Category Archives: Eurasian Axis

From the Surreal to the Real to the Meta-Real, by Batiushka

The Ukraine and its puppeteers may be winning in the Surreal and the Meta-real, but they’re getting their hands headed to them in the Real. From Batiushka at thesaker.is:

The Surreal

For one brief moment we thought that Monty Python had made a comeback, starring Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Surreal because of both characters, the former who returned post-haste from the Caribbean dreaming of a victorious return, the latter who appears to have been responsible for the terrorist attacks on the Nordstream pipelines (so said Truss’ mobile phone) and the Crimea-Kerch Bridge. No surprises here, as she represents the same ruthless British Establishment, which carried out the Litvinenko murder (carried out under ‘white man speak with forked tongue Bliar’) and the bungled Skripal murders (carried out under the son of millionaire slave-traders Cameron), making a clumsy mess of trying to frame Russia for them. Only zombies would believe that Russia was responsible for either mishap. Russia may not be populated with geniuses, but, unlike MI6, it is not populated with morons either.

Then we learned that the latest episode of the Great British Comedy Show was over – though only until the next one – with the utterly incompetent Truss backstabbed and sacked by her own. But the surreal was not over: A multimillionaire Hindu took over the UK Premiership and he has already hinted at cancelling Truss’ intention to increase the ‘defence’ budget of the bankrupt UK by 50% by 2030. This same Hindu banker is now responsible for appointing all bishops of the State-run ‘Church of England’! Yes, it is Monty Python again. The most important thing, however, is that Truss’ crazed fingers have been taken away from the nuclear button. Perhaps her American masters ordered it.

As for ‘Richy’ Sunak, his PR people are presenting him as another nice brown Obama (1). (Remember – the one who refused to close down Guantanamo Bay and murdered people by drone, for which the CIA kindly funded and then awarded him one of their Nobel Peace Prizes?). But already, on Sunak’s watch, the not-so-secret UK secret services have co-ordinated a pathetic drone attack on the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Of course, just as James Bond was the one who simply did the US’s dirty jobs for them, it was all okayed in Washington first. Hopefully, friends in India might tell Sunak to start behaving like a morally upright Indian, not like a British moral pygmy. Hopefully.

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Putin Skewers US Ineptitude, by Ray McGovern

Having been on the receiving end of it so many times, Vladimir Putin recognizes U.S. ineptitude when he sees it. From Ray McGovern at antiwar.com:

Speaking on Oct. 27 at the Valdai International Discussion Club, Russian President Vladimir Putin questioned the sanity of those who would “spoil relations with China at the same time they are supplying billions-worth of weapons to Ukraine in a fight against Russia.”

In answer to a question on “the growing tensions between China and the United States over Taiwan,” Putin labeled visits by top U.S. officials to Taiwan a “provocation.” Putin added:

“Frankly, I do not know why they are doing this. … Are they sane? It seems that this runs completely counter to common sense and logic … This is simply crazy.

“It may seem that there is a subtle, profound plot behind this. But I think there is nothing there, no subtle thought. It is just nonsense and arrogance, nothing else. … Such irrational actions are rooted in arrogance and a sense of impunity.”

Elite, Exceptional People

What kind of people are behind what Putin describes? It turns out they come from the same stock of white-privileged, exceptional, ivy-mantled “Best and Brightest” that brought us Vietnam. This time, it is President Joe Biden who brought them in. Giving Biden the benefit of the doubt, I believe he was/is not smart enough to understand that they have made a big mess of things.

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Everybody Wants to Hop on the BRICS Express, by Pepe Escobar

The U.S. tells Europe to shiver and starve this winter for Ukraine . . . or else. Russia and China have a different approach with its allies, and it appears to be working. From Pepe Escobar at unz.com:

Let’s start with what is in fact a tale of Global South trade between two members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). At its heart is the already notorious Shahed-136 drone – or Geranium-2, in its Russian denomination: the AK-47 of postmodern aerial warfare.

The US, in yet another trademark hysteria fit rife with irony, accused Tehran of weaponizing the Russian Armed Forces. For both Tehran and Moscow, the superstar, value-for-money, and terribly efficient drone let loose in the Ukrainian battlefield is a state secret: its deployment prompted a flurry of denials from both sides. Whether these are made in Iran drones, or the design was bought and manufacturing takes place in Russia (the realistic option), is immaterial.

The record shows that the US weaponizes Ukraine to the hilt against Russia. The Empire is a de facto war combatant via an array of “consultants,” advisers, trainers, mercenaries, heavy weapons, munitions, satellite intel, and electronic warfare. And yet imperial functionaries swear they are not part of the war. They are, once again, lying.

Welcome to yet another graphic instance of the “rules-based international order” at work. The Hegemon always decides which rules apply, and when. Anyone opposing it is an enemy of “freedom,” “democracy,” or whatever platitude du jour, and should be – what else – punished by arbitrary sanctions.

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Welcome To the New Multipolar World Order – Part 4, by Iain Davis

The conclusion of Iain Davis’s excellent series, from Davis at iaindavis.com:

Part 1 of this series looked at the various models of world order.

Part 2 examined how the shift towards the multipolar world order has been led by some surprising characters.

Part 3 explored the history of the idea of a world ordered as a “balance of power,” or multipolar system. Those who have advocated this model over the generations have consistently sought the same goal: global governance.

In Part 4 we will consider the theories underpinning the imminent multipolar order, the nature of Russia and China’s public-private oligarchies and the emergence of these two nations’ military power.

The Wider Context of the Ukraine War

There is no evidence to suggest that the war in Ukraine is, in any sense, “fake.” The political and cultural differences among the populace of Ukraine are older than the nation-state, and the current conflict is rooted in long-standing and very real tensions. People are suffering and dying, and they deserve the chance to live in peace.

Yet, beyond the specific factors that led to and have perpetuated the conflict in Ukraine, there is a wider context that also deserves discussion.

The so-called leaders in the West and in the East have had ample opportunity and power to bring both sides in the Donbas war to the negotiating table. Their attempts to broker ceasefires and to implement the various Minsk agreements over the years were weak and half-hearted. Both sides, it seems, chose instead to play politics with Ukrainian lives. And both sides ultimately fuelled the conflict. The West has done little but exacerbate the situation. And, though it faced a tough economic choice, the Russian government could certainly have leveraged its commanding position in the European energy market to better effect.

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Biden’s Tech-War Goes Nuclear, by Mike Whitney

Biden just approved a package of sanctions against China that’s almost a declaration of war. From Mike Whitney at strategic-culture.org:

“Lots of people don’t know what happened yesterday. To put it simply, Biden has forced all Americans working in China to pick between quitting their jobs and losing American citizenship. Every American executive and engineer working in China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry resigned yesterday, paralyzing Chinese manufacturing overnight. One round of sanctions from Biden did more damage than all four years of performative sanctioning under Trump. Although American semiconductor exporters had to apply for licenses during the Trump years, licenses were approved within a month.

With the new Biden sanctions, all American suppliers of IP blocks, components, and services departed overnight – thus cutting off all service [to China]. Long story short, every advanced node semiconductor company is currently facing comprehensive supply cut-off, resignations from all American staff, and immediate operations paralysis. This is what annihilation looks like: China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry was reduced to zero overnight. Complete collapse. No chance of survival.”

Posted at Jordan Schneider’s Twitter account @jordanschnyc from a translated thread at @lidangzzz

The Biden administration intensified its war on China last week when it detonated a thermonuclear bomb at the heart of Beijing’s booming technology industry. In an effort to block China’s access to crucial semiconductor technology, Team Biden announced onerous new export rules aimed at a “comprehensive supply cut-off” of essential semiconductor technology which– according to one analyst– led to an “immediate operations paralysis.” The terror unleashed by the announcement was aptly summarized in a thread posted at Jordan Schneider’s Twitter account from a translated thread at @lidangzzz (See above quote)

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Patrick Lawrence: The Non-West Coalesces

A lot of countries are deciding that they don’t have to be the U.S.’s vassals. From Patrick Lawrence at sheerpost.com:

Nations representing more than 80 percent of the global population and a like percentage of global gross domestic product are perfectly capable of seeing the Biden administration’s pointed provocations and do not approve.

OPEC President Bruno Jean-Richard Itoua Leads First In-Person OPEC Meeting Since COVID-19. Image source: OPEC

Something of epochal importance happened in Vienna, where the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, now known as OPEC–Plus with the inclusion of the Russian Federation, convened recently for its first in-person session since 2020. You would not know of this development if you rely solely on the reports carried in our corporate-owned media.

The world just took a significant turn into the 21st century. Let us stay abreast of it, leaving those who refuse to see this to their own devices.

President Biden, apparently not intelligent enough to understand the emergent new era and indifferent to the interests and aspirations of others, quickly made as big a mess of things as could be made. Last week he threatened Saudi Arabia, which co-chairs OPEC–Plus with the Russian Federation, with “consequences” for what transpired in Vienna. This is what imperiums do when their primacy is threatened—they encourage the very currents in history they are determined to disrupt.

As reported everywhere, OPEC–Plus decided to reduce the oil production of member nations by two million barrels per day as of next month. This may amount to an actual cut of half that amount, as many OPEC–Plus members—Nigeria, for instance—have not been lifting to their quotas anyway. But oil prices are already increasing, and we will soon see this at our filling stations. As retail prices rise, it is likely to complicate the political fortunes of the Biden administration and Democrats on Capitol Hill just as the midterm elections approach. So, a pretty big deal.

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Russia courts Muslim countries as strategic Eurasian partners, by Pepe Escobar

Contrast how Russia treats potential allies in Eurasia and how the U.S. treats actual allies in Europe. The U.S. could learn a thing or two from Russia. From Pepe Escobar at thesaker.is:

Everything that matters in the complex process of Eurasia integration was once again at play in Astana, as the – renamed – Kazakh capital hosted the 6th Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia (CICA).

The roll call was a Eurasian thing of beauty – featuring the leaders of Russia and Belarus (EAEU), West Asia (Azerbaijan, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Qatar, Palestine) and Central Asia (Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan).

China and Vietnam (East and Southeast Asia) attended at the level of vice presidents.

CICA is a multinational forum focused on cooperation toward peace, security, and stability across Asia.,Kazakh President Tokayev revealed that CICA has just adopted a declaration to turn the forum into an international organization.

CICA has already established a partnership with the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU). So in practice, it will soon be working together side-by-side with the SCO, the EAEU and certainly BRICS+.

The Russia-Iran strategic partnership was prominently featured at CICA, especially after Iran being welcomed to the SCO as a full member.

President Raeisi, addressing the forum, stressed the crucial notion of an emerging  “new Asia”, where “convergence and security” are “not compatible with the interests of hegemonic countries and any attempt to destabilize independent nations has goals and consequences beyond national geographies, and in fact, aims to target the stability and prosperity of regional countries.”

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Michael Hudson: A Roadmap to Escape the West’s Stranglehold

Michael Hudson was one of the first to suggest that the U.S. proxy war against Russia was also a war on Europe, particularly Germany. From Hudson at unz.com:

It is impossible to track the geoeconomic turbulence inherent to the “birth pangs” of the multipolar world without the insights of Professor Michael Hudson at the University of Missouri, and author of the already seminal The Destiny of Civilization.

In his latest essay, Professor Hudson digs deeper into Germany’s suicidal economic/financial policies; their effect on the already falling euro – and hints at some possibilities for fast integrating Eurasia and the Global South as a whole to try to break the Hegemon’s stranglehold.

That led to a series of email exchanges, especially about the future role of the yuan, where Hudson remarked:

“The Chinese whom I’ve talked to for years and years did not expect the dollar to weaken. They’re not crying about its rise, but they are concerned about flight capital from China as I think after the Party Congress [starting on October 16] there will be a crackdown on the Shanghai free-market advocacy. Pressure for the coming changes has been long building up. The spirit of reform to rein in ‘free markets’ was spreading among students over a decade ago, and they have been rising in the Party hierarchy.”

On the key issue of Russia accepting payment for energy in rubles, Hudson touched upon a point rarely examined outside of Russia: “They don’t really want to be paid just in rubles. That’s the one thing Russia doesn’t need, because it can just print them. It only needs rubles to balance its international payments to stabilize the exchange rate – not to push it up.”

Which brings us to settlements in yuan: “Taking payment in yuan is like taking payment in gold – an international asset that every country desires as a non-fiat currency that has a value if one sells it (unlike the dollar now, which may simply be confiscated, or ultimately left abandoned). What Russia really needs are critical industrial inputs like computer chips. It could ask China to import these with the yuan Russia provides.”

Keynes is back

Following our email exchanges, Professor Hudson gracefully agreed to answer in detail a few questions about the extremely complex geoeconomic processes in play across Eurasia. Here we go.

The Cradle: The BRICS are studying the adoption of a common currency – including all of them and, we expect, the expanded BRICS+ as well. How could that be practically implemented? Hard to see the Brazilian Central Bank harmonizing with the Russians and the People’s Bank of China. Would that involve only investment – via the BRICS development bank? Would that be based on commodities + gold? How does the yuan fit in? Is the BRICS approach based on the current Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) discussions with the Chinese, led by Sergey Glazyev? Did the Samarkand summit advance, practically, the interconnection of BRICS and the SCO?

Hudson: “Any idea of a common currency has to start with a currency-swap arrangement among existing member countries. Most trade will be in their own currencies. But to settle the inevitable imbalances (balance-of-payments surpluses and deficits), an artificial currency will be created by a new Central Bank.

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The Golden Road To Samarkand, by Amir Taheri

There are many unanswered questions about the Eurasian multipolarity that Russia and China are trying to create. From Amir Taheri at gatestoneinstitute.org:

  • The Russian media, echoing President Vladimir Putin’s speech at the summit, say the SCO is designed to end “the unipolar world “by creating a “multipolar system”.

  • The Chinese media offer a different version. The SCO is meant to offer a new political system for the whole world as an alternative to the Western democratic model.

  • To the Islamic media in Tehran, celebrating the Islamic Republic’s admission to the club after 11 years of supplication, the SCO is an extension of the “Resistance Front” created to contain and defeat the American “Great Satan.”

  • The SCO’s identity as a club of queer fellows has been further emphasized by the admission of a host of new members all of whom have territorial disputes with each other.

  • Some Western commentators have dubbed the SCO “a new power bloc”. That may be jumping the gun a bit. SCO members are more dependent on trade with the European Union, the US, Canada, Japan, South Korea and Australia than with each other.

  • The Samarkand club represents some 40 percent of the world’s population and over 20 percent of the global GDP, not to mention four of the 9 nations with nuclear arsenals. Yet, it seems unlikely to become an anchor of stability in Eurasia; its members are more interested in petty schemes than grand ideas of peace and cooperation.

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The Spoils of War, by Eamon McKinney

Europe’s elite kowtow to the U.S., but deprivation from the U.S.’s proxy war with Russia is pushing a lot of ordinary Europeans past the breaking point. From Eamon McKinney at strategic-culture.org:

In light of recent revelations the assumption that wartime plunder is only visited on “enemies” needs to be re-evaluated, Eamon McKinney writes.

“The spoils of war” normally refers to the plunder extracted from enemies during and after a conflict. However, in light of recent revelations the assumption that wartime plunder is only visited on “enemies” needs to be re-evaluated. While the Empire’s supposed “ally” Ukraine has already been lined up to be dismantled and pillaged by the Western financial powers post war, it seems as if the resources of the Ukraine will not be sufficient to satisfy the American Empire’s insatiable greed. A recently leaked document from American think tank, The Rand Corporation outlines clearly the next stage in the planned destruction of Europe, where friend and foe alike are fair game for the Cabal’s limitless avarice.

The Rand Corp was established in 1946, it is one of many such think tanks the U.S. establishment outsources its thinking to. Made famous by the “Pentagon papers” leak during the Vietnam war, its role in the planning, operation and continuance of that genocidal conflict left few in any doubt whose interests it serves. Funded primarily by the Pentagon, the U.S. Army and the Air Force, it claims that it is non-partisan, meaning that regardless of the incumbent political party, it serves the permanent government, the deep state.

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