fact that he [Saddam Hussein] has weapons of mass destruction. … If that’s not true, it would have been better not to say it.”
(My journalism mentor, Robert Parry, had this to say about Hiatt’s remark. “Yes, that is a common principle of journalism, that if something isn’t real, we’re not supposed to confidently declare that it is.”)
It’s worse now. Russia is not Iraq. And Putin has been so demonized over the past six years that people are inclined to believe the likes of James Clapper to the effect there’s something genetic that makes Russians evil. “Russia-gate” was a big con (and, now, demonstrably so), but Americans don’t know that either. The consequences of prolonged demonization are extremely dangerous – and will become even more so in the next several weeks as politicians vie to be the strongest in opposing and countering Russia’s “unprovoked” attack on Ukraine.
Humorist Will Rogers had it right: “The problem ain’t what people know. It’s what people know that ain’t so; that’s the problem.”
Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. His 27-year career as a C.I.A. analyst includes serving as chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and preparer/briefer of the President’s Daily Brief. He is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).
This article is from AntiWar.com
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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Ray,
Are there analysts and decision-makers within the intel community and military pushing back against this suicidal policy the way there was against the Iraq War and even some of the moves toward overt war with Iran?
Thanks for all your reporting, Ray! Thanks for being amongst the first to warn us against the disastrous Iraq War!
I know US citizens are stupid. But are they this stupid? Stupid enough to waste Ukrainian lives in a proxy war, yes! Stupid enough to not realize that it’s already a de-facto NATO war with “Ukrainian” troops with Midwestern US accents in the Kharkiv Offensive, yes! But stupid enough to commit US troops above board in an unprecedented direct confrontation between nuclear super-powers?
I mean, if we commit US troops to this, that would be breaking the tradition that, since the dawn of the nuclear age, nuclear super-powers don’t have direct military confrontations but only proxy wars, right? I mean the dangers of escalation would be something even the most horrific war-mongers would be fearful of, wouldn’t it. The whole shooting match could be over in minutes! Back to insect life, a world ruled by the cockroach.
Scott Ritter pointed out the other day that, although Stoltenberg said some ridiculously aggressive things, the officers below him in NATO, who realize how dangerous nukes are, have been more level-headed.
War is another way to advocate for more national debt.
The civil chaos of the USA government/society, and the Great Reset oppression, are submitted to be funded by two methods of questioned legality.
First: An Income tax on Sovereign Citizens is not consistent with Constitutional authorization nor does statutory authorization for such a tax exist. Ref. hxxps://stateofthenation.co… THE INCOME TAX SCAM & 87,000 ARMED
Second: The Federal Reserve system covertly transfers ‘profit’ derived from auctions of Treasury securities to unknown shareholders. All profit of the Fed legally belongs to the government. The relevant accounts have never been audited. Ref. hxxps://stateofthenation.co/?p=116267 THIS IS OUR BANKING SYSTEM
Both methods involve financiers – BEYOND GOVERNMENT – who are the chief beneficiaries.
If this nefarious funding of corrupt politicians and Great Reset is not exposed, all far-right legislation will be subverted with new globalist subterfuge.
Thanks, Ray. And I echo the plaudits appearing in so many of the comments. You are an inspiration to many, including this younger brother – and at age 83! (You, not me!! :-) )
Just to flesh out a couple of your bullet points, which you have often pointed out in the past, and probably felt you didn’t have space for in this piece.
First, in then Ambassador to Russia, Burns’ Feb, 2008 cable – and this connects to your apt “existential threat” analogy to the Cuban Missile Crisis – Burns went on to say something about Russia having it’s own valid security interests, right? And not for nothing, we know of this cable because Julian Assange and Wikileaks published it. (Where the heck is now CIA Director Burns in all this??)
Secondly, another fact that makes the Russian invasion even more understandable is the 8 years of war unleashed against the Donbass provinces, which refused to accept the legitimacy of the 2014 U.S. led coup, by the Ukrainian government from the 2014 to 2022, resulting in the deaths of 14,000 Russia-leaning and Russian speaking people in the East.
Read in combination with Scott Ritters CN article, one might be disposed to despair. Let’s get out in the street instead!
Larry McGovern
The military and the national security apparatus are clearly locked in to a self sustaining circle jerk when we consider U.S. foreign policy.
The big money lobbies control congress directing the paralyzed congressional body as they wish. The media has been bought off or controlled very effectively presenting only the news they are told to present.
Millions of “exceptional Americans”, high on the propaganda have bought in to the big government line that Russia must be destroyed and all is well.
The result is stated in McGovern’s provided Will Roger’s quote, ” The problem ain’t what people know. It’s what people know that ain’t so; that’s the problem!”. Truer words have never been spoken!
Things have been this way since at least 1984-1988 when John Kerry was investigating international organized crime, especially the drug trade. Bush 41 was in the middle of it right along with Ronnie raygun. That was aground 38 years ago. I had a strong grasp on what was happening at the time and anytime I questioned the story, which I referred to as the “Party Line”, and the values being reinforced by a shitty president and vice president you would have thought I took classified documents from the White House.
Raygun was such sleaze he allowed the Contra Affair, knew all about in fact, Bush was such a crook he pardoned anyone who could finger him. $@ was conned into running and getting elected because of his complicity with CIA drug dealing. Anytime I tried to talk about it I was the “crazy one”.
Now I no longer particularly give one shit whether this gets posted here or not. But remember this those of us who are true believer’s in the this known true version of history here have known the bottom line for the last 38 years. People don’t want to believe the truth because it terrifies them. You know being exceptional Americans and all.
Now our “Exceptional leadership” in this country has us set up for another depression type round of murderous economic failure which could in the end kill hundreds of thousands of Americans. Or a nuclear war that could terminate the planet. Nice going, what a bunch of dumb fucks.
And that’s not considering how many newly U.S. minted millionaires stand to go broke in the process. I sure they will not be pissed off to the “Nines.”
I see no way the U.S. will weather this storm without serious civil strife.
Ray you show great strength in your convictions, in these trouble times your public stance is to be commended. Thank you!
Thanks CN
“thanks to the media — few Americans know about the widest war in 77 years that is now on our doorstep.” Ray McGovern
HENCE, everyone, please, take advantage of CN’s Fall Fund Drive and Bring Home, “American Dispatches,” A Robert Parry Reader.
Imo, Investigative Journalism (Robert Parry, Ray McGovern, et al) in The Divided $tates of Corporate America, is beyond crucial.
I agree. Keep Investigative Journalism, A L I V E; &, “The House” Rockin!!! L o n g live, Consortium News, et al. Thank You.
“If wars can be started by lies then they can be stopped by truth,” Julian Assange, i.e., “American Dispatches,” A Robert Parry Reader. FYI, American Dispatches rocks, everything, i.e., “the level of corruption. Who they be, “the corrupt,” the executioners; &, all about the MSMedia’s “journalism” aka reporting.
Echoing others, “Robert Parry came to the conclusion that “the media” is not delivering the news honestly or straight-forwardly. Consequently, Robert Parry built Consortium News “a new infrastructure for conveying information that is honest, independent, and incorruptible.”
“Ring the bell. That still can ring.” Twenty-Eight (28) Years of publishing!!! Score! Consortium News.
“May you have a strong foundation when the winds of change, shift” (Robert Parry > Joe Lauria); and, “May your song always be sung.” (Bob Dylan).
Back to Ray McGovern’s, “Conditioned for War with Russia.” TY….Onward & Upwards.
Ray McGovern is one of the most courageous and honest people I have ever met, and when I say “honest” I mean just that, especially in his lectures, articles and during Q & A while being interviewed. He was one of the first Americans to speak “Truth to Power” during Bush Jr. (and Chaney’s) crimes of aggression and war crimes in Iraq, which caused us no harm, but we wanted their oil.
Between the overpaid psychopaths in the Pentagon, parading around in their military costumes with chests full of fruit salad, and the Usury Masters on Wall Street, and the defunct (for the most part in telling the truth) mainstream media and the Hollywood crowd working with the CIA, et al, most people except what they hear or read on the MSM outlets which are paid shills for the above.
Very sad! American Hubris seems to have no boundaries, and that’s scary!
Thank you Ray, Joe L. and the CN staff for doing great work in trying to teach and enlighten people before it’s too late!
This bring up a question on human nature, are people willfully ignorant, are they confused, are they evil? Let’s flesh that out:
1. Information exists for people who care. My current reading is Steven Kinzer’s 2006 “Overthrow,” which is mini-histories of the U.S. coups in Hawaii, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Nicaragua, Honduras, Iran, Guatemala, South Vietnam, Chile, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq. It is appalling. You read that, viola you achieve proper skepticism about the nature of US behavior around the world for many past decades. A properly skeptical people will not board a leaky boat, fly in a tattered aircraft, or invest in a company with a junk balance sheet. They will not authorize a consistently evil government. So what’s up?
2. This statement is where McGovern’s article fails: “Most Americans are just as taken in by the media as they were 20 years ago, when they were told there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. They simply took it on faith.” This is not what is going on, Americans invest just about zero real faith in media, outside the weather report that causes you to decide what to wear.
3. Americans are not “”taken in.” Americans are as savvy as any people. However they act on their own interests, which means they act on their stake in any game in which they play. What is the American stake in US / Russia relations? You can’t name it, it doesn’t really exist. The only stake is akin to picking the good guy in a movie – it’s completely cost free, you do as you wish to titillate yourself as an exercise in social psychology.
Lacking stake in the game, Americans go with what is easiest, which by any reckoning with respect to Ukraine is to go along with the lies. It’s easier to just watch the movie and root for your side while you sit in the dark theater.
If American families were billed even $100 a month for their investment in weapons to Ukraine, this disaster of misdirection would grind to a halt immediately. People who care would do more good by demanding that we pay as we go, than demanding that the whole population grow a conscience it does not naturally own.
The problem with your assertions is that you presume everyone is interested in doing the work it takes to find out what is going on. That’s not reality, in the US and elsewhere. It is not by accident that the pace of living has increased and that there are distractions such as cell phones, twitter, facebook, etc. They are designed to shorten people’s attention span.
A simple example would be the events following Charlottesville. Despite Trump specifically stating that he condemned the neo-Nazis, the narrative continues to this day, believed by a large section of the population, that he refused to do so. The same goes for the Putin`s puppet” narrative of the Russiagate hoax. Yes, the information is there and easy to find, providing people want to find it, but they don`t.
H. L. Mencken (1880 – 1956): “As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents… the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
This was written more than 100 years ago, and so was the quote below. Americans have been self-serving bigoted liars since they arrived in North America. Their lies give Americans the ‘right’ to do as they please, to whomever gets in the way of making money.
Alexis de Tocqueville : “I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.”
Jimmy Carter: “[The US] is just an oligarchy, with unlimited money being the essence….”
H. L. Mencken (1880 – 1956): “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.”
William Casey (CIA Director 1981-1987): “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”
I have taught about propaganda in my college composition classes for decades but hadn’t come across that first Mencken or de Tocqueville quote.
Both are keepers.
Americans are not that unique in our love of ignorance. Hitler said something similar, and it works about as well for our warmongers as it did for him:
“The receptive powers of the masses are very restricted, and their understanding is feeble. On the other hand, they quickly forget. Such being the case, all effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials and those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotyped formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward.”
hxxp://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/document/docpropa.htm
I collect quotations and am very careful to retain their original meaning when I do lest I dilute their value. Thus I keep an eye open when the meaning of a good statement is distorted, as in this reply of yours to my post.
The Tocqueville quote is out of context and misses his point. He is saying that the institution of democracy is the culprit enforcing the lack of ideas in America, not America itself. He is pointing a finger at democracy, not America per se. Of course Tocqueville was an aristocrat, at the time he wrote democracy was associated with the violence of mob rule in the French Revolution. America attracts Tocqueville’s ire because it was so damned democratic, something you may, ironically, admire.
You completely abuse the Carter quotation and it does not take much to see this as it does not pass the smell test; Carter certainly loves the USA and would not cheaply condemn it like your quote implies. The quote you only partially post is from a radio interview. Jimmy was speaking about elections, not “[The US]” in general.
There is no lack of material to say what you aimed at without taking quotes out of context and destroying their meanings. Hopefully if someone like me bothers to jump you every time you do what you did here, you’ll slow down and learn to be more precise.
Another way of looking at most people’s relationship to the anti-Russia propaganda: if people see through it, bother to post something about it, or even look at what others have posted and see the berating by the army of PR shills hired to shame people into conformity, they just figure it’s better to keep their mouths shut.
The propagandists have a problem too: selling the Iraq War was easier since most Americans hadn’t paid attention to our history with that country until the drumbeat for war started. By contrast, a lot of us are old enough to remember the end of the Cold War, the promises made in return for the reunification of Germany, and the political and economic changes Russia made at the time with our “help.”
Since so many of us remember that, the propagandists are left with shouting us down and calling previously accepted history Russian disinformation.
If everything were black or white, would Biden be a demon? Or a sweet old guy who wouldn.t hurt a fly?
And now provoking China too? Are these asinine people out of their (lacking) minds??? It isn’t the first time I state that it is high time the US be taught a lesson it won’t forget so soon. For the sake of life on Earth…
We couldn’t successfully occupy medium-small countries like Iraq or Afghanistan, but our foreign policy geniuses think they can bring our only peer in nuclear weapons and its vast land AND a country with five times our population that in the Korean War, fought us to a standstill just a couple of years after finishing their revolution.
At best, they might create a failed state in Russia, which would mean thousands of loose nukes.
At worst, they will spark a nuclear war that makes our world uninhabitable.
Bipedal homunculi, who call themselves Homo Habilis, but in this case boors & morons – a feeble-minded, savages, individuals, who rob nature – mother, &, therefore, by killing themselves, only nature will survive, rise from his knees, & the spawn – of hell, this will come down to no, disappear, dissolve, scatter dust in the infinity of the universe, like a geek of the universe, her worst creation.
Sick in the head, weak-minded, do not consider themselves fools & idiots. The level of development of their mind, they usually consider prohibitively high. Individuals – ( the tongue does not dare to call this elite of the nazis – people), cannot solve complex problems, tend to be slow, slow-witted, perform meaningless actions, unwillingness to think. Primitive beings living within the boundaries of the stereotypes inspired by them.
This is not a Russian war! Russian people never threatened anyone! This is a war of the USA, NATO, Britain & Europe with Russia! And to threaten the whole world is the handwriting of the US & not Russia. Therefore, I sincerely consider the USA & their european vassals to be a civilization of lies. For me, the USA & Britain – is the meanest & bloodiest state on the planet. And by the way, is not surprising, that the heroes of the US – this are Batman, Spiderman, Superman, etc. Primitive beings living within the boundaries of the stereotypes inspired by them. USA is the most deceitful state in the world! The most criminal & nazi. A country of crooks, murderers, rapists, thieves, ship whores, the illiterate, the mentally retarded, the subhuman. You are rats & scum, nazis, russophobes, executioners of the russian people!
What a nation, such & heroes!!!
There goes your green card.
one wonders why Putin took so long to confront the US. Preparation presumably!
Where DO our Fearless Leaders get their misinformation about China or Russia?
Ordinary Chinese people get what they think they know about the USA from Hollywood rom-coms and from TV shows like Gossip Girls or Vampire Diaries. Is Senile Old Joe relying on Terry and the Pirates comic strips? Is Blinken getting his impressions of China from Jackie Chan films?
It’s not where they get their information but where they get their orders: from a handful of inbred trust fund babies, bankers, and hedge fund managers who think the whole world is their property and the rest of us are serfs that have to be brought to heel.
Glad your back on Consortium Ray. Reply comments are straightforward.
Well, true to your calling for the word this piece is essential for our
understanding of just how deeply the military-corporate state is embedded in what
passes for mainstream American journalism.
Back in 1962, when Khrushchev brought missiles into Cuba, was that
a response to American high-powered missiles in Turkey? And JFK had
them removed so settling peacefully the Cuban Missile Crisis? Maybe his undoing.
If so, it’s unprovoked provoked all over again.
Thank you, Ray, for a cogent essay laying out important facts on Ukraine. Would that your essay were published in the NYTimes and the WaPo. But wait…that would mean we have a free press.
Russia and China have “core interests” in Ukraine and Taiwan? What are they, other than the itch to invade and take over, subjecting them to a dictatorship, a la Hong Kong, and exploiting them to the max? Who wants to live as a vassal under Putin and Xi?
Most of the points you make seem valid to me, NATO is far too belligerent, and the quest for arms profiteering is shameful and criminal. This doesn’t mean that Putin and Xi are fine fellows, just looking out for the interests of their citizens…as if. Sometimes a demon is a demon. Would YOU like to go protesting on the street, in either Russia or China?
In simple terms Ukraine and Taiwan are “ core interests “:based on one, pure geography and two,both are currently politically antithetical to Russia and China respectively. Just as the Monroe Doctrine is central to the US’s “ core interests “.Surely you understand that. Although it seems you don’t.
Instead you shill the neocon notion that Russia and China simply wants “subjugate” and take their land “ just because we want to takeover”and create a “ dictatorship “. In China’s case a dictatorship it would be. In Russia’s case you’ve obviously
accepted the MSM and collective west narrative that Russia is a “ dictatorship “. Complete with sham elections and a censored media . A point that could well be made concerning our own state of “ democracy “. Russian democracy sure isn’t perfect but remember they’ve only been at it for thirty one years. How truly democratic was the US after only 31 years. Think about it.
As long as the US persists in inviting Ukraine and Taiwan into “ the club” of course they will be of “ core interest“ to both Russia and China.
Oh and one last thing. As for protesting in the streets. Let’s go back to the Kent state National Guard killings of students protesting Vietnam. Or more recently in my country, Canada , just this past February, where Trudeau used the most draconian legislation we have, The Emergencies Measures Act to stop a peaceful citizens protest against Covid mandates and restrictions at our Parliament Hill,Ottawa. People were arrested and jailed without judicial process and held without bail even to the extent of having their bank accounts frozen and assets raised on GoFundme by regular citizens also frozen.
That’s quite apart from the “ kettling” and beatings handed out to protesters at the G20 in Toronto in 2010. I could go on but suffice to say protesting in western countries isn’t as rosy as you imply.
It’s clear Western oligarchs are all in for war with Russia and China.
Most of the progressive writers and politicians who were staunchly against the Iraq War have fallen in line with demonizing Russia and even China (before China has given us a credible excuse).
Just today, protesters peacefully protesting Manchin’s dirty deal have been arrested. Protesting in the USA, isn’t a walk in the park.
If everything were black or white, would Biden be a demon? Or a sweet old guy who wouldn.t hurt a fly?
You sound intransigently naive and perhaps poorly read. For your information, it is both China and the Russians who have a fine history of throwing out dictators via revolution, while the US does not. The US has a fine history of using money & guns to overthrow the elected leadership of smaller nations for the benefit of our dictators; those Americans who own the most investments. So you have your vision of the world upside down and backward. I suggest you read Steven Kinzer’s 2006 “Overthrow” for some detail on just how wrong you are about the fundamentals that may have lead you to your view of China or Russia.
The tendency to demonize individuals or nations is evidence of a lack of something; of information, of insight, of empathy, of experience. What should come to mind for instance re Hong Kong is British imperialism, not a parroting of some claptrap you’ve been exposed to in a US paper trying desperately to sell copies.
I agree with the author’s thesis but I think left out of the discussion regarding anti ballistic missiles is that under MAD doctrine, an effective ABM shield is a first strike enabler. This is just as threatening as the convertibility discussed in the article.
Ray McGovern is another one of the TRUTH-TELLERS that I listen to.
McGovern had a 27 year career as a CIA Analyst, including as Chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch.
He was responsible for preparing,and giving President Reagan the “President’s Daily Intelligence Briefing.”
Then, in retirement, he co-founded a group of Whistle-blowers called “Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)” that called out Bush/Cheney for lying about WMDs and for using torture!
When THAT GUY tells me that we are closer to World War III than we have EVER BEEN, and it’s NOT because Putin is evil – it’s because the American Military-Industrial Complex knowingly, and intentionally, provoked Russia with our relentless eastward expansion of NATO . . . you are damned right I am going to listen to what he has to say!
He has earned my respect as a truth-teller, and I, sure as hell, am going to trust him before I trust any of the “retired” Generals and Spooks on MSNBC and CNN.
MSNBC Military and Intelligence Analyst Gen. Michael Heyden, the former Director of both the CIA and the NSA, is worth over $53 Million dollars, folks.
Do you really trust THAT GUY is going to tell you the truth about the Military-Industrial Complex?!
First you needlessly parrot credentials information that is posted in the author bio here, as though you did not read the article or just like to repeat the obvious. Then you add a straight up lie about Michael Hayden’s net worth (who I have no love for), one that is downright silly and does not pass the basic smell test. Add ostentatious spacing between non paragraphs as though you are laying out a tabloid, plus all-caps, and the impression is that you are not to be taken as a serious adult.
Prompt Critical,
You don’t say what you see as the the “thesis” and as you get the bit about ABM wrong (they are an arms race enabler) it’s hard to presume what you mean. To be effective, you should not write as though you expect people can read your mind. They can’t.
Thanks, Prompt Critical, I learned decades ago there is no such thing as an “effective ABM shield”. Even if there were such a thing, convertible “ABM” sites in Romania and Poland would play no significant role in that “shield”. It’s a geography thing. Ted Postol, MIT Professor Emeritus (physics) and former senior adviser to the Chief of Naval Operations, has written about this.