Turkey and the USSR or: the wages of good will and meekness is death

The text might as well be titled China and the USSR or India and the USSR or, or, or. You will soon know why.

The nation of Kurds numbers some 40 million people of which an estimated 14-15 million live in Turkey (10 million – in Iran, 6 million – in Iraq and 2 million – in Syria). Turkey’s overall population amounts to 85 million, so Kurds make up a fifth of it. What’s even more important, they occupy an area in Turkey that is all-Kurdish (just as is the case in corresponding regions in neighbouring Iran, Iraq and Syria). Kurds, therefore, ought to have their own national state, an independent state, carved out of the pieces of territory inhabited by them in the four countries aforementioned. Why, the United Nations pursues the principle of the self-determination of nations (ha! ha! – when did you last hear about a dependent nation being able to win independence in keeping with this principle that is enshrined by the United Nations?) Understandably, none of the countries that have large Kurdish minorities has any intention to even theoretically consider ceding a part of their territory to the nation of Kurds and letting them have their own independent state. Why understandably?

Kurdish-inhabited areas in the Middle East (Wikipedia)

Because in politics and generally among people it does not pay to be magnanimous, to be friendly, to be evangelically meek. If the meek shall possess the earth, then maybe in afterlife. Case in point? The USSR.

After four decades of the Cold War, the formidable Soviet Union, an empire that everyone reckoned with and respected if not feared, that empire surrendered to the West, its opponent, almost unconditionally, just like the Third Reich in 1945, with this significant difference, however, that the Soviet Union showed good will without being shelled into Stone Age and thus compelled to lay down its arms. The capitulation was complete:

[1] the military block of the USSR’s satellite states was dissolved;

[2] the economic union of the USSR’s satellite states was disbanded;

[3] the Marxist-Leninist ideology – the driving force behind Soviet policy-making – was abandoned entirely and condemned;

[4] the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics was disunited, disassembled (though a referendum held prior to that event showed that the majority of the USSR citizens did not want it) and new independent states emerged;

[5] capitalism was invited to all former socialist countries and replaced socialist economy;

[6] the Soviet past was in the years to come savaged in the media, lambasted in the educational system and bad-mouthed in the entertainment;

[7] post-Soviet elites bent over backwards to please their Western partners;

[8] almost everything of value was privatized, which is another phrase to say: sold to Western companies.

Good will and meekness. Yet, to paraphrase Saint Paul, the wages of good will and meekness is death. In return for their good will and meekness the Russians received:

[1] economic chaos;

[2] domestic terrorism and wars with national minorities;

[3] the ever-growing expansion of NATO, encircling their territory;

[4] refusal to be accepted to NATO;

[5] refusal to be accepted as equal partners in a world united from Lisbon to Vladivostok, as proposed by Russia’s president;

[6] an inimical Ukraine (apart from the inimical Poland, the Baltic States, Romania and the ever belligerent Caucasus), a Ukraine which was reeducated to hate all things Russian, trained to fight a war against Russia, encouraged to kill Russians (the fourteen(!) thousand in the Donbass region in the years 2014-2022, the fifty or so incinerated in Sevastopol, to name just two cases);

[7] the ongoing proxy war with the West.

Consider the last point. Rather than holding the whole territory of Ukraine with its 50 million(!) people (such was Ukraine’s population in 1991), its agriculture and industry, now Russians must fight them or else the anaconda’s stranglehold around them would soon deprive them of their last breath.

Back to Turkey. Why should Turkey let go of its Kurds, China – of its Uyghurs? Why should India disintegrate into the many states that it is made up of? Why show good will and meekness? The wages of good will and meekness is death. Such must be the inference that the ruling elites of the said countries must have arrived at. Imagine China giving up on Tibet and Uyghurs or Turkey letting go of its Kurds and maybe Armenians… Beijing would soon have a proxy war in its backyard against Tibet or Uyghurs (both supported by the United States), while Turkey – a war against Kurds and Armenians (supported by Iran or Syria).

The West have taught everyone a good lesson: be strong and expand, never give up or else. And remember: the wages of good will and meekness is death.

The idea of one civilization for all is inhuman and preposterous

Putin’s Valdai speech of 5th October, 2023

On 5th October, 2023, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin delivered a speech during a conference of the the 20th convention of the International Discussion Club held in Sochi. His words dealt with the ongoing political events and trends, without however naming names or making a reference to Ukraine. Russia’s president made a pronouncement concerning the West’s ideology and Russia’s stance on it or Russia’s response. The speech may be divided into the part criticizing the West and the part that lays down Moscow’s view of the world politics.

Here’s the anti-Western content:

The Western world, the notion that for all intents and purposes amounts to the Anglophere, in the opinion of the Russian leader and most likely of the Russian ruling elites has a track record of always seeking to dominate the globe, of always wanting to run the show by means of imposing on the other countries rules and principles that they are expected to abide by or else those rules and principles are brought to them with a bludgeon.

The West is always in need of an enemy, a foe, a rogue state because an external enemy serves the purpose of explaining to the populace the internal problems, and because an external, formidable enemy rallies the citizens of a country around their leader or leaders.

The West is run by the elites that do not pursue the interests of their nations; rather, in their self-aggrandizement they are ready to risk the welfare of their nations in an attempt to win dominance in this or other point on the globe.

The West defines an enemy as anyone – a state, country, nation, leader, political entity – who does not wish to follow the West’s dictate, who is not submissive enough, who does not acquiesce to being bossed around, who does not sign on to the idea that there is one global central power and global values to be observed.

President Vladimir Putin then went on to expound the world view represented by the Russian authorities.

First, there is no one civilization engulfing the globe: rather, there are many civilizations, none of them better or worse than the others, and they all deserve to be recognized and respected. Consequently, there are no universal rules to be observed by all humanity, nor can there be a political concept of a global world.

Second, international problems ought not to be solved by a selected group of political dominant entities; nor should they be approached and tackled by all nations: rather, they ought to be discussed and solved by those concerned.

Third, nations should break with this idea imposed by the West of pursuing bloc politics. Nations have their own, individual, separate interests. There are no bloc interests or the so-called bloc interests boil down to being the interests of the bloc’s hegemon.

Fourth. Russia seeks no territorial expansion (that was the only direct reference – although without naming the country – in the speech to the ongoing war in Ukraine); Russia is the largest country on planet earth and for years to come will be busy developing and managing the vast swaths of land in Siberia.

Why is this war being prolonged?

You recognize this fragment, don’t you? Suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. At the outbreak of the hostilities, Ukrainians were very much aware of the proportion of the opposing forces, and so they were willing to negotiate. Such talks even began in Turkey but – lo and behold – Kiev received a command to back out. Now the hostilities are slowly nearing its second year and the number of casualties is rising. More than four hundred thousand (FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND) Ukrainians are said to have lost their life, but despite these horrible losses and despite the ten thousand being played off against the twenty thousand – to adduce the introductory parable – the war continues and there is no sign of it coming to an end. Why? Do Ukrainians really think they can beat the Russian bear? Do Ukrainians really think they can regain lost territories? Do Ukraine’s Western supporters and guardians really think Ukraine can win and regain its lost territories? Anyone in his right senses cannot believe that, especially high-ranking officials, whether in Ukraine or in the West, because they have all the data and, consequently, they know that ten thousand is fighting a losing battle against twenty thousand. If they know it – assuming we are dealing with people in their rights senses – then why is this war being prolonged?

The Independent

The war is being prolonged for three reasons, two of which are rather familiar to the reader. One purpose in having this war go on is to weaken Russia as much as possible, to keep it engaged in a conflict, to make Russian president less and less popular among Russians and – maybe? – have the Russian people topple him down. A highly unlikely event, considering the highest approval rates that Vladimir Putin gets as compared to all the other leaders around the globe (Western leaders are credited with less than 50% of approval). The other reason is to deplete American stockpiles of arms so as to have a pretext to replenish them i.e. so that the industrial military complex can have new government lucrative commissions for the production of replacement equipment. There is yet a third important reason why the war – a proxy-war between the United States and Russia – is being prolonged.

The Dive with Jackson Hinkle

Up to February 14, 2022, American troops had carried out military operations or – simply put – outright wars and interventions in very many places of the world, and nowhere did they encounter an enemy to be reckoned with. Whether it was Iraq or Yugoslavia, America’s opponent was significantly weaker, smaller, and usually politically isolated. It is in Ukraine that the American military are encountering an opponent that is a match. It is not only the type and quality of the advanced weaponry that the Russians use, but also the strategy and the tactics that they employ. Americans want to learn about their rival (enemy) as much as possible from the warfare. Ukraine is their laboratory, a military area where a war game is conducted, a war game for real with this precious exception that no American soldier gets killed (save for mercenaries, but that’s a different story). Americans have their advisors there on the ground, they have American mercenaries i.e. American active duty soldiers in disguise, while obliging Ukrainians provide the Pentagon with any and all intel. The war in Ukraine is a huge opportunity to study the Russian army in action. It is a huge opportunity to make Russians reveal the most secret, the most advanced of their weapons. Wars being wars, a hope arises that some of the most advanced types weapons might be intercepted. The reader might recall how the British received the whole V-2 ballistic missile that landed in marshes in occupied Poland and was retrieved, disassembled and documented by the Polish Home Army and then sent in pieces to the United Kingdom by means of a Dakota that flew from southern Italy to Poland and back.

Ukraine cannot win this war, just as ten thousand cannot prevail over twenty thousand. Nor can the collective West win it. Still, the United States can keep one of its global rivals militarily engaged (for more information, see the geopolitical ideas developed by RAND in 61 Gefira Feb 2022), study the Russian strategy and tactics and hope for intercepting as many items of Russian military technology as it is possible. That is why Ukrainians must die.

What if the USSR continued to exist? A thought experiment.

What if the USSR continued to exist? First, in A.D. 2023 it would not be the same USSR as in A.D. 1989, still less so as in A.D. 1960 or earlier. Everything evolves, so would the USSR and it would have continued to evolve, to change. Consider China, for that matter. The Soviet Union would have been capitalist in all but name with a strong say on the part of the government and the communist(?) party. Since Gorbachev, we would not have had simpletons as leaders like Nikita Khrushchev in the Kremlin. Rather, refined individuals like the said Gorbachev or present-day Putin: i.e. educated men with good manners.

Having said which, let us think about the world A.D. 2023 with the still existing USSR. What would have happened between 1991 (the year of the dissolution of the Soviet Union) and 2023? or – still better, still more relevant – what would not have happened between 1991 and 2023?

1 The Warsaw Pact would have continued to exist, which by itself and in itself means that NATO would not have expanded to central and eastern Europe; which in turn means that no conflict would have been in the making as we can observe it today.

2 Yugoslavia would have continued to exist, and even if it had somehow disintegrated, then peacefully. Certainly, there would have been no bombing of Yugoslavia by West, no civil war, no show trials in the Hague, no murdering of Slobodan Milošević in prison.

3 There would have been no wars in Chechnya: thousands of lives would have been saved.

4 No worldwide covid-occasioned freezing of the world activities would have been feasible. Most probably, the powers that be – those who prepared the covid dress rehearsal (before who knows what?) – would not have even considered imposing that ill-famed worldwide curfew with all others attendant restrictions.

5 All central European countries would still have been part of the “European Union of the East” i.e. the Comecon. The Western European union would not have expanded to the east.

6 Most remarkable: Ukraine would have remained the second most important republic of the Soviet Union. As such:

[a] in 2023, it would have approximately 50 million inhabitants as opposed to the estimated 25 or so million at present;

[b] it would have been highly industrialized; no need for people to flood Europe in search of employment;

[c] 400 thousand Ukrainian men would not have been killed, tens of thousands would not have been maimed or become amputees;

[d] Ukrainian cites, towns and villages would have remained unscathed;

[e] the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic would still possess the Donbass and Crimea.

7 The Baltic States would not have been depopulated as they are now.

8 The managers of the world in the West would not have dropped their masks and would not have:

[a] accelerated the ethnic replacement; and

[b] enforced homosexuality on people at large.

Why? Because during the existence of the Soviet Union both sides tried to convince their own societies and the societies in the opposite political bloc that their system was better, more attractive, more humane. Surely, the open propaganda of homosexuality with all attendant phenomena like encouraging teenagers to take hormone blockers or change their biological sex would have been moderated or even deactivated; surely, the Western managers of the world would not have wanted to show to the central Europeans and the citizens of the Soviet Union how much they despise their own Western nations and how much they want to replace them with aliens.

9 Muammar Qaddafi would not have been toppled; no influx to Europe of people from Africa would have occurred.

10 Most probably Germany would not have been re-united. The existence of East Germany would have influenced the policy-making of Western Germany; since by 2023 travel restrictions would certainly have been loosened, Western Germans might have been able to move to East Germany in an attempt to flee the homosexual propaganda and the ethnic replacement if these had been executed as they are today. Notice that Alternative for Germany is especially popular in the former German Democratic Republic. How much more would it have been popular if that republic had persisted?

11 The Comecon (the eastern version of the EEC or the European Economic Community, the predecessor to the European Union) would have evolved into a rivalry counterpart of the EEC (a miniature of today’s BRICS?), which would have been a healthy phenomenon: rather than having a monopolist as regards the economic, political and societal model, we would now have two European models of civilizational development, vying with each other and not letting each other degenerate into something that we can now see in the European Union.

What do you say to all of the above? True or false? Notice how many lives would have been saved in Yugoslavia and Ukraine. Notice how many able-bodied men would have served their respective countries with their hands and brains rather than with their corpses. Notice the continued immutability of state borders that we would have had up to now and the resultant peace. Correct me if I’m wrong.

World War One and Cold War

It is amazing how similar the outcomes of World War I and the Cold War are. Indeed, how similar the military and political realities are.

Let’s simplify the picture: In World War I, it was Germany and Austria-Hungary against the West (with Russia falling out of the picture toward the end of the war). It was the German world (Germany was almost 100% ethnically German, while in the Habsburg monarchy the German element was in the minority but still dominated the whole country) against France and the Anglophere, i.e. the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada.

During the Cold War it was the Soviet Union and its satellites against the West, again mainly the Anglosphere. The Soviet Union corresponded in this comparison to Germany in that it was basically a Russian state (including Russian-speaking Ukrainians and Belorussians), while the countries of the Warsaw Pact corresponded to the Austria-Hungary or Dual Monarchy.

The two political and military camps – the German dominated Europe as opposed to the West, and the Russian dominated Europe as opposed to the West – vied for dominance. The hostilities during World War One brought about the weakening of the German-dominated alliance juts as the peaceful rivalry during the times of the Cold War brought about the weakening of the Soviet or Russian dominated part of the world. Talks were brokered, the warring parties sat at the negotiating table and slowly but surely a peace deal was worked out: Germany trusted its military and political adversaries would settle the post-war relations in a chivalrous way; so did the Soviet Union with regard for the victorious Western world. What happened next?

In the case of Germany the West – especially France – inebriated with victory began to step up demands and multiply acts aimed at humiliating yesterday’s enemy; precisely the same happened in the aftermath of the Cold War: the West – especially the United States – inebriated with its victory over the Soviet Union began stepping up demands and humiliating Russia, the core of the former Soviet Union. After 1918, Germany was forced to pay enormous contribution to the victors, cede chunks of territory and generally subjugate itself to the diktat of yesterday’s enemies. After 1991, Russia as heir to the Soviet Union lost huge chunks of territory (Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic States, the Caucasus and the central Asian republics) and experienced a financial and economic plunder comparable to what Germany had gone through after World War One. What was the result in both countries?

An economic crisis that played havoc with the cohesion of society and a lingering sense of being humiliated and cheated. Yes, cheated, because the winning nations went back on their promise of jointly creating a better, peaceful world and only sought dominance and exploitation. The ten or so years of the Weimar Republic and the ten or so years of the presidency of Boris Yeltsin have much in common: both states found themselves at the mercy of the winning powers, both states were immersed in economic and political crisis, and both nations felt disillusioned with democracy made by the West. The result?

The result was in either case roughly the same: in the early 1930s in Germany and in the early 2000s in Russia, a strong leader emerged and gained popular support: in either case the strong leaders succeeded in first alleviating and then eliminating the economic, social, and political crises, and in either case both strong leaders managed to slowly restore the international high standing of their respective countries. In either case, the West’s relentless drive to expand its dominance eventually entailed war.

For all the approximations, the similarities are striking, are they not?

Why the war is still going on

The war in Ukraine has been going on for almost a year now. There is no doubt that it is a war between Russia and the West, between Russia and NATO, between Russia and the United States. There is also no doubt that Kiev, left to its own devices, would have long since been beaten and conquered and subjugated by Moscow. The constant supply of arms, financial loans and political support coming from the West means that Ukraine continues to fight, albeit not only with its own army, but also resorting to thousands of mercenaries from a variety of nationalities. Polish and British soldiers and officers are said to be operating in Ukrainian uniforms. The West has deployed all its authority, all its diplomatic and economic muscle, to sustain Ukraine’s resistance against Russia. Is it because anyone in Washington, London, Paris and Berlin or Kiev believes that Ukraine can win this war? Is it because anyone in Washington, London, Paris and Berlin or Kiev believes that Ukrainian troops will drive out Russian troops, that Ukraine will regain not only the four provinces that have been annexed to Russia, but also the Crimea? Is it because Moscow, having been repulsed and vanquished, will start paying compensation to Ukraine and the Russian leaders will stand before the international tribunal in The Hague like the former leaders of Yugoslavia and Serbia?

Of course not! So why are they fighting this war? Why are Washington and London, Paris and Berlin encouraging Kiev to resist further? Why are Western governments subjecting millions of Ukrainians to death, starvation, cold and emigration? The answer is self-explanatory. Because if the war goes on as long as possible, then:

① Russia, a rival that the West dislikes (to put it mildly), will be weakened and bled to the maximum;
② Ukraine will incur as much debt and as many obligations to the West as possible, only to repay them for decades, i.e. to relinquish control over its own natural resources, production facilities and population (for how else can Kiev repay these gigantic obligations?); Continue reading →

Who benefited from all this?

The mechanism is simple. The Hegemon has power. The Hegemon has power not only because it is economically powerful and because it has a powerful military force. The Hegemon has power also and perhaps above all because it has a mint where it mints the world’s coin. The Hegemon can therefore, for example, put too much money into circulation, i.e. create inflation, and since the whole world uses the Hegemon’s money in trade between countries, this inflation hits all the economies of the world! Inflation in the Hegemon translates into inflation in all the other political players. This is a political masterstroke!

We wanted to draw attention to yet another mechanism, equally efficient, equally cleverly devised. Here it is. The Hegemon looks around to select nations or states, anywhere on the globe, but especially those where there are various natural resources or developed industries. Having found a region of the world that the Hegemon would like to exploit, the Hegemon looks around for such two nations, two states or social groups that do not like each other very much. Never and nowhere in the world is this task difficult. All neighbourhoods are fraught with a long history of conflict: France-Germany, France-England, Germany-Poland, Hungary-Romania, Croatia-Serbia, Greece-Turkey, Poland-Russia, Poland-Ukraine, Ukraine-Russia… and these are just a handful of conflicts and just European ones! They all can be revived, they all can be fuelled and they all can be exploited. Religious and ideological divisions can also be skilfully manipualted: Catholic-Protestant, Catholic-Orthodox, Sunni-Shiite, believer-infidel, right-left, liberal-conservative, you name it.

States are governed by different people, not necessarily the wisest, not necessarily the most sensible, not necessarily the prudent. Since they are not the wisest or most prudent people, since they are people who have weaknesses and (often) burning ambitions, they can be skilfully controlled. This is precisely what the Hegemon does. The Hegemon seeks out individuals who have exuberant political ambitions and helps such individuals to take power in a country. The Hegemon selects people with a psychological profile that ensures they will be remotely controllable. The Hegemon can create compromising situations for such an individual or it can nurture such an individual: the Forum of Young Global(!) Leaders of the International Economic Forum or universities founded or financed by various NGOs are breeding grounds for such leaders.

Political dissidents from the countries of Central Europe before 1989, people who often emigrated to the West, acted in the West, received support from the West, these people were excellent material for the Western secret services. These services were able to pick and choose human tools, human puppets for their intelligence games and political manoeuvres, and these puppets usually did not even realise that they were someone else’s… tools. The awarding of scholarships to such people for study or research, or the granting of prizes in various fields, tied the beneficiaries to the centres that exercised power over them in an extremely strong and thus permanent manner. Who can resist an award, international recognition, acclaim, or interviews for CNN or the BBC? Continue reading →