The West and Russia are engaged in a full blown hybride war. They are fighting each other in the juridical, financial and economical domain, they are engaged in cyberwarfare and proxy-wars. The future shall not be the same, expecting that the current conflict will reach new lows in the coming period. Germany is the sole Western power to prevent a further escalation of the conflict.
Many analysts see the Ukraine conflict as the beginning of the renewed conflict between Russia and the US. It is already dubbed as “the new cold war” and being portrait as the consequence of Putin’s aspirations to rebuild the Soviet Empire. In this narrative the Russian-US conflict started at an more or less random period in the recent history.
To get a better understanding of the current conflict it is preferable to identify the Libyan crisis as the start of the Russian-US restrained relation, it is the beginning of a new kind of war: “hybrid war”.
During the Libyan conflict the NATO let coalition was granted to enforce a no fly zone in Libya, it soon escalated in a full blown illegal war against the Kaddafi regime. Not only did the NATO forces bomb government and military targets in Libya, according to the British media, Britain’s Special Forces were in disguise on the ground. It was clear that France, the US, the Netherlands and Great Britain where engaged in a full blown conservative war inside Lybia. Even though it was obvious that those armies were engaged in battles with the Libyan army, their respective governments flat out denied that they were at war at all. The same pattern was visible over and over again during the uprise of the Syrian Jihadist movements against Assad. Syrian Jihadist were, according to Reuters, supported by the CIA from Turkey. A strategy that has been later adopted by Russia in Ukraine.
The conflict in Syria was the first confrontation that resulted in a direct dispute with Russia. Britain stopped a Russian ship in international waters, carrying attack helicopters for Syria, on the grounds of international juridical laws.
In 2013 tensions between the West and Russia peaked again, as Putin personally prevented America from bombing Syria. Obama’s proposed military actions in Syria would definitely have propelled ISIS into power in Damascus. Putin’s open letter to the US’ public, denouncing Obama’s American exceptionalism, was a humiliation of the american ruling elite. This open letter in the US media was a clear form of media warfare and a component of modern Hybrid warfare.
Putin’s media move was swiftly countered by the Lesbian Gay Human Right campaign directed against the Sochi Olympic Winter Games. Western leaders do not hesitate to visit the Saudi Royals, who have the worst track records on human rights, they felt obliged to boycott the Russian Olympic Winter Games due to some unimportant Russian legislation that prohibits the education on lesbian and gay rights.
During the Winter Games in Sochi , Yanukovych, the democratically elected president of Ukraine, was violently disposed from power. At the same time McCain, the former presidential candidate of the Republicans during the 2008 elections and one of the most influential lawmakers in Washington, declared on television that Mr. Putin will be the next to be disposed from power. We are not elaborating here on the political events in Kiev and the role of Europe and the US. We have only noticed that Yatsenyuk, the individual installed as Prime Minister, right after the disposal of Yanukovich, is according its own website a key allay of NATO,
Russia’s political establishment adapted extremely fast to this new reality and managed to annex Crimea. Making use of the same hybrid tactics as their Western allies had done, Russia was able to destabilize the new US backed government in Kiev. They were even able to install their own power base in parts of East Ukraine. Just like the West and US are denying to have their special forces deployed in Libya, Russia denies to have its troops deployed in Ukraine. Identical to the Jihadist who managed to destroy two of Assad’s battle harden armies, “thanks to the help of Allah”, there was a much smaller miracle in East Ukraine. The separatist in the Donbas region won the battle on their own ground against a highly corrupted and inexperienced Ukrainian army.
The Ukraine conflict pitched Europe and the US directly against Russia, what soon resulted in a tit for tat of economic sanctions imposed by European, American and Russian lawmakers.
It is not clear how the new geopolitical alliances will emerge yet . China backed Russia without doubt, but stopped short of colliding directly against the US. The current conflict with Russia is part of a bigger geopolitical confrontation. China’s establishment is fully aware that the Chinese potential to become an economic superpower, even surpassing the US, is a bigger thread to US’ hegemony than Russia is.
At the same time US and Chinese business community understand that a full blown confrontation between China and the US will harm the powerful Wall Street financial community. It is for that reason that Soros, as advocate of the US financial establishment, did circulate a clear warning against deteriorating relations between China and the US.
The West is in a full hybrid war with Russia and this hybrid war will escalate further the oncoming period. The war will be fought on the following territories.
- Hot proxy wars
- Cyber war
- Economic
- Financial
- Media
- Juridical
Hot proxy wars.
The Syrian and Libyan war is already completely out of control, while the West struggles to contain the mess it has created. Moscow and Germany will not let Ukraine spiral into the same mess that has been fabricated by NATO in Libya and Syria. Russia will wait to for the right opportunity to join the Donbas with Crimea. Judging by Putin’s actions in the past, he will wait for the perfect timing.
More proxy wars are going to follow probably not in the east of Europe. But keep a close eye on the Caucasus, especially the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict and Central Asia.
A new cyber-offensive industry will emerge
Cyber-war will be an important part of the hybrid war. The ICT defense industry is already a widely respected industry specialized in delivering anti-virus software. What will be new however might be the emergence of an offensive cyber-war industry. The development and delivering of all kinds of “virus” attacks will not be the unique domain of hackers and criminals anymore. Expected is a new and respected industry that is specialized in the development of malicious attack software. State sponsored viruses like Duqu and Stutnext are rising. The US’ software industry will be the first victim of the cyber-hostilities as customers are risking to be the victim of all kind of deliberately build in vulnerabilities.
Economical war.
Russia, the US and the EU are already engaged in economical warfare by putting sanctions on each other. Things will be a little more complicated here because a big industry is involved. France, pressured by the US halted its delivery of the already build Mistral ships. The geopolitical weakness of Paris became dramatically clear when Hollande surrendered to US’ pressure, even though Greece withstands US’ pressure by signing a gas pipeline deal with Russia. More astonishing was the deal that Moscow signed with Germany to build an extra North Stream Gas line, without any openly political objection from Washington. The US has to recognize that the Germans have become the de facto power in Europe.
Judicial warfare.
There will be a rise in legal claims against governments and all kind of organizations that represent state interest. It has already been successfully done by the US, using legal blackmail against European banks to prevent them from operating in Cuba. There are going to be spectacular legal cases to disrupt Russia’s society and its political establishment. Expected is that the US will succeed in their legal attempt to strip Russia from the world soccer tournament.
New coalition will be constituted
For the coming period Moscow, Beijing, Washington and Berlin will concentrate on the forming of coalitions; China is definitely on Russia’s side, but they are not willing to jeopardize their relations with the West on behave of Russia. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Iran still have to make up their mind. Germany might be the sole European power left that could alter the course of events.
Sources from the internet
Security Council Approves ‘No-Fly Zone’ over Libya, Authorizing ‘All Necessary Measures’ to Protect Civilians, by Vote of 10 in Favour with 5 Abstentions Source UN 17 March 2011
Demanding an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute “crimes against humanity”, the Security Council this evening imposed a ban on all flights in the country’s airspace — a no-fly zone — and tightened sanctions on the Qadhafi regime and its supporters.
Britain’s Secret War in Libya: British Special Forces uncovered on the ground Source Mirror 1 June 2012
THE UK’s secret ground war in Libya is revealed today in this bombshell image of ex-SAS troops with rebels. The elite unit is funded by the MoD via a security firm to topple Colonel Gaddafi. David Cameron insists no British boots are on the ground in Libya. But a senior military source said: “They’re representing Britain.”
Russia blasts NATO over Libya – and Libya over Syria Source Russia Today 18 March 2012
Russia says that NATO should apologize for causing civilian casualties during their air raids in Libya in 2011 and pay compensation. Moscow has also accused Libya’s new government of training Syrian rebels and instigating terrorism.
Britain stops Russian ship carrying attack helicopters for Syria. Source the Telegraph 19 June 2012
A Russian ship believed to be carrying helicopters and missiles for Syria has been effectively stopped in its tracks off the coast of Scotland after its insurance was cancelled at the behest of the British government.
Obama signs order to ‘support Syrian rebels’ Source BBC 2 August 2012
Approved earlier this year, the directive permits the CIA and other US agencies to provide assistance to help oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
McCain: Ukraine unrest should make Vladimir Putin “nervous” Source CBS Face The Nation
Fifa crisis: Threat of Russia and Qatar being stripped of next two World Cups intensifies Source The Telegraph 17 June 2015
Swiss attorney general insists he has no qualms uncovering evidence that could lead to Russia or Qatar being stripped of 2018 and 2022 World Cups
State-sponsored cyber-attacks are the new normal says Kaspersky Lab Source the Memo 16 June 2015
State-sponsored cyber-attacks first made headlines in 2010 when Stuxnet, a computer worm of alleged Israeli origins destroyed a fifth of Iran’s nuclear power plant capabilities (Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad pictured above during a tour of the kinds of nuclear centrifuges that were damaged by Stuxnet in 2008).
Gazprom, E.ON, Shell and OMV agreed to develop gas transportation capacities for the deliveries of the Russian natural gas to Europe Source Hellenic Shipping News 19 June 2015
With this project we plan to continue and expand our successful partnership with Gazprom. The experience gained in Nord Stream has demonstrated that transportation of gas through the Baltic Sea is a reliable solution for the EU energy needs from the economic, technical and environmental points of view’, Klaus Schäfer pointed out.
