Putin Warns "Russia Has Right To Respond" To US Military Buildup, Hints At Use Of Nuclear Weapons

Multiple Russian state media outlets are reporting that President Vladimir Putin has stressed that Russia has a right to respond to US military build-up in Europe while furthering its strategic nuclear deterrence capabilities in a speech delivered before a Defense Ministry meeting on Friday in the city of Balashikha outside of Moscow.

At the same meeting Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that NATO has doubled the number of its military drills since 2012 in the vicinity of Russia"s borders, noting that Russia is carefully monitoring what it considers hostile NATO build-up and intensified surveillance operations along Russian borders. The defense minister further indicated that the number of NATO-member country troops stationed near Russian borders has tripled, growing from 10 to 40 thousand in three years, saying "In the Baltic states and Poland, four battalion-tactical groups, an armored brigade of the US Army, headquarters of NATO multinational divisions in Poland and Romania are deployed."

Russian solider during the September "Zapad" (West) war games. Image source: Getty

Since the crisis in Ukraine (which began in 2014) and Russia"s subsequent annexation of the Crimea, an Obama administration policy of steady build-up and periodic war games has been in place in East European and the Baltic countries, including Bulgaria, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Romania. A little under a year ago a Reuters report acknowledged that NATO has been "expanding its presence in the region to levels unprecedented since the Cold War" - something which the Pentagon has long touted as defensive in nature.

And just this week news broke that after months of indecision over whether or not to move forward with Obama-era legislation which initially paved the way for legalizing US arms sales to Ukraine, Trump has approved the first ever US commercial sale of weapons to the Kiev government, which Moscow sees as an illegitimate puppet regime supported by the West. According to The Washington Post, "administration officials confirmed that the State Department this month approved a commercial license authorizing the export of Model M107A1 Sniper Systems, ammunition, and associated parts and accessories to Ukraine, a sale valued at $41.5 million. These weapons address a specific vulnerability of Ukrainian forces fighting a Russian-backed separatist movement in two eastern provinces."

Meanwhile, it is likely that Putin"s words are to some extent a calculated response to news of the unexpected approval of US arms exports to Ukraine, which was reported on Wednesday. Putin characterized Washington"s new national security strategy as "aggressive" and "definitely offensive" according to Russia"s TASS news agency.

Putin said that both the US and NATO have been "accelerating build-up of infrastructure in Europe" in violation of the 1987 treaty on the elimination of intermediate-range and shorter-range missiles. He said concerning the new and expanding US missile defense system now based in Poland that they are not merely defensive in nature but offensive weapons: "The point is, and specialists know about it very well, those launchers are all-purpose. They can also be used with existing sea-launched cruise missiles with the flight range of up to 2,500 km [1,550 miles]. And in this case, these missiles are no longer sea-launched missiles, they can be easily moved to land," Putin said.

He added further that Russia"s Defense Ministry "should take into account" Western military strategies and that "Russia has a sovereign right and all possibilities to adequately and in due time react to such potential threats."

And notably concerning Putin"s reference to nuclear weapons and infrastructure, TASS summarizes the following:

There are efforts to disrupt strategic parity through deployment of global anti-missile defense system and other strike systems "equatable to nuclear weapons," the Russian leader told military officials. At the moment, Russia"s strategic nuclear forces are a reliable deterrent to such a military build-up, he added. However, it is necessary to develop them further, Putin said. "I"m talking about missile systems fit to steadily counter not only existing, but also future ABMs."

This comes as earlier this week another spine-chilling scare story involving the Russians and Putin"s plan for supposed global domination spread widely in Western media after two major European tabloids published sensational headlines on Wednesday claiming that, according to the UK"s largest tabloid The Sun, Russia secretly practiced full-scale invasion of Europe with bombing raids on Germany during Russia"s September "Zapad" (West) military drills. 

Graphic purporting to show Russia"s September pre-planned "Zapad" military drills. The UK Sun tabloid published it along with the following scaremongering and false headline: "Russia secretly practised full-scale invasion of Europe with bombing raids on Germany during Vladimir Putin’s military drills."

However, analysis of the Russian military games produced by Chatham House (essentially the UK version of The Council on Foreign Relations, or CFR) admitted that the exercise was "small, managed, and contained" while being defensive in nature as "a dress rehearsal for defending against a NATO intervention" and meant to send a message to the West, saying "This is what Russia wants the West to believe is the Kremlin’s understanding of what a conventional war between Russia and NATO forces would look like."

The Chatham House analysis further commented that the West"s previous "scaremongering" over the periodic military games (and lately revived this week in the media) is actually affirming the Russian perspective - that NATO-driven threat inflation and scare tactics are really what"s driving current tensions and build-up between the two sides.

According to Chatham House:

Western commentators were obsessed with the numbers of Russian troops being mobilized during the course of exercise and stuck firmly to the "100,000 servicemen" narrative. But Russia proved them wrong by keeping the drills small, managed, and contained.

 

The Kremlin could therefore credibly claim that the West overreacted and fell victim to scaremongering and reporting rumors that Moscow was not being transparent about the nature of the exercise and its intentions.

Considering that Chatham House is at the heart of the UK"s political and defense establishment, this is a remarkably candid admission from a source that"s usually hawkish on the perceived Russian threat of anti-NATO military expansion. 

But perhaps as US and NATO military bases have increasingly encroached on Russia"s borders over the last two decades, it is finally becoming obvious and undeniable even to the most establishment of Western pundits that Putin has a reason to build up Russian defenses in equal measure.

"Sorry Chump, You Didn"t Have It In Writing"

Authored by Eric Margolis via EricMargolis.com,

At a time when the United States is convulsed by anti-Russian hysteria and demonization of Vladimir Putin, a trove of recently declassified Cold War documents reveals the astounding extent of the lies, duplicity and double-dealing engaged in by the western powers with the collapsing Soviet Union in 1990.

I was covering Moscow in those days and met some of the key players in this sordid drama.   Ever since, I’ve been writing that the Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, and Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, were shamelessly lied to and deceived by the United States, Britain, and their appendage, NATO.

All the western powers promised Gorbachev and Shevardnadze that NATO would not expand eastward by ‘one inch’ if Moscow would pull the Red Army out of East Germany and allow it to peacefully reunify with West Germany.  This was a titanic concession by Gorbachev: it led to a failed coup against him in 1991 by Communist hardliners.

The documents released by George Washington University in Washington DC, which I attended for a semester, make sickening reading (see them online).  All western powers and statesmen assured the Russians that NATO would not take advantage of the Soviet retreat and that a new era of amity and cooperation would dawn in post-Cold War Europe.  US Secretary of State Jim Baker offered ‘ironclad guarantees’ there would be no NATO expansion.  Lies, all lies.

Gorbachev was a humanist, a very decent, intelligent man who believed he could end the Cold War and nuclear arms race.   He ordered the Red Army back from Eastern Europe.  I was in Wunsdorf, East Germany, HQ of the Group of Soviet Forces, Germany, and at Stasi secret police HQ in East Berlin right after the pullout order was given.  The Soviets withdrew their 338,000 troops and 4,200 tanks and sent them home at lightening speed.

Western promises made to Soviet leaders by President George W. H. Bush and Jim Baker quickly proved to be empty.  They were honorable men but their successors were not.  Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush quickly began moving NATO into Eastern Europe, violating all the pledges made to Moscow.

The Poles, Hungarians and Czechs were brought into NATO, then Romania and Bulgaria, the Baltic States, Albania, and Montenegro.  Washington tried to get the former Soviet Republics of Georgia and Ukraine into NATO.  The Moscow-aligned government of Ukraine was overthrown in a US-engineered coup.  The road to Moscow was open.

All the bankrupt, confused Russians could do was denounce these eastward moves by the US and NATO.  The best response NATO and Washington could come up with was, ‘well, there was no official written promise.’  This is worthy of a street peddler selling counterfeit watches.  The leaders of the US, Britain, France, Belgium and Italy all lied.  Germany was caught between its honor and imminent reunification. So even its Chancellor Helmut Kohl had to go along with the West’s prevarications.

At the time, I wrote that the best solution would be for the demilitarization of formerly Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe.  NATO had no need or business to expand eastward.  Doing so would be a constant provocation to Russia, which regarded Eastern Europe as an essential defensive glacis against invasions from the West.

Now, with NATO forces on its western borders, Russia’s deepest fears have been realized.

Today, US military aircraft based on the coasts of Romania and Bulgaria, former Warsaw Pact members, probe Russian airspace over the Black Sea and the vital strategic port of Sevastopol.  Washington talks about arming chaotic Ukraine.   US and NATO troops are in the Baltic, on Russia’s northwestern borders.  Polish right-wingers are beating the war drums against Russia.

In 1990, KGB and CIA agreed to the principal of ‘not one inch’ eastward for NATO.  Former US ambassador to Moscow, Jack Matlock, confirms the same agreement. Gorbachev, who is denounced as a foolish idealist by many Russians, trusted the Western powers. He should have had a battalion of New York City garment district shyster lawyers to document his agreements in 1990.  He thought he was dealing with honest, honorable men, like himself.

Is it any wonder after this bait and switch diplomacy that Russia has no trust in the Western powers?  Moscow watches US-run NATO oozing ever eastwards. Today, Russia’s leaders firmly believe Washington’s ultimate plan is to tear apart Russia and reduce it to an impotent, pauper nation.  Two former Western leaders, Napoleon and Hitler, had similar plans.

Instead of carrying on about Hitler’s duplicity after Munich, we should look at our own shameless behavior after 1990.

NATO Ministerial Meeting: Preparing For War On Russia?

Authored by Stephen Lendman,

America controls NATO policymaking. The alliance serves as its global imperial arm – warmaking its mission, not fostering world peace and stability.

Nor does it have anything to do with defense at a time the only threats alliance members face are invented ones. Real ones don’t exist.

World peace and stability notions are contrary to US objectives, wanting unchallenged dominance over world nations, their resources and populations.

America’s diabolical agenda involves endless wars of aggression, wanting all sovereign independent nations replaced by US vassal states, creating ruler/serf societies globally, an open-air prison for ordinary people disposed of if resist – a world unsafe and unfit to live in.

On November 8 and 9, NATO ministers met in Brussels. Like his predecessors, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg was appointed to serve US interests, taking orders from Washington.

Issues discussed included revising NATO’s command structure, including “a new command to help protect sea lines of communication between North America and Europe, and another command to improve the movement of troops and equipment within Europe,” said Stoltenberg – stressing “our ability to move forces,” he added.

Against what, he didn’t explain – preparing for war on Russia the unstated objective, whether or not waged. It’s more likely than not ahead – a modern-day Operation Barbarossa with nukes if launched.

Russia and China represent the final frontier of resistance against US sought global dominance.

Eventual conflict against both nations is ominously possible, maybe likely or certain, a grim prospect if happens.

High on the ministerial agenda is improving infrastructure for warmaking, including upgraded roads and bridges, facilitating movement of troops, weapons and equipment.

So-called “deterrence for collective defense” is code language for possible offensive operations. The private sector in NATO countries have an “important role to play,” said Stoltenberg.

In late October, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu explained his nation must deal with serious threats on its western borders.

During a Defense Ministry Board meeting, he said “(t)he military and political situation at our western borders remains tense and shows a tendency to escalation.”

US-led NATO forces are deployed menacingly close to Russia’s borders, their hostile presence a cause for great concern.

If Russian troops were positioned along America’s north and/or southern borders, or offshore near its east, west, or Gulf coasts, Washington would consider their presence an act of war. Conflict could follow.

America’s provocative Eastern European presence has Moscow justifiably concerned, Shoigu explaining:

“The intensity and scale of the operational and combat training of the bloc member-countries’ military forces near our borders are growing.”

 

“Only in the past three months there have been over 30 drills in East European and Baltic states” – heightening tensions, Shoigu adding:

 

“We’re implementing a set of measures to neutralize the emerging challenges and threats,” including modernized hardware positioned by yearend and upgraded infrastructure.

Former head of Russian airborne troops/current lower house State Duma Defense Committee chairman Vladimir Shamanov warned about hostile NATO saber-rattling, “bring(ing) nothing positive,” he said.

Given America’s rage for endless wars and global dominance, the threat of catastrophic nuclear war is ominously real.

NATO Launches New Black Sea Force To Target Russia

Authored by Jason Ditz via AntiWar.com,

NATO has announced the launching of their multinational Black Sea Force, based in Romania, and including an entire Romanian brigade of 4,000 troops.

“We are sending a very clear message: NATO is here, NATO is strong and NATO is united,” Stoltenberg told assembled Polish, Romanian, Spanish and Portuguese soldiers.

The force is there to target Russia in the Black Sea region.

Romania insisted the deployment is “not a threat to Russia” and that the purpose of having more troops there to “target” Russia is “peace, not war.”

“We are not a threat for Russia. But we need dialogue from a strong position of defense and discouragement,”

900 US troops were deployed to Romania to participate in this force.

Since Russia doesn’t border NATO anywhere in the Black Sea region, the force appears to be largely pointless, except for additional grandstanding about NATO’s “readiness” for a fight with “invading” Russian forces, in an invasion that’s been predicted for years.

This appears to be an attempt to mirror the creation of NATO’s much larger Baltic forces, which are all deployed at or near the Russian frontier, and which see large western military contingents placed in tiny Baltic states.

The Root Of Current Tensions: "They Hold No Loyalty Except To Themselves And To Personal Gain"

Authored by Jeremiah Johnson (nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the United States Army Special Forces) via SHTFplan.com,

One of the items that is regularly reported on, but quietly…not alarming anyone…is the situation developing in Eastern Europe and the Baltic States. 

At the forefront is Ukraine, as the U.S.-orchestrated coup of 2014 and the subsequent annexation of Crimea by Russia created a line to develop into a Second Cold War.  This is the root of the current tensions where both Russia and the U.S. are continuously posturing against one another.

The root of the matter lies in the undue influence that was secured by Georgy Schwarz (also known as George Soros) with the purchase of John McCain.  An article just surfaced on September 13, 2017 entitled Power Games: What McCain, Soros, and the Clintons Have in Common, by Ekaterina Blinova of Sputnik News.  The article gives a brief history of “The McCain Institute for International Leadership,” a non-profit organization profiting on the campus of Arizona State University.  This non-profit organization has received “minor” donations, such as $1 million from the Saudi Arabian government in 2014.

Financial ties between McCain and Soros have been exposed in the past, and that the two have had a nebulous relationship since 2001.  Interestingly enough, it was McCain who was the leading proponent behind the regime change in Ukraine.  Assisted by Victoria Nuland with Obama and Hillary Clinton acting the part of “Zardoz” floating invisibly in the background, supplying the authority, and with Sen. Lindsey Graham as a lapdog-collaborator, it was McCain who orchestrated the coup above-board.

Beneath the boards was Soros.  The reason Soros funded Maidan (the right-wing ultra-nationalists of Ukraine) and approved of Arseniy Yatsenuk (a globalist scientologist who currently resides in California) was to grab Eastern Ukraine for himself.  Soros planned on dumping $50 million, backed by political control via McCain and the other Munsters, and financially by the IMF…all wrapped up in the NATO Hegemony….and buying himself one third of Ukraine…with all types of natural resources from coal to minerals…for 1/1000^th of its actual worth.

Soros’ plan fell apart, because he did not count on the Russians seizing Crimea to secure Sevastopol (their Black Sea Fleet HQ) and access to the Mediterranean.  He also did not count on Ukrainians of Russian national derivation revolting in Eastern Ukraine against the installed puppetry of Yatsenuk (Yoda) that eventually “morphed” into Petro “Willy Wonka” Poroshenko’s Kiev government.  Because of the insurrection in the east, the IMF would not bail Ukraine out of the $9 billion plus owed to Russia to pay Gazprom for natural gas consumption.

Notice the complexion of the game has changed.  Soros now is fostering ties with Russia, in the hopes that he can take those mineral and oil rights from the other direction and take himself off the hook with the Russian government. Par for the course in the manner of Rothschild, bankrolling both Napoleon and the British government and selling short on both sides to pocket from the overall misfortune of the situation.  A situation caused by Rothschild and instigated into a war that gave him profits.  Only the players are different in the comedy being played out today.

Jared Kushner has deep ties to Soros, as does Hillary Clinton.  As mentioned in other articles, read Shadow Party by Poe that outlines the key role Soros played in the rise to power of Hillary Clinton.  The President truly needs to clean Washington out, and remove these politicos that kowtow and bend to the whim of oligarchs.  Only then can foreign policy be set that is in the interests of the United States and not a pack of privateers, oligarchs, and politicians…such as a Pelosi who begins a career making $150 grand and ends up with a net worth of more than $40 million.

There is a part of it all that is even worse than the theft.  Because of these games and the corruption attached to them, these individuals depose governments and throw whole nations into civil war and anarchy for the promulgation of personal power and personal gain.  World wars begin on the whims of madmen and see fruition because those madmen are in positions of authority derived from the citizens, yet with no accountability to the citizens.  They hold no loyalty except to themselves and to personal gain.

Russia Kicks Off "Biggest Display Of Military Power Since The Cold War"

Today, Moscow kicked off its controversial, week-long "Zapad-2017" drill, the latest iteration of a series of training maneuvers that began under the Soviet Union in the 1970s, and which has angered and put NATO and Baltic States leaders on edge. Land, sea and air units will be taking part in war games until the 21st of September across a huge area encompassing western Russia, Belarus, the Baltic Sea and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

After a long break following the collapse of communism, Zapad, or "west" in Russian, was revived in 1999 and then was expanded after Vladimir Putin became president at the end of that year. Previous versions were held in 2009 and 2013.  Moscow says fewer than 13,000 troops are participating - the threshold for inviting international observers - but NATO members believe as many as 100,000 troops will be involved in the drills. That would make this year"s drill the biggest display of Russian military power since the end of the Cold War a quarter-century ago. 

Foreign observers from NATO were never allowed to watch Soviet-era Zapad exercises, and diplomats based in Moscow were barred from visiting regions where the exercises were taking place. That was supposed to change with the signing of the Vienna Document, adopted in 1990 by the Vienna-based Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and updated in 2011, but Russia has always found ways to circumvent the agreement.

In the drill, Russia and Belarus will deploy their troops, designated as "the Northern ones" to stand up to the aggression from "the Western ones" – armed attackers from the made-up countries of Vesbaria, Lubenia, and Veishnoria. According to the scenario released by Russian and Belarusian defense officials, Vesbaria and Lubenia are located in the Baltic region and control the corridor which links the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad with Belarus.

In the real world, the corridor roughly corresponds to the border between Lithuania and Poland, both of them NATO members.  The hypothetical state of Veishnoria, however, is located in the Grodno area of Belarus, near the country"s western border. Experts cited by DW see this as a sign that Minsk and Moscow are preparing scenarios for threats originating in NATO countries as well as from within Belarus. The Grodno area seems to have a special significance as the home for a large population of Poles living in the former Soviet state. However, military officials insist that the scenario was developed "against a hypothetical opponent, unrelated to the concrete region."

What is the goal of the drill?

"Belarus and the Kaliningrad region have been infiltrated by extremist groups with the intention of committing terrorist attacks. The illegal militias are backed from abroad, providing them with armaments and naval and air capabilities. In order to neutralize the opponents, land forces will be deployed to cut off their access to sea and block air corridors in the region, with the support of the air force, air defense forces, and the navy," the official plan says.

The goal of the Zapad-2017 maneuvers is to coordinate actions between regional military commands "in the interest of ensuring military safety," Moscow and Minsk said. "The Republic of Belarus strives to prevent armed conflicts, and the Russian federation is providing it with political backing, financial aid, as well as technical and military support," according to the Belarusian Defense Ministry.

The drill is set to proceed in two stages. Initially, the military will boost their air force and air defense capabilities to protect key military and state objects, and prepare to "isolate regions of activity by the illegal armed groups and their subversive-reconnaissance squads." The second stage will be "to work out the issues of managing troops while repelling an aggression" against Russia and Belarus.

Who will take part?

Officially, the two countries say that some 12,700 servicemen will be involved in the upcoming drills. "Zapad-2017" will also involve 70 planes and helicopters, 280 tanks, 200 artillery weapons, ten ships, 200 "heavy weapons and guns" and various other pieces of military equipment. The drills will also include agents of the Russian intelligence service FSB, as well as people working for the Russian Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

However, NATO allies have repeatedly disputed these numbers, with German Defense Minister Ursula Von der Leyen claiming the real number is likely to be upwards of 100,000 troops. International accords mandate that countries provide a larger degree of transparency when holding drills with over 13,000 troops.

Last weekend, Russia’s Defense Ministry said it was "bewildered" by Von der Leyen"s assertion, and repeated its claims that drill would stay below the 13,000 threshold. Previously, the Kremlin has asked foreign defense officials and military-diplomatic corps to visit the final stage of the joint exercise at one of the sites in Russia. Belarus also stated that it had sent out invitations to UN, OSCE, NATO, the post-Soviet Commonwealth of Independent States, and military attaches accredited in Belarus.

Despite a global anti-Russian wave that would make McCarthy blush, so-called experts don"t believe that Russia is about to launch a war, at least not yet , according to NBC.  "NATO remains calm and vigilant, and committed to keeping Estonia and all our allies safe," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said last week in Estonia, one of the tiny Baltic nations that borders Russia and often worries about undue influence from Moscow. But not everyone in the region is so sanguine. In Lithuania, another Baltic nation that was once part of the Soviet Union, Defense Minister Raimundas Karoblis summed up the mood.

"We can"t be totally calm. There is a large foreign army massed next to Lithuanian territory," he told Reuters.

Other Western officials, including the head of the U.S. Army in Europe, Gen. Ben Hodges, have raised concerns that Russia might use the drills as a "Trojan horse" to make incursions into Poland and Russian-speaking regions in the Baltics. Hodges made the comment in a Reuters interview in July.

There are fears that Moscow may be moving far more troops into Belarus than it intends to withdraw, establishing a permanent military presence there on the border with NATO countries. And officials in the Baltics and Poland have voiced alarm that the exercises could be used as a cover for Russian aggression, as happened in 2014, when Moscow staged large-scale exercises to camouflage preparations to intervene on the side of pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine.

NATO is also concerned: "Russia is not organizing defensive operations but instead an offensive threat, testing how serious we are about protecting the members of NATO," said Jonathan Eyal, international director of the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think tank. Belarus not only borders Russia, but also three of America"s key but relatively isolated NATO allies: Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia.

"Russia is reminding us that the Baltic states are relatively indefensible," Eyal added according to NBC. "They want to see where the cracks are in NATO and where they can be widened."

Stoltenberg, the NATO secretary general, said he could not speculate about the real purpose of Zapad-2017, saying that this would become clear only once it was over next week. At the same time, he noted, the exercise fits a “pattern of a more assertive Russia” that is “exercising more aggressively” and, through its actions in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, has shown that “it is willing to use military force against its neighbors.”

In hypothetical scenarios played out by the Rand Corporation last year found that it would take Russian forces just 60 hours to reach the outskirts of the Estonian and Latvian capitals of Tallinn and Riga.

In terms of this year"s Zapad exercise, what concerns some officials and experts is they aren"t exactly sure how big they will be. There are also questions about Putin"s true intention. The last Zapad exercise, in 2013, featured "more than 75,000 men, who were engaged in simulated operations in the air, on land and at sea," according to a report by The Jamestown Foundation, a Washington-based research institute. For comparison, last year 24 NATO members held a military exercise named "Anakonda," which included more than 31,000 service members.

Whatever the number, the exercises come against the backdrop of several close encounters between Russian and NATO aircraft and ships in recent years.

"There"s always a possibility for miscalculation when that"s going on," Gen. Curtis M. Scaparrotti, NATO"s supreme allied commander, told reporters last month, referring to these near-misses. "I think that"s the importance of transparency, particularly on Russia"s part, to tell us about [the Zapad] exercise: What should we expect to see, what is the size of them, where will they operate?"

* * *

What is far less mentioned in the western press, is that are pointed out earlier, Belarus had previously invited international monitors from various foreign countries to observe the active phase of the drills.

“We are not planning to attack anyone. In terms of what the drills will be like – we’ve invited almost anyone who wants to attend. Let them come and watch,” Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko stated in September. In July, Belarusian Defense Minister Andrey Ravkov, also stressed that international organizations, including the UN, NATO, and the OSCE, as well as more than 80 foreign observers, are invited to the drills since there is “nothing to conceal.”

Finally, while the world’s attention is focused on Zapad 2017, NATO and its allies have increased their military activity on Russia"s borders.

Launching today, by odd coincidence, Sweden is holding its largest war games in over two decades, timed to start at the same time as the Russia-Belarus drills. Apart from exceeding the number of troops participating in Zapad 2017 by several thousand, the maneuvers are aimed to prepare for a possible Russian attack.

Moreover, around 40,000 NATO troops and allied forces have taken part in various military drills in Europe this summer, according to Air Force Brigadier General John Healy, who directs the drills of US forces in Europe. Eighteen NATO exercises, including Noble Partner in Georgia, occurred in the Black Sea Region alone, close to the Russian border, in summer 2017. At the same time Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria joined separate US-led Saber Guardian 2017, which took place this summer. Around 25,000 service members from 22 allied and partner nations were involved in the drills, making them the largest of the 18 Black Sea region exercises this year.  Earlier, Ukraine hosted the US-led Sea Breeze 17 naval drills, involving around 2,500 troops and more than 30 ships from 17 participating countries.

Pat Buchanan Exposes What Harvey Really Wrought

Authored by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,

Like 9/11, Hurricane Harvey brought us together.

In awe at the destruction 50 inches of rain did to East Texas and our fourth-largest city and in admiration as cable television showed countless hours of Texans humanely and heroically rescuing and aiding fellow Texans in the worst natural disaster in U.S. history.

On display this week was America at her best.

Yet the destruction will not soon be repaired. Nearly a third of Harris County, home to 4.5 million people, was flooded. Beaumont and Port Arthur were swamped with 2 feet of rain and put underwater.

Estimates of the initial cost to the Treasury are north of $100 billion, with some saying the down payment alone will be closer to $200 billion. In inflation-adjusted dollars, the cost of Harvey will exceed that of the Marshall Plan, which rebuilt Europe after World War II.

Though the country has appeared united since the storm hit, it is not likely to remain so. Soon, the cameras and correspondents will go home, while the shelters remain full, as tens of thousands of people in those shelters have only destroyed homes to return to.

When the waters recede, the misery of the evacuees left behind will become less tolerable. Then will come the looters and gougers and angry arguments over who’s to blame and who should pay.

They have already begun. Republicans who balked at voting for the bailout billions for Chris Christie’s New Jersey after Hurricane Sandy ravaged the coast in 2012 are being called hypocrites for asking for swift and massive federal assistance to repair red state Texas.

And whereas George W. Bush soared to 90 percent approval after 9/11, no such surge in support for Donald Trump appears at hand.

Indeed, the sneering and sniping began on his first visit to Texas.

He failed to celebrate the first responders, they said...

He failed to hug any of the victims...

He failed to show empathy...

First lady Melania Trump wore spiked heels boarding Marine One for Texas.

A prediction: The damage done by Harvey — as well as the physical, psychic and political costs — will cause many to echo the slogan of George McGovern in 1972, when he exhorted the country to “come home, America.”

The nation seems more receptive now, for even before Harvey, the media seemed consumed with what ails America.

The New York and D.C. subway systems are crumbling.

Puerto Rico is bankrupt.

Some states, such as Illinois, cannot balance their budgets.

The murder rates are soaring in Baltimore and Chicago.

Congress this month will have to raise the debt ceiling by hundreds of billions and pass a budget with a deficit bloated by the cost of Harvey.

And the foreign crises seem to be coming at us, one after another.

Russia is beginning military maneuvers in the Baltic and Belarus, bordering Poland, with a force estimated by some at 100,000 troops — Vladimir Putin’s response to NATO’s deployment of 4,000 troops to the Baltic States and Poland.

The U.S. is considering sending anti-tank missiles to Kiev. This could reignite the Donbass war and bring Russian intervention, the defeat of the Ukrainian army and calls for U.S. intervention.

In the teeth of Trump’s threat to pour “fire and fury” on North Korea, Kim Jong Un just launched an intermediate-range ballistic missile over Japan. Trump’s answer: U.S. B-1Bs make practice bombing runs near the demilitarized zone. Reports from South Korea indicate that Kim may soon conduct a sixth underground test of an atomic bomb.

War in Korea has never seemed so close since Dwight Eisenhower ended the Korean War with an armistice more than 60 years ago.

Despite the opposition of his national security team, Trump is said to be ready to repudiate the Iranian nuclear deal in October, freeing Congress to reimpose the sanctions lifted by the deal.

This would split us from our NATO allies and, if Iran ignored the new U.S. sanctions or began anew to enrich uranium, force Trump’s hand. Is he, are we as a country, ready for another trillion-dollar war, with Iran, which so many inside the Beltway seem so eager to fight?

The U.S. and Turkey have urged Iraq’s Kurds to put off their nonbinding referendum on independence Sept. 25. The vote seems certain to endorse a separate state. A Kurdistan, seceded from Baghdad, would be a magnet for secession-minded Kurds in Turkey, Syria and Iran, 30 million in all, and present a strategic crisis for the United States.

Along with the steady growth of entitlement spending, the new dollars demanded for defense, the prospect of new wars and the tax cuts the White House supports, Hurricane Harvey should concentrate the mind.

Great as America is, there are limits to our wealth and power, to how many global problems we can solve, to how many wars we can fight and to how many hostile powers we can confront.

The “indispensable nation” is going to have to begin making choices. Indeed, that is among the reasons Trump was elected.

Will Europe Rebel Against U.S. Sanctions?

Authored by Curt Mills via National Interest,

In comprehensively punishing Moscow, Washington risks further cleaving itself from senior European leadership.

The United States finalized new sanctions against Moscow last week, roping it in with perennial bad actors Iran and North Korea. Despite complaints from Donald Trump and Rex Tillerson—the pair of ex-CEOs that now lead U.S. foreign policy—the administration assented to the “flawed” package on Wednesday. While Trump is sometimes accused of abandoning the trans-Atlantic alliance and scuttling the post-war order, the president now risks further damage to relations with many in Europe by targeting Russia with fresh sanctions.

Hawks in Washington are clearly taking notice of the European position. “Europe’s opposition to the sanctions is troubling. You can’t on one hand ask for a bigger U.S. military commitment to the continent while on the other hand oppose nonmilitary coercive measures,” Boris Zilberman, a Russia analyst at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, told me. A central plank in Europe’s concern is energy—the continent is quite reliant on Russian energy (something Ronald Reagan famously warned the Europeans against during the Cold War). “It is déjà vu all over again. Back in the 1980s the Reagan administration targeted Soviet energy exports, specifically pipeline projects. Europeans saw it as a double whammy for them, undercutting their energy security and—given potential secondary sanctions on many firms involved—penalizing their companies,” says Clay Clemens, an expert on German politics at the College of William & Mary.

In particular, a project called Nord Stream 2 between Europe’s central player, Germany, and Russia’s controversial energy company Gazprom could be affected by the sanctions. In addition to Gazprom, the deal has investments from European companies; its signatories aim to carry natural gas under the Baltic Sea. “Some Germans quietly hope that [Nord Stream 2] could transform their country into a European energy hub,” The Economist noted in June. The Ukrainian crisis is also at play here: the project would allow Russia “to bypass existing pipelines in Ukraine, depriving the Ukrainians of lucrative transit fees,” the outlet noted.

But the United States and the EU are not united, and Europe is feuding internally over how to handle this, as well. In contrast to Germany, the Brits haven’t stood in Washington’s way. “We agree that it is important to send a message to Moscow that Russian actions in Ukraine and Syria, interference in the domestic affairs of other countries, and undermining of the rule of law, will be met with a strong response,” a United Kingdom official told me, indicating London didn’t find the legislation abrasive and praising the sanctions for emphasizing “the importance of transatlantic unity.” The Baltic states and Poland, Russia-weary and opposed to Nord Stream 2, have gone along with the sanctions, and would potentially block more radical retaliation by the EU. European Council president Donald Tusk, the former Polish prime minister, has also criticized Nord Stream 2. Vice President Pence was in Estonia earlier this week, and Poland hosted Trump ahead of the G20 summit last month, where he seemingly received a hero’s welcome in a country that has moved dramatically rightward in recent years.

But elsewhere in Europe, including in the EU leadership, there is great concern. In startling language Wednesday, European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, of Luxembourg, appeared to treat the U.S.-Europe alliance as a potentially open question. “The U.S. Congress has now also committed to only apply sanctions after the country’s allies are consulted. And I do believe we are still allies,” he said in a statement, with his office noting that “if the US sanctions specifically disadvantage EU companies trading with Russia in the energy sector the EU is prepared to take appropriate steps in response within days.” “We are prepared,” Juncker told a Brussels radio station Wednesday. “We must defend our economic interests vis-à-vis the United States. And we will do that.”

The German establishment is apoplectic, directly accusing the United States of trying to enrich itself economically—the sanctions are paired with provisions encouraging Europe to buy U.S. natural gas. In the era of President “take the oil” Trump and an Exxon Secretary of State, some are suspicious of American motives like never before. “One is left with the sense that the United States is looking to its own economic interests,” Volker Trier, the head of the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, said last week. In the 1980s, “there was also a sense that the US sanctions were designed to reduce competition for American energy exports,” Clemens noted to me.

Wary of bucking Germany, France has also expressed reservations about the sanctions. “Any conflict in the Paris-Berlin axis is potentially suicidal for Europe at this point,” Vincent Michelot of Sciences Po Lyon tells me. The French foreign ministry said last month the language passed out of the House looked illegal. This Parisian dismissal comes at a time when Trump seems to be cultivating a relationship with the new French president, Emmanuel Macron, who Michelot says is trying to set himself up as an “indispensable mediator” in European and international affairs.

If Ukraine is one nonobvious tripwire in this dispute, Syria is another. Macron has tacitly backed a future for Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, in a major change in French policy. “It is a radical departure from Hollande’s strong stance that there could not be any political resolution of the Syrian conflict with Assad around the negotiation table,” Cecile Alduy of the France-Stanford Center told me. “More importantly, Macron is contradicting himself on this . . . In early April, he was in favor of a military intervention against Assad.” Prolonged, public disputes between Berlin, Paris and Washington could imperil efforts at even unrelated negotiations, however.

In the end, Europe, especially with Germany in the lead, might take a pass on a full-scale feud. Europe “cannot allow the relationship with Russia to sink to the level of the U.S.-Russia confrontation,” Michelot says. “The preference [in most of Europe] is still for some kind of constructive engagement policy, despite EU sanctions after Ukraine,” Clemens says, but cautions: “Of course, overall, it is a tough balance for Merkel in particular to strike, since she has been the leader most skeptical of Putin.”

NATO Beefs Up Logistics Infrastructure For Offensive Operations

Authored by Alex Gorka via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Some very important news is kept out of spotlight and undeservedly so. Bits of information pieced together indicate that very quietly the North Atlantic alliance is gearing up for large-scale combat operations. War preparations are not limited to weapon systems deployments and troop movements that hit headlines. No combat can be waged without logistics.

The US Army official website informs that the US European Command (EUCOM) Logistics Directorate (ECJ4), other EUCOM directorates, NATO allies and partners, and the Joint Logistics Enterprise (JLEnt) are effecting an unprecedented security transformation. They are transitioning from being focused on assurance through engagement to being a warfighting command postured for deterrence and defense. Throughout fiscal year 2017, 28 joint and multinational exercises in 40 European countries, the buildup of four NATO Enhanced Forward Presence (EFP) multinational battlegroups in the Baltics, and overlapping deployments of rotating armored brigade combat teams and combat aviation brigades will test, validate, and offer proof of principle for these infrastructure and organic capability investments.

NATO Exercise Saber Guardian 17, a US Army Europe-led, multinational exercise, took place in Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania on July 11 - 20, 2017 with 25,000 troops and forces from 24 countries. The event demonstrated the increased scope and complexity of war games. The drills were conducted against the background of this year"s rotational deployment of more than 4,500 troops in the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, as well as Poland. 2nd Cavalry Regiment soldiers are already operating as a deterrent force roughly 100 miles from Poland’s border with the Russian military enclave of Kaliningrad.

Citing the lessons learned from the training event, US Army Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, commander of US Army Europe, emphasized in an interview the importance of NATO logistics. According to him, progress is evident but much remained to be done to ease the movement of military equipment and forces across Europe in the event of a real crisis, and Germany could play a crucial role. Hodges noted that Berlin could ensure guaranteed rail access as part of its bid to boost military spending from around 1.2 percent of gross domestic product to the 2 percent NATO target.

The military leader underscored the importance of creating a military free transit zone modeled on the 1996 Schengen agreement to allow free forces movements across the borders of European NATO members.

Meanwhile, construction works are in full swing to enable Poland to host combat-ready stocks at the 33rd Air Base, operated by the Polish Air Force. Powidz, a village with a population of 1,000, is to become a strategically important NATO hub for the Baltics and all of Northern Europe. The plans include the delivery of more than a brigade’s worth of military vehicles, equipment, artillery and personnel. In April, Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges described it as the «center of the center of gravity».

Over the next two years, $70 million will be spent on 77 military infrastructure and improvement projects for both US Army and US Air Force operations. An additional $200 million in NATO funds will be spent for the US Army Corps of Engineers to construct a new storage site and warehouse facility in Powidz. Poland’s increasing importance is the result of a combination of factors, Hodges said, including geography and existing hubs, such as the NATO Enhanced Forward Presence unit in the country’s northeast. «Any contingency we have to deal with, we’ll almost certainly have to come through Poland», he noted.

US European Command Chief Gen. Curtis M. Scaparrotti is planning for an expanded military presence in Europe to eventually include a full US Army division. If that happens, even on a rotational basis, the Army would likely need more facilities for basing forces.

In May, US Army Europe announced that it had established a new tactical headquarters in Poznan, Poland. The goal is to enhance the mission command of US rotational forces and units assigned to US Army Europe conducting operations where no significant military presence had been previously maintained.

So, Poland is in focus of the infrastructure efforts but the plans go much further. The Estonian town of Tapa, which sits at an important railway junction, is located less than 150km (93 miles) from the Russian border. It has recently become the base for a NATO battle group, in accordance with the Enhanced Forward Presence concept approved at the Warsaw summit in 2016. It envisions multi-national battle groups deployed in each of the three Baltic States and another in Poland.

General Sir Nicholas Patrick «Nick» Carter, the head of the British Army as Chief of the General Staff, said «We would very much like to test the land line of communication from our mounting bases in Germany, forward into the Baltics, and we would absolutely like to test what it would be like bringing in reinforcing capabilities - the signature equipment that are appropriate to show how you would reinforce and to understand what would happen».

In 2016, Poland and the Baltic States reached an agreement to link Poland, Finland and the Baltic States with the unified Trans-European Transport Network (NRA) that will be crucial to the defense of the Baltic States. A continuous rail link named «Rail Baltica» from Tallinn to Warsaw (Poland), via Kaunas (Lithuania) and Riga (Latvia) will lead to significant logistical implications for the NATO.

Thomas Durell Young, a program manager at Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California, and a staff consultant at the RAND Corporation, has recently published a book, titled Anatomy of Post-Communist European Defense Institutions. He believes that the «new» members of the alliance - Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, the three Baltics States, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, and some of the republics that emerged out of Yugoslavia - need to radically transform their «ineffectual legacy logistics organizations« with the help of «old» members of the alliance. Professor Young emphasizes the importance of reform as a potential war with Russia would «almost certainly» start in Central or Eastern Europe.

The rapid creation of logistics infrastructure and some other factors, such as militarization of the Scandinavian Peninsula, fit into a bigger picture of NATO war preparations in East Europe and the Baltics. These are not steps of defensive nature. The goal is to acquire the ability to move substantial forces to the areas close to Russia’s borders gearing up for offensive operations in an armed conflict.

Vladimir Putin, At Wit's End With Washington, Opts For Poker Over Chess

Authored by Robert Birdge via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made a calculated bet that the embattled Trump administration will interpret his expulsion of hundreds of US diplomats from Russia as more of a friendly warning than an overtly hostile act.

As US lawmakers on the weekend sent to President Trump"s desk a bill that would make it virtually impossible for the US leader to revoke a new round of anti-Russia sanctions without congressional approval, Putin announced that 755 American diplomats «will have to leave Russia as a result of Washington"s own policies».

Speaking on Sunday, the Russian leader – clearly exasperated by the clinical bout of Russophobia that took possession of the American psyche long before a rich real estate developer named Donald Trump emerged on the scene – delivered a message loaded with both strength and regret when he said: «We"ve been waiting for quite a long time that maybe something would change for the better, we had hopes that the situation would change. But it looks like, it"s not going to change in the near future ... I decided that it is time for us to show that we will not leave anything unanswered».

All things considered, Putin"s response was exceptional for its balance and restraint. Although 755 diplomats may sound like a small army, slashing the US side by that number gives Moscow and Washington exactly 455 civil servants each. That sounds not only fair, but logical. 

At the same time, Putin announced the seizure of two US properties in Moscow – a warehouse and a riverside retreat nestled in a wooded area along the shores of the Moscow River. Once again, this maneuver is merely tit-for-tat on the part of the Russians, and lacks enough punch to inflict any mortal wound on US-Russia relations. That is, unless the Americans – who have until Sept. 1 to comply with the expulsion order – wish for it to. 

Importantly, Putin"s expulsion order is not against the Trump administration. It is a well-timed response to a malicious move by ex-President Barack Obama, who, in the waning hours of his disastrous presidency, declared 35 Russian diplomats «persona non grata», while performing a land grab on Russian properties. He gave these officials and their families just 72 hours to leave the country – and right before New Year"s, the most popular Russian holiday.

At the time, Putin, confident that bilateral relations would improve under Trump, shrugged off Obama"s desperate last act on the political stage. 

«We will not create problems for American diplomats. We will not expel anyone,» he said. «Furthermore, I invite all children of US diplomats accredited in Russia to the Christmas and New Year tree in the Kremlin».

Ironically, then-President-Elect Donald Trump called Putin «very smart» for not allowing Obama to cause him to react harshly to the expulsion, thereby delivering a long-term setback to US-Russia relations. What could not have been anticipated at the time, however, was to what extent the "Deep State" – that disruptive and destructive shadow force that comprises the real power behind the Oval Office – would go to destroy the Trump presidency (It is worth mentioning that the very existence of the Deep State precludes the ludicrous notion that Russia somehow «hacked American democracy» since Moscow understands better than anyone that regardless of the US political party in power – Democrat or Republican, take your choice – the real decisions are made by a monolithic, supra-political structure that does not tolerate political freedom in any form, and least of all democratic. Any attempt to rig such a fixed system would be pure folly).

The fact that Trump almost immediately declared his intent to sign the Russian sanctions bill indicates that he either caved in to the relentless pressure by the establishment, or he was never very sincere about restoring relations with Russia in the first place. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. However, judging by the unhinged anti-Russia comments by members of his staff (UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, for example, in March told NBC: «We cannot trust Russia ... We should never trust Russia»), it seems Trump was the only one in Washington in favor of fixing the US-Russia relationship. 

Indeed, after US lawmakers voted in favor of the anti-Russia bill, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson delivered a comment that was so stupid it had to be calculated. The House and Senate votes in favor of more Russian sanctions, Tillerson said, «represent the strong will of the American people to see Russia take steps to improve relations with the United States». 

Huh?

And then Tillerson signed off with the following statement that actually carried a thinly veiled threat: «We will work closely with our friends and allies to ensure our messages to Russia, Iran, and North Korea are clearly understood». 

Tillerson, however, will now have to work extra hard to get the message across to America"s European allies, especially the Germans, who are fuming mad about the latest anti-Russia sanctions. That"s because the sanctions target any company that is involved in Russia’s energy export pipelines, like Nord Stream 2, a joint Russia-German project to carry Russian natural gas under the Baltic Sea, bypassing American client states, like Ukraine, Poland and the Baltic States. 

In other words, what we have here is the American superpower attempting to deny the right of economic cooperation between two consenting states. In the event the US fails to get what it wants, which seems to be everything under the moon, its infantile will is enforced by the small yet lethal firearm known as "sanctions." Fortunately, such bumbling "diplomacy" is transparent even to the most knee-jerk Russophobes for the very simple reason it places their own financial security at great risk.

So what is the source of this latest anti-Russia mood coming out of Washington? Briefly, it began in earnest in September 2015 when Russia made the decision to enter the Syrian fray – legally, it should be added, with an expressed invitation by President Bashar Assad – to fight against the terrorists of Islamic State. Strangely, the more damage Russian forces inflicted upon this malevolent group, the more it was criticized by US politicians. 

However, the anti-Russia witch hunt really hit its stride when it became clear that Hillary Clinton would lose the 2016 presidential election to the populist Donald Trump. The Deep State that backed her needed a scapegoat for the devastating loss, and Russia, as usual, provided a convenient suspect. To this day, seven months after Trump entered the White House, the world has not seen a single scrap of hard evidence to suggest Russian interference in the election. But that has not stopped the media from continuing its non-stop attacks on both Trump and Putin (We may eventually see Vice President Mike Pence, who espouses the world view of the US elite, take over the reins of the US presidency. This week, after meeting the trembling leaders of the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, Pence delivered this line of rubbish: «Russia seeks to redraw international borders by force, undermine democracies of sovereign nations and divide the free nations of Europe»). 

Although we may hope that Donald Trump will see the writing on the wall as far as US-Russia relations go, and find ways to restore bilateral relations between the world"s two nuclear powers, things are not so simple as that. Trump has been assailed by a mainstream media that can only be described as out of control and half-insane. Worse than the military industrial complex, it is truly hell-bent on war, which became clear after Trump bombed a Syrian airfield in April and became an overnight darling of the Neo-Liberal goon squad. When Trump eventually curbed his appetite for violence and bloodshed, he once again became a target for media-sponsored destruction.

Clearly, either the media and its many powerful proponents will get their way and bring down Trump, or Trump – and in direct contradiction to history"s tragic lessons (read Kennedy and Lincoln) – will somehow emerge victorious against the Deep State. The options for Russia, not to mention the American people themselves in such a dire and dangerous situation, are rather slim. A bit like leaving Las Vegas with more in your pocket than when you first arrived.

In conclusion, Putin"s move was a long time coming, yet this may have been exactly what the Deep State – anxious for any excuse to permanently wreck US-Russia relations – had been eagerly anticipating.

Sabotaging Russia-US Relations For Good

Authored by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

The strategy that the American deep state intends to employ to sabotage once and for all the possibilities of a rapprochement between the United States and Russia has been revealed.

After months of debate over the bad state of relations between the United States and Russia, the G20 offered the stage for the two leaders to meet and start discussing the various problems facing the two countries. In the days following the summit in Hamburg, the Kremlin and the White House revealed that Putin and Trump met three times in bilateral talks to discuss how to improve relations between the two nations. The ceasefire reached in southern Syria is therefore intended as the first step in a new direction set for Washington and Moscow.

As was easy to foresee, the deep state did not like this prospect of cooperation, immediately unleashing the mainstream media on Trump, because repeated meetings with Putin at the G20 were apparently suggestive of some sort of collusion, as if the leaders of two nuclear powers cannot even speak with each other. Obviously uncomfortable with these meetings, the sabotaging of relations between Russia and the US has taken a new turn. The previous ceasefire in Syria, reached by Kerry and Lavrov during the previous administration a year ago, was sabotaged by the US Air Force’s bombing of Syrian troops at Deir ez-Zor, which killed and injured more than a hundred Syrian soldiers. This served to favor Daesh’s assault on government positions, hinting at some sort of cooperation between Washington and the terrorists. Moscow immediately interrupted any military-to-military communication with Washington, which included the ceasefire reached between Lavrov and Kerry.

This time the strategy seems more refined and certainly does not lend itself to military action. Following the incident in Deir ez-Zor, the bombing of the Syrian base, and the downing of the Syrian Su-22, any further US military provocation would be met with a harsh response from the Russian side, risking an escalation that even the US military does not seem willing to to risk. For this reason, it seems that an approach that relies more on legislative means than military power has been chosen.

The Senate has overwhelmingly voted to impose new sanctions, the primary purpose of which is to deny the US President the ability to end sanctions on Russia without Moscow first demonstrating good will to resolve points of friction between the two countries. The areas of disagreement include the situation in Ukraine and Syria, nuclear weapons, an end to the alleged hacking of US elections, and the supposed intention of Moscow to invade the Baltic states. Obfuscation, lies and misinformation seem to be the driving force behind the Senate vote. The bill will end up on Trump"s desk, and at that point he will have to decide whether to sign it or not. If he signs it, it will obvioulsy limit his autonomy.

With Trump"s latest move, it is difficult to know whether he directly ordered the CIA to stop funding jihadists fighting Assad in Syria, or whether it was an independent choice of the CIA connected with other plans of which we are not aware. In any case, it seems to have particularly agitated the deep state, which now sees its destabilization plans for Syria hampered, with Moscow left in full control of the Syrian state and its fate.

The role of the deep state, in addition to enriching its components through the military-industrial complex, is based on the continued need for the United States to have enemies (read my complete series in parts 1, 2, 3 and 4), which requires major investments in armaments and intelligence agencies, two of the fundamental components of the deep state.

The 4+1 theory, in military terms, refers to the four major challenges facing the United States, plus a fifth, namely: Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, plus terrorism. Having four powerful enemies - regional if not global powers - such as China and Russia, creates the necessary conditions for the United States to continue to justify its presence in volatile regions like the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe. In all these areas, US attention is directed at one of these four challenges. The fifth danger, terrorism, acts as a corrosive that slowly erodes individual freedoms within the United States and its allies, justifying their continued presence in historically hostile territories like the Middle East under the guise of fighting terrorism, when in actual fact advancing their own geopolitical objectives. The bottom line remains the need for Washington to expand its own war machine over the whole planet, hoping to be able to influence every single issue with political, economic and military power or pressure. The end game is to prolong as long as possible the agony of a unipolar, American-dominated world order that is rapidly fading in the place of a fairer and more just multipolar world order.

American allies push for sabotage

With this latest Senate proposal, the deep state wants to eliminate the danger that Trump can exercise his own initiative to remove sanctions against Moscow and pursue the path of peace with Russia. A reconciliation with Moscow is viewed with particular suspicion by two main allies of the US in the region, that is to say, Israel and Saudi Arabia. There are no two other capitals that have more influential lobbies in Washington then Riyad and Tel Aviv. It is not surprising, then, that the American deep state, made up of many who are sympathetic to the Saudis and Israelis, views positively the sabotage of relations between Washington and Moscow. It is very likely that the Israeli and Saudi lobbies have spent considerable sums of money to push senators and congressmen to support this proposal.

Saudi Arabia and Israel have invested enormous amounts of money and political weight to the overthrow Assad, and the direction that the war in Syria is taking is likely to turn violently against them. Israel finds a Syrian state strengthened by alliances with Hezbollah, Russia, Iran, Lebanon and Iraq likely to render the Israeli hopes of controlled chaos in the region vain. Saudi Arabia, like Israel, is afraid of seeing the rebuilding the Shiite axis extending from Iran to the Mediterranean through Iraq and Syria. It is a nightmare for those who hoped to oust Assad, control Iraq and ultimately subdue under their own power all of the Middle East region. With Moscow"s intervention almost two years ago, Syria"s Assad resumed a triumphant march against Daesh and jihadist terrorism, cleaning up much of the nation and reversing the negative trend that threatened to break down the Baathist republic.

A rapprochement between Moscow and Washington is seen as a danger by Tel Aviv and Riyadh, which is why hostile relations between Russia and the US has become a rallying point for an alliance between liberals and neoconservatives in the United States, along with takfiris in Saudi Arabia and Zionists in Israel.

Conclusions

This axis opposed to any kind of rapprochement between Moscow and Washington has found many sponsors in the European political system; that is until the consequences of these new sanctions were made clear. Trump reiterated that the US objective is to sell LNG to European partners by becoming an energy-exporting nation. One of the direct effects of sanctions on Russia is the prevention of Europeans from collaborating with Russian energy companies, thereby sabotaging the plan for the North Stream 2 link and probably even the Turkish Stream integrating into the European pipeline network. Political reactions in Europe have not been missed, and understandably irritation has reached boiling point (including Moscow’s). It would also seem that schizophrenia seems to be a distinctive feature of the politicians of the old continent. The Baltic states fear a non-existent threat of a Russian invasion, while Germany and Austria complain of American interference in their strategic energy plans, considering it unacceptable.

A divided and inconsistent West drowns in its own discordant decisions. Trump, stupidly, initially tried to placate the deep state by offering Flynn"s head to the highest bidder. This only served to worsen the situation, bringing Trump to admit an unwavering attempt to hack US elections on the Russian side. To complete this disaster, missiles were launched against the Shayrat Airbase in Syria on the basis of fictitious evidence of a chemical attack on Syrian civilians by the Syrian Arab Air Force.

All of these choices have worsened the initial situation of the presidency, which now finds no more cartridges to fire in order to withstand the pressure of its senators to approve new sanctions. Trump decided to bend the knee and obey in hope of obtaining some kind of concessions from the deep state. This did not work, and now Trump is struggling for political survival.

It seems clear now that the Republican senators are in some way blackmailing Trump: so long as he does not fully give up on Russian rapprochement, the huge electoral promise of eliminating and replacing Obamacare will remain just a dream, causing him major damage. In this context, Trump seemed less prepared for the Washington hawks, and seems to have lost this important political battle.

It remains to be seen how effective the deep state will be in sabotaging these attempts of rapprochement between Washington and Moscow. The effects may be exactly the opposite, as already seen in the many failures of Washington"s strategic plans. The neocons/liberals and their regional allies in the Middle East continue to weaken American security by renouncing a partnership against terrorism, which would certainly benefit American citizens in the first place as well as calm the situation in the region. But then again, chaos is always the first choice of the American deep state for the purpose influencing events by fomenting violence and thereby advancing strategic goals and objectives. We can only hope that this time they have overplayed their hand and that European allies, or the Trump administration, will try to survive this new sabotage attempt.

Russia, Belarus Joint Drills Used As Pretext For NATO War Preparations

Authored by Peter Korzun via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

«Zapad-2017» is a joint strategic military exercise of Russia and Belarus scheduled for September 14-20, 2017. NATO, the United Nations, the OSCE and other countries have been invited to send their observers. In compliance with provisions of the Vienna Document, Russia presented detailed information about the exercise on July, 13. A special briefing is planned for the OSCE. Before the exercise starts there will be an extended briefing held in Moscow. NATO officials want Russia to abide by the Vienna Document. That is exactly what Moscow and Minsk are doing. But…the alliance believes that problems remain.

Despite the policy of transparency adopted by the organizers of the exercise, NATO officials express concern and make hostile statements to instigate tensions. Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite views the upcoming event as «demonstrative preparations for the war with the West». Russia’s ambassador to Lithuania, Aleksandr Udaltsov, said that the hullaballoo raised about the upcoming drills was nothing else but fearmongering. According to him, «The hysteria which is being whipped up in Lithuania is meant to score political points and justify the militaristic psychosis».

Concocted stories are going round to say that Russia wants to grab a part of Polish and Lithuanian territories in the Suwalki gap region. Baltic officials have warned  that Russia may leave troops in Belarus after the exercise. Estonian Defense Minister Margus Tsahkna strongly believes that’s what will happen. According to him, Estonia and other NATO countries possess intelligence to confirm this statement. The Russian ambassador in Minsk, Aleksandr Surikov, called the stories «unhealthy speculation».

According to official data, around 13,000 personnel will take part in the exercise at most. About 10,200 troops will be involved on the territory of Belarus, including 7,200 Belarusian military and about 3,000 Russia’s servicemen. 680 pieces of military hardware, including armored vehicles, would take part in the exercise at six different training grounds scattered across the two countries. Evidently, these forces pose no threat to the North Atlantic alliance, but NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg is skeptical, saying, «From previous experiences related to previous exercises, we have every reason to believe that it may be substantially more troops participating than the official reported numbers».

Some NATO members believe the true number of participating troops will be 100,000. US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis finds such a large buildup «simply destabilizing».

The Center for European Policy Analysis states that «Russian military exercises have become a dangerous tool, politically and militarily. The «train as you fights» approach—especially when nuclear attacks are an option—poses a serious threat to the West». According to it, «We must also be able to send clear unambiguous messages of unity, cohesion and readiness». That’s the rub. The messages are really sent. The exercise is used to justify war preparations by the NATO alliance.

The recent steps taken to militarize North Europe are just another example. There are many more.

It’s no coincidence that Estonia, a small Baltic country with the government expressing special concern over the upcoming exercise, has become a special destination for US Vice President Mike Pence on his European trip (July 30-August 2, 2017). He said that plans to boost military presence are underway in addition to some 4,000 troops and military hardware in the three Baltic states and Poland to counter Russia"s presence in the Baltic Sea region. According to the vice president, the US is considering deploying Patriot surface-to-air missiles to Estonia. The issue was discussed with Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas on July 30.

Lithuania and Poland have also said that they want American air defense systems deployed on their soil. Patriot is not Aegis; it has rather limited capability against ballistic missiles. The system is not a threat to Russian strategic systems. But it will be evolved. Patriot modifications may acquire ballistic missile capability. What matters is that infrastructure will be in place. Other systems, like ballistic missile capable Aegis, could be deployed there, too.

Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite said on July 31 that the United States will increase its military presence on the territory of Lithuania at the time of Zapad-2017 will be held. US Air Force aircraft will arrive at the Siauliai base to carry out an air policing mission in the Baltic region. «During the West-2017 exercises, the US will double the usual number of fighter aircraft stationed in Lithuania», she said, noting that also «there will be more military, hardware and ships». A rotating contingent of Lithuania’s NATO allies involving 100 personnel and four fighter jets is stationed at the Lithuanian Zokniai air base. Four more fighter jets are stationed at Estonia’s Amari facility. In June, a 1,000-member NATO force of troops from Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Norway came to be stationed in Lithuania as a «rotational» force. Battle groups from the UK and Canada moved to Poland, Latvia, and Estonia. Estonia hosts troops from Britain, France and the United States.

The more US forces and weapon systems are stationed in the Baltic states, the more politically dependent on Washington they become. For instance, a Lithuanian state-owned gas trading company will receive the first delivery of US imported LNG in August. The LNG costs more than pipeline-supplied gas but that’s what military and political dependence does, making one pay for it. Military exercises come and go but increased US military presence remains to bolster political influence.

In June, NATO held a large-scale exercise in the region called Saber Strike. Three US strategic bombers supported BALTOPS and Saber Strike large-scale training events.

So, large-scale military exercises conducted by NATO are routine events not to worry about but a Russian-Belorussian training event is something extraordinary to raise hue and cry and use it as a pretext for military expansion. That’s how Zapad-2017 serves as a spook used for propaganda purposes.