Meanwhile in Venezuela...

Venezuela's chief prosecutor has accused Washington of seeking to stoke violence in her country, after US lawmakers called for funding for activist groups there.

"There's no doubt that this is to fund the violent actions taking place in Venezuela," Luisa Ortega Diaz told reporters in Geneva on Friday.

Diaz said the money would be used to buy C4, a kind of explosive. She had said earlier that authorities had seized a kilo of C4, 200 fire-bombs and 25 firearms during a wave of protests in Venezuela.Nicolas Maduro,

Meanwhile, Maduro said South Florida politicians are leading the US into an extremist foreign policy against his country.

US Senators Marco Rubio and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen are leading a "Miami lobby" trying to influence President Barack Obama, Maduro said in a televised news conference on Friday.

Rubio and Ros-Lehtinen are co-sponsoring efforts in their respective chambers to impose sanctions on members of the Venezuelan government tied to human rights abuses.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2014/03/venezuela-says-us-seeks-fund-violence-20143154165937419.html

About 93% of voters in Crimea have backed joining Russia and seceding from Ukraine, according to exit polls quoted by Russian news agencies.

Polls closed at 18:00 GMT and officials hailed a "record" turnout. Preliminary results are expected within hours.

Many opponents boycotted the vote, which has been rejected by the US and the EU as illegitimate.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26598832

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The western press always mention vote "boycott" when the result does not go the western way... The point of a vote is to get a result and voting sure is never "perfect". George Bush got elected by major faults in the voting system in Florida. Tony Abbott got elected when the mediocre mass media led by the merde-och press waged a MASSIVE campaign against his opponent... A "boycott" is not even a "protest" or an "against" vote. "Opponents" should vote... "Opponents" who do not vote are not opponents. And whether the US or the EU consider the vote as "illegitimate" is irrelevant.

I consider the weekend vote in Tasmania as "illegitimate" because of the trickery of a mediocre mass media there as well. It is actually quite telling that there are still people voting against the Liberals (CONservatives) considering the constant war of media words waged against the Greens and Labor.

Russian president Vladimir Putin has signed a treaty making Crimea part of his nation, despite the threat of further punitive sanctions by the West.

Mr Putin has made a fiercely patriotic address to a joint session of parliament in the Kremlin, punctuated by standing ovations, cheering and tears.

Britain responded by announcing it would suspend all bilateral military cooperation with Russia, while the US warned of further sanctions against Moscow.

During his speech Mr Putin lambasted the West for what he called hypocrisy, saying Western nations had endorsed Kosovo's independence from Serbia but now denied Crimeans the same right.

"You cannot call the same thing black today and white tomorrow," he declared to applause, saying Western partners had "crossed the line" over Ukraine and behaved "irresponsibly".

He said Ukraine's new leaders, in power since the overthrow of pro-Moscow president Viktor Yanukovych last month, included "neo-Nazis, Russophobes and anti-Semites".

Mr Putin said Crimea's disputed referendum vote on Sunday, held under Russian military occupation, was in full accordance with democratic procedures and international law.

He said the results show the overwhelming will of the people to be reunited with Russia after 60 years as part of the Ukrainian republic.

"People in the Crimea clearly and convincingly expressed their will. They want to be with Russia," he said.

To the Russian national anthem, Mr Putin and Crimean leaders signed a treaty on making Crimea part of Russia. The treaty will be ratified within the next few days.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-18/vladimir-putin-crimea-russia/5329772

Though most of the government in Europe are in favour of a boycott, most of the European community businesses are horrified at any light whiffy hint of sanctions... Russia is a "good" customer of European goods and Europe NEEDS the "energy" from Russia's gas and oil... Killing off this goose would be like say killing the goose...

And despite the hooplahas, most leaders in Europe would have to think that Putin is right — but they cannot be seen acquiescing to his "bully" tactics or give him ANY credit or credibility... as they support their own bullying tactics... They need a "face-saving" exercise as they perform a voodoo dance supporting the neo-nazis to show they care about "freedom" in Ukraine... It hurts.

http://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/6133 (posted April 2008)

It's not only in Crimea where Russian President Vladimir Putin is playing with fire, but also in eastern Ukraine. The majority of the people in the economically powerful region speak Russian and reject the new government in Kiev.

The pensioner Oxana Kremenyuk limps as she passes by the House of Culture in a small village in eastern Ukraine. As a young woman, she used to dance here. Today the stucco is crumbling and the windows are broken. "The people in Kiev are driving our country into civil war," she says. "These good-for-nothings should be slaving away the way we do here." Kremenyuk receives a pension of about €90 ($125) a month. In order to ensure there is food on the table, she keeps 10 chickens and a pig.

read more: http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/how-moscow-is-moving-to-destablize-eastern-ukraine-a-959224.html

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For quite a while now, possibly since the days of President Reagan, or even earlier, the "west" has been trying to destabilise Ukraine (along with stuffing up the Soviet Union). Say that when Boris Yeltsin took over the Russian Government, he was a bit of a loose drunken cannon but this did not stop the "west" to carry on helping dissent ferment in Ukraine or in Russia... Anything would do: the price of bread or the cost of Vodka would have been used in the press for simpletons... Payola to some people would have helped propel themselves on the political stage...

It is easier to create shit than to understand or create things rationally... and spies and agent provocateurs can do wonderful things on the level of stirring crap... But the reality is that in East Ukraine, the population is still very much "Russian". By this we cannot underestimate the pride of being Russian (or American for that matter) in circumstances in which one's root are primordial over anything else, especially when the choice is narrowed to the arch-enemy versus lending a hand for the motherland.

It's like supporting a football team. Whether they play crap or not, it's still your football team and at the moment the striker is scoring goals. Why would not you cheer...?

It's all about the psychology of how we belong and relate... Despite some hiccups (that the west is painting as major flaws — tell me which world leader does not have flaws? — don't answer Tony Abbott. He is not a world leader and he lies) Putin is steering Russia as best as such a country can be. Sure he will stop "oligarches" from earning an honest crust when we know all they want to do is plunder the country  — but then the "west" is up in arms about multinationals shifting moneys to avoid paying taxes... Under Putin's firm hand a few of multinational CEOs would end up in jail where they belong — and soon the tax bill would be paid. But we would not want that, would we?... We prefer less regulation and more opportunity to flaunt the system so that our rich dude can get their cut rather than be "socialists", which would mean that the loot belongs to most of us rather than a few elitist rich mugs...

See how the game plays out... 

British business lobby the CBI has petitioned the Electoral Commission to cancel its registration as an official supporter of the no campaign in the Scottish independence referendum.

The sudden switch in policy came after more than a dozen organisations, including major universities such as Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dundee, government agencies in Scotland and the broadcasters STV and BBC, resigned from the CBI to protect their neutrality in the independence debate.

The CBI had registered as a supporter of the no campaign, allowing it to spend up to £150,000 before September's referendum, on legal advice because it planned to make clear that it opposed independence at its official events and functions

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/apr/25/scottish-independence-referendum-cbi-uturn-no-campaign

Nach dem Triumph des Front National bei der Europawahl zeigt sich Parteichefin Le Pen selbstbewusst. Im Gespräch mit dem SPIEGEL warnt sie Kanzlerin Merkel vor dem Hass der Nachbarländer - und zeigt Bewunderung für Kreml-Chef Putin.

read more: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/frankreich-le-pen-warnt-merkel-vor-explosion-der-eu-a-972726.html

--------------------------

Meanwhile:

By SPIEGEL Staff

With the help of news services like RT and Ruptly, the Kremlin is seeking to reshape the way the world thinks about Russia. And it has been highly successful: Vladimir Putin has won the propaganda war over Ukraine and the West is divided.

Ivan Rodionov sits in his office at Berlin's Postdamer Platz and seems to relish his role as the bad guy. He rails in almost accent-free German, with a quiet, but sharp voice, on the German media, which, he claims, have been walking in "lockstep" when it comes to their coverage of the Ukraine crisis. During recent appearances on two major German talk shows, Rodionov disputed allegations that Russian soldiers had infiltrated Crimea prior to the controversial referendum and its annexation by Russia. He says it's the "radical right-wing views" of the Kiev government, and not Russia, that poses the threat. "Western politicians," he says, "are either helping directly or are at least looking on."

Rodionov defends President Vladimir Putin so vehemently that one could be forgiven for confusing him with a Kremlin spokesperson. But Rodionov views himself as a journalist. The 49-year-old is the head of the video news agency Ruptly, founded one year ago and financed by the Russian government. The eighth floor of the office building has a grand view of Germany's house of parliament, the Reichstag. It's a posh location and the Kremlin doesn't seem to mind spending quite a bit of money to disseminate its view of the world from here. Around 110 people from Spain, Britain, Russia and Poland work day and night in the three-floor office space on videos that are then syndicated to the international media.

At first glance, it's not obvious that Ruptly is actually Kremlin TV. In addition to Putin speeches, there are also numerous other video clips available in its archive, ranging from Pussy Riot to arrests of members of the Russian opposition. When it comes to eastern Ukraine, however, the agency offers almost exclusively videos that are favorable towards pro-Russian supporters of the "People's Republic of Donetsk," which was founded by separatists. You'll also find right-wing radicals like Britain's Nick Griffin or German far-right extremist Olaf Rose, an ideologist with the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), stirring up hatred towards the European Union and its Ukraine policies.

read more: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/russia-uses-state-television-to-sway-opinion-at-home-and-abroad-a-971971-druck.html

The brewing conflict between the Russian Oligarchy and the Russian people is reaching a crisis point. The side that prevails will determine the future of Russia and perhaps the world.

On 17 March 1991 a referendum was held in the Soviet Union on whether or not the USSR should continue to exist. There was an 80% turnout (some 185,647,355.00 of registered voters). The upshot of this election was that 113,512,812.00 voted to preserve the USSR. That’s 71.92%. Their wishes were disregarded, however. The entrenched bureaucracies and business interests, collectively the nomenklatura, decided that this was too good an opportunity to pass up; there was money to be made in this once in a lifetime situation. Which sounds eerily rather like EU referenda practise.

The sunny interlude of Gorbachov was to give way to the beginning of the Yeltsin catastrophe – a catastrophe not equalled since WW2. The emergence of the cosmopolitan business oligarchy and its political hangers-on was to consolidate its power and create a new kind of political, economic and social structure. At the time, and even today, the leading Russian capitalists’ over-riding aim was to realign their country into an assigned subordinate position in the world hierarchy of capitalist classes thus subjecting the Russian economy into a semi-peripheral extractive structure based on oil, gas, metallurgical products and military hardware.[1]

As the old Soviet system was dismantled the scale of the looting was mind-boggling. The level of the subsidies which passed from the state sector to the private sector could be gauged from the sale of assets involved amounting to less than 5% of their market value. State enterprises were sold off at a mere 20th or even 30th of the value of their real worth.

The whole process was overseen by western advisers, such as Jeffrey Sachs, Andre Schleifer and the lawyer Jonathan Hay, all of which had a high degree of influence over Russia’s economic policy; a policy leverage which was unprecedented in a sovereign state. The whole operation was conducted under the auspices of institutions such the IMF and World Bank. Policy prescriptions emanating from these sources were predictable and banal: if it moves, privatise/deregulate it. Local additions to this retinue were the extremely dubious neo-liberal duo of Yegor Gaidar and Anatoly Chubais who were only too keen to join in the plunder.

In addition to the dismantling of the industrial/manufacturing sector of the Soviet economy to undergo another pernicious episode during the transformative process, namely the continual outflow abroad of capital from the Russian economy.

In the crisis of 2014-2015 the net outflow of private capital was estimated at $210 billion. This huge amount of money could have been used to boost both wages and investment and overcome the slump which occurred in 2008. It should be noted that when business borrows more from the world that it lends to it (i.e., imports more capital than it exports) the government sharply increases the exports of capital via its own mechanisms. Such funds are sent abroad by the state and private sector. Overall Russia remains invariably a net exporter of financial resources. It is only natural as the former Soviet republics are bled dry and real wages have fallen.”[2]

In passing it is worth mentioning in this context that what was true of Russia was also true a fortiori of the rest of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) a regional organization of 10 post-Soviet republics in Eurasia formed following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and ex-satellites in Eastern Europe. The policies and economies of these nominally sovereign states shifted to largely deindustrialised nations brought about by the decline of manufacturing and growth and the development of extractive sectors.

In terms of their position in the world economy these states have been transformed into suppliers of low value-added materials to the developed capitalist centre. An army of cheap mobile labour at one pole and a comprador class of tycoons and property owners plus out-and-out criminals at the other. Such has been the nature of their ‘liberation’, with Ukraine and Moldova bringing up the rear having descended into what can only be considered as peripheral or third world status and which are now the two poorest countries in Europe.

The post-Soviet states now export mainly products characterised by a low degree of processing of the original raw materials and import products with a high level of added value.[3]

It is an economic truism that in international trade, states do not, generally speaking, get rich or significantly develop by concentrating their efforts on the promotion and export of raw materials. Time and again it has been shown that the vicious cycles of underdevelopment can only be effectively countered by changing the productive structures of peripheral and semi-peripheral states. This took place in the United States and Germany in the 19th century. A successful nation-building project involves a top-down strategy involving increasing diversification away from sectors with diminishing returns to scale (traditional raw materials) to sectors with increasing returns (technology, increasingly intensive manufacturing and services) creating a complex division of labour and new social structures in the process.

This will create an urban market for goods, which will induce specialization and innovation, give rise to new technologies, create alternative employment and create economic synergies which will serve to unite a nation-state both economically and politically. This is not to say that extractive industry will cease, since the key to coherent development is the interplay between sectors with increasing and diminishing returns in the same labour market. This is, in essence, has been the East Asian model of development during the 20th century.

It is precisely this type of long-term nation-building strategy which is imperative for Russia but which is being thwarted by the existence of a cosmopolitan oligarch class whose interests run counter to any to any such strategy and, moreover, who are perfectly content take profits from extractive exports and then invest them back into the centre of the capitalist system, usually in the shape of paper assets like US Treasury Bills and/or property. Cronyism, corruption, incompetence are endemic characteristics of this powerful group and they are unfortunately firmly ensconced in positions of influence and power in Russia. It would be reasonable to surmise that a political, parasitic system of Yeltsin-lite is now extant in Russia and that a domestic head of steam is, judging by its internal critics, building up in opposition. For every action there is a reaction.

Of course, this evolution of capitalism to its later parasitic stages – that is to say, financialised capitalism – is by no means restricted to Russia. This process was pioneered in the United States with the shift of American corporations from managerial firms to financialised structures. The shareholder revolution along with the development of the shadow banking system consisting of hedge funds, private capital, unlisted derivatives all unregulated in over the counter (OCT) transactions coalesced to form the basis for the financialization process.

Corporations were ruthlessly downsized, restructured, stripped of assets, their investment funds severely curtailed. All that mattered was the bottom line – increasing dividends and bloated share/stock prices.

The modern financial world-capitalist system placed short-term pecuniary gain above long-term growth of productive, value-creating enterprise. The new system was codified and became known as the ‘Washington Consensus’ And of course these novel phenomena were not lost on the new lumpen-bourgeoisie who had come to power in Russia during the Yeltsin interregnum.

The postulates of Washington Consensus – price liberalisation, deregulation, liberalisation of capital controls, flexible labour markets – were taken up with alacrity by the Russian nouveaux riches who in their adulation for all things American had become more catholic than the pope. It was what George Orwell who once referred to this phenomenon as ‘Transferred Nationalism’ that is to say the total denigration of your own nation-state, society, its culture and history, to the worship and allegiance to some other body or nation. In Russia’s context the fawning infatuation of its business and political class, and some of its intelligentsia, to the United States and its culture.

Predictably perhaps, a deep split in the Russian ruling elite took place. The two groups of Yeltsin’s elites which supported Putin’s coming to power gradually transformed into two parts of his current coterie. One of them originating from business circles comprises the ‘Atlantic Integrationists’ who are favourably disposed to integrating Russia into the capitalist world system on Western conditions – in essence an archetypal comprador elite. The other significant group whose origins were in the Soviet secret services (the Siloviki) are called ‘Eurasian Sovereigntists’ who are if favour of strengthening the independent position of the country in the world economy and international policy. Their goal is to free Russia from dependency on the West, promote Eurasian integration and strengthen relations with other members of the BRICS.

Putin balances precariously between these two factions and listens to both ex-Finance Minister Alexi Kudrin an arch-Atlantic Integrationist who recently accepted a leadership post at the public finance watchdog Audit Chamber, a post that has a mandate to oversee government expenditure, and Sergei Glazyev, a Eurasian Sovereigntist who is advisor to Putin on regional economic integration, and member of the National Financial Council of the Bank of Russia. Whose side Putin is on is a matter of conjecture, but what isn’t conjecture is the result which this internal political struggle has had on the formulation and consistency of Russian Foreign Policy.

This particularly came to light in the context of the Ukrainian crisis of 2013-14. Ukraine had long been a prize which the West (i.e. NATO) sought to detach from Russia and integrate into its own sphere of influence. The first attempt was made with the Orange Revolution, led by Yuschenko and Tymoshenko, two wealthy opportunist chancers who eventually fell out over the division of spoils in what was one of the early prototypes of colour revolutions. The second time around a new colour revolution was the western inspired coup against the sitting President, Yanukovich, and as a coup was largely successful. I have written extensively on this issue elsewhere as have many others and the history is easily available.

The preparation for this putsch was meticulously engineered to realise this objective. For more than two decades western agencies, the CIA, National Endowment for Democracy (NED) Human Rights Watch, local Ukrainian and Russian oligarchs, had been actively preparing for such an outcome and were absolutely dependent on the West, particularly for finance. About 1000 NGOs were controlling the main aspects of Ukrainian society including pro-western political parties, armed neo-nazi militants such as Right Sector and Svoboda trained in Poland and Georgia by NATO instructors. All the necessary perquisites were in place to carry out a colour revolution and install an anti-Russian regime.

At the time things seemed to be going swimmingly for the Kiev Putschists. But like many detailed, fool-proof plans – But in the words of the famous Scottish poet, Robbie Burns, ‘The best laid plans of mice and men oft gang agley.’ (go awry). However, the West had spent a great deal of cash US$5billion, according to Victoria Nuland, Assistant Secretary of State of Eastern European and Eurasian Affairs, and the West wanted to see the results of its investment.

… the West was eager to reap the results of its long-term strategy. Ousting the Russian Naval from Sevastopol and replacing it with NATO forces, extending NATO membership to Ukraine, deploying US anti-missile defence system in Ukraine, disrupting economic relations of the two countries, imposing great damage on the Russian economy, including its military production, supressing the rights of the Russian speaking areas in the Ukraine, and generally humiliating Russia. Taken together these measures threaten the very foundations of Russian national security in all possible meanings. Not a single Russian government which would like to preserve even a shadow of support of its population and keep its position as an actor of international relations could tolerate such a mortal threat.”[4]

Putin was forced to make the decision to confront the NATO juggernaut and its neo-nazi client in Crimea on 16 March 2014. The referendum was overwhelmingly endorsed by the electorate by a very large majority. Crimea re-joined Russia. Moreover, the misgivings of the people of the Crimea about rule from Kiev were confirmed by the outrages of the Odessa fire atrocity and a week later by Ukrainian militia shooting down unarmed civilians in the eastern Sea of Azov port of Mariupol.

Suffice it to say that Putin’s obduracy and these events did not go down at all well with the Atlantic Integrationists in both Russia and Ukraine. The Rebellion in the Eastern provinces of Donetsk and Lugansk was the last straw for the oligarchy, forcing Putin to make some accommodation to their (the oligarch’s) demands. The Russian President also had to deal with was the Eurasian Sovereigntists as well as the mass of the Russian people who wanted him to take a much tougher stance on Western and Kiev-enabled aggression in both Russia’s backyard of the Donbass and internationally, and the Atlantic Integrationists who wanted accommodation with the West – on the West’s terms! Abject surrender might have been a more accurate description.

The bottom line was that Putin’s view of Russia’s future development and position was couched within the context of a neo-liberal global economy which, as it stood, was largely controlled by the US either directly or with the assistance of the US-controlled global institutions such as the IMF WTO WORLD BANK and so forth plus, the weaponization of the US$ as global reserve currency.

As for the Russia’s inclusion in the ‘rules based’ international environment – this was sadly out of whack with the barely hidden Western view: i.e., US Imperial-aggrandizement and a geo-political, zero-sum game of winners and losers, with Russia in the latter category. Putin was seemingly comfortable with a neo-liberal global economic order and what he considered to be Russia’s rightful place within that order. And his vision – a tissue of neo-liberal tripe dished up by the likes of Kudrin – i.e., a free market from Lisbon to Vladivostok, made him susceptible to the propaganda of the Atlantic Integrationists.

A globalized neo-liberal order would only include Russia as a subaltern member, which is precisely what the Atlantic-Integrations are hankering after. Is Putin aware of this? Well advisers like Glazyev are, or is the President trimming his sails to meet the demands of the oligarchy? It is difficult to tell. But he seems to be in the unenviable position of riding two circus horses which are moving in different directions; a political position which ultimately precludes compromise; a fact which is evident in the stirrings of an internal political crisis in Russia itself. These internal policy anomalies have been replicated in Russian foreign policy as pointed out below.

Moscow continues to lose its influence in post-Soviet states. This can be observed in both the Caucasus and Central Asia. Even, their close ally, Belarus, occasionally demonstrates unfriendly behaviour and focuses its own efforts on the exploitation of economic preferences granted by Russia.

Evaluating the current internal political situation in Russia and its foreign policy course, it’s possible to say that the Russian leadership has lost its clear vision of national development and a firm and consistent policy, which are needed for any great power. Another explanation of this is that the Russian leadership is facing pressure from multiple agents of influence, which stand against vision of a powerful independent state seeking to act as one of the centres of power on the global stage. 

One more factor, often pointed out by experts, is the closed crony-caste system of elites. This system led to the creation of a leadership, which pursues its own narrow clannish interests. Apparently, all of these factors influence Russian foreign and domestic policies in one way or another. The 2014 events in Crimea showed to the Russian population that its state is ready to defend the interests of the nation and those who describe themselves as Russians even by force of arms. This was the first case when this approach was openly employed in the recent history of Russia. 

Therefore, the population was enthusiastic and national pride was on the rise. However, the Kremlin failed to exploit these gained opportunities and did not use them to strengthen the Russian state. In fact, up to February 2019, the policy towards eastern Ukraine has been’ inconsistent’.’’[5]

Inconsistent seems a rather evasive term to use when describing Russia’s policies in the Donbass. The DB represented a buffer zone between Russia and the Ukie Neo-nazi militias. Russia hardly wanted the likes of the neo-nazi units and their petty-Fuhrers, Pariuby, Yarosh and Biletsky and their Wannabee-Waffen SS outfits sitting on Russia’s western frontier less than 100 km from the major city of Rostov-on-Don. But at the same time a relatively tight leash was kept on the Eastern rebel militias.

But the war was to go badly for the Ukrainian forces. A rebel counter-offensive in the winter of 2015 went into overdrive after the Ukie army and volunteer battalions underwent a crushing defeat in the battle of Ilovaisk and were forced into headlong and disorderly retreat under constant bombardment from Russian artillery along the Sea of Azov coast in February 2015. (This Russian military intervention was almost certainly ordered by Putin.)

At this point the rebel commanders were within sight of Mariupol a city of half a million in the Donetsk region, and an important Seaport and Airport; its capture would have changed the whole balance of power in the conflict. But, the capture of Mariupol was forbidden at Moscow’s orders. And this gave Poroshenko’s routed army a breathing space to regroup and fight another day.

I think it reasonable to surmise that the influence of the conservative elements in the Kremlin were responsible for this. It doesn’t take much to figure out what was happening. A compromise between the two Russian political factions led to precisely this ‘inconsistency’ in Russia’s response to the war. On the plus side The Ukie Army was stopped in its tracks at Ilovaisk and suffered another humiliating defeat at the Delbatsevo in February 2015. No fresh offensives have been launched since then. Putin is on record as saying on many occasions that any Ukrainian attempts to overrun the two republics of LPR, DPR will not be tolerated.

However, it bears repeating that with the Ukies on the run in 2015 the Kremlin ordered an immediate cease-fire and this ceasefire actually saved Poroshenko’s army and his regime from a complete rout. Given Moscow’s initial inconsistences and later compromises with Kiev and the West, distrust of the Kremlin grew constantly in the militias’ ranks, as did the popular outrage among the Russian people, at Moscow’s lack of principle and action. By September the Kremlin vacillation was transformed into a more or less logical political line: to deny both sides a decisive victory.

The Donbass would be out of bounds for Poroshenko and the Ukrainian military, but there would be no independence or integration of the DPR, LPR into Russia. The militias would be defanged, and order restored. Throughout this whole episode Russian authorities have done their best to isolate the most belligerent elements among the rebels and compel them to leave the DB. Some of the more independent leftist militia leaders – Motorola, Givi, and Zakhachenko – were assassinated by unknown assassins, allegedly Ukrainian hit-squads (which nobody believes among the local militias).

Their crime was to reject the Minsk agreements – which had also been rejected by the Kiev regime outright – which extracted unilateral concessions on the two republics, and the orders to declare their allegiance to return to a federalised Ukraine. In short, the DB had become something of an embarrassment to certain sections of the Russian ruling class; these people where more concerned about the admission to the world’s globalist elite than they were about the people of the DB or even Russia’s future as an independent sovereign state. All of this was to soothe the West and the oligarchs that everything was under control and an attempt to promote a wider accommodation to the West.

Thus, Russian foreign policy was thus a function of the internal political struggle in Russia itself. But this internal political watershed is part of a global crisis which is also giving rise to powerful disruptive shocks in the Anglo-Zionist Empire.

These are momentous and historical developments which have yet to play out and which will ultimately influence the future of humanity.

Suffice it to say that for all its shortcomings, and there were quite a number, the Soviet Union enabled, possibly by accident, the existence of national liberation struggles and social-democratic reform parties around the world. The post-war settlement was based upon an agreement between the respective class blocs in the core countries of capitalism of concessions of capital to labour and in the global south a long retreat from empire by the UK, France, and Portugal, and the first Cold War which was based upon a ‘Realist’ foreign policy of détente even when Reagan came to power. That epoch is now over. The whole era was brought to a shuddering halt and reversal with the demise of the USSR.

Post-war social progress was, it seems, a tactical, aberrant form of European capitalism made necessary by the challenge of communism. We now know the second half of the sentence whose first half, so strongly believed in 1989, stated: ‘Western style welfare capitalism is better than Eastern Communism…’ The second half went unnoticed 10 years ago … ‘but western style welfare capitalism only existed because of communism.’ Now Europe (and the world – FL) seems to be drifting towards, a divided, turbulent and ugly future.”[6]

Read more:

https://off-guardian.org/2019/03/15/russian-stalemate/

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