The Trump Doctrine In A Regional Context

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Oriental Review,

The last section of the new US National Security Strategy (NSS) describes the envisaged application of the Trump Doctrine in a regional context all across the world, and it’s worthwhile to examine what storylines will most likely be advanced by the policy document’s intrinsic infowar component. This analysis is divided according to the geographic categories contained in the NSS and proceeds along that order, after which a brief summary will be presented in highlighting the most discernable global trends.

Indo-Pacific

The US says that “a geopolitical competition between free and repressive visions of world order is taking place in the Indo-Pacific region” as China employs multifaceted influence strategies in a concerted effort to get regional states to follow its economic and political models. Although presented by China as being mutually beneficial, the NSS describes Beijing’s Silk Road relationships as being detrimental to its partners’ sovereignty. In response, Washington claims that “states throughout the region are calling for sustained U.S. leadership in a collective response that upholds a regional order respectful of sovereignty and independence”, which implies the creation of what the author has previously described as a ‘China Containment Coalition’ (CCC) to preserve the existing US-led unipolar system them. The suggested outcome of this initiative is the US’ “quadrilateral cooperation with Japan, Australia, and India”, with the latter once again being referred to as a “Major Defense Partner” whose “growing relationships throughout the region” will be supported by the US.

Elsewhere in the area, North Korea is identified as “a global threat that requires a global response”, later revealed in this section as being missile defense cooperation between the US, Japan, and South Korea towards the eventual aim of “an area defense capability”, one which was previously described in the document as “not intended to undermine strategic stability or disrupt longstanding strategic relationships with Russia or China.” Looking southwards, the US wants to “reenergize [its] alliances with the Philippines and ­Thailand and strengthen [its] partnerships with Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, and others to help them become cooperative maritime partners”, with it being inferred that “reenergizing” is a euphemism for “winning back” Manila and Bangkok. Altogether, the US plans to use ASEAN and APEC as regional institutions for advancing its geopolitical and economic interests, with the former probably seeing some of the ASEAN states become the US’ “Lead From Behind” partners in “containing China” while the latter will result in more bilateral trade deals.

EU

Russia is fear mongered as engaging in “subversive measures to weaken the credibility of America’s commitment to Europe, undermine transatlantic unity, and weaken European institutions and governments”, suggesting that any objective developments that even remotely hint at either of these three conclusions will be dismissed as ‘Russian propaganda’ and their messengers discredited as ‘Russian agents/trolls’. China is also mentioned in this section as having “gain[ed] a strategic foothold in Europe by expanding its unfair trade practices and investing in key industries, sensitive technologies, and infrastructure”, showing that the US is now paying attention to the progress that its 16+1 framework has made in the “Three Seas” region of Central and Eastern Europe and will likely go on the information offensive against it in the coming future.

Daesh and the Migrant Crisis are also listed as posing serious threats to the EU as well.

In reassuring the continent, the US says that its “European allies and partners increase [its] strategic reach and provide access to forward basing and overflight rights for global operations”, which explains the self-interested reason why Washington will evidently abide by its Article 5 commitment to NATO. It believes that deepening transatlantic collaboration is necessary to protect Europe from the aforementioned threats that were described, with military spending increases geared towards modernizing capacities and building a ‘missile defense shield’ to ‘protect’ against Russia, Iran, and even supposedly North Korea too, while US efforts to “contest China’s unfair trade and economic practices and restrict its acquisition of sensitive technologies” in the EU will probably mean that Junker’s September 2017 proposal for a “European Enabling Framework” ‘screening process’ will become a roadblock to Beijing’s plans.

Furthermore, the US wants to expand its energy exports to Europe, which might see it getting more involved in the activities of LNG terminal-hosting “Three Seas” states such as Croatia and thus setting the stage for a “Balkan Pivot” to more directly counter China there.

Middle East

Right off the bat, the US blames Iran for all of the region’s woes by stating that “the interconnected problems of Iranian expansion, state collapse, jihadist ideology, socio-economic stagnation, and regional rivalries have convulsed the Middle East”, accusing what it labels as “the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism” of “tak[ing] advantage of instability to expand its influence through partners and proxies, weapon proliferation, and funding” that oftentimes takes the form of Iran “develop[ing] more capable ballistic missiles and intelligence capabilities, and [undertaking in] malicious cyber activities.” Iran is painted as the ultimate evil in order to whitewash Israel, which the US attempts to unabashedly do in the passage where the authors write that “the threats from jihadist terrorist organizations and the threat from Iran are creating the realization that Israel is not the cause of the region’s problems.”

In fact, the NSS notes, “states have increasingly found common interests with Israel in confronting common threats”, in a nod to the de-facto alliance between the GCC and Israel against Iran. The US lists its chief objectives as strengthening cooperation with the GCC and what it describes as the “independent state” of Iraq, with the latter phrase hinting that Washington will work behind the scenes to counter Tehran’s influence in Baghdad. This presumption is apparently confirmed by the next passage where the US commits to “work[ing] with partners to…neutralize Iranian malign influence”, which again implies a similar “Lead From Behind” strategy just like it wants to employ in the Indo-Pacific.

Moreover, the US says that it will “seek a settlement to the Syrian civil war that sets the conditions for refugees to return home and rebuild their lives in safety”, signaling a step back from its previous regime change obsession and possibly opening the doors for a pragmatic ‘New Détente’ deal with Russia over this issue. In addition, the expected US commitment “to helping facilitate a comprehensive peace agreement that is acceptable to both Israelis and Palestinians” is reiterated in the text, though this is nothing more than rhetoric for distracting from the US’ determinedly pro-Israeli policies. Most interestingly, however, is the penultimate policy prescription that the US will “help (its) partners procure interoperable missile defense and other capabilities to better defend against active missile threats”, which demonstrates that its missile defense plans are indeed Eurasian-wide and stretch all across the EU-Mideast-Northeast Asian Rimland.

South And Central Asia

The US draws significant attention what it describes as Pakistan-based threats on multiple occasions, slyly speaking tongue-in-cheek when talking about the Pakistan that it’s supposedly seeking in order to indirectly accuse the Pakistan of today of embodying these said threats. For example, when the authors write that their country “seeks a Pakistan that is not engaged in destabilizing behavior…will press Pakistan to intensify its counterterrorism efforts, since no partnership can survive a country’s support for militants and terrorists who target a partner’s own service members and officials…(and) will also encourage Pakistan to continue demonstrating that it is a responsible steward of its nuclear assets”, it’s essentially saying that Pakistan is destabilizing the region, supporting anti-American militants and terrorists who target US forces in Afghanistan, and irresponsibly wielding nuclear weapons which might one day fall into the hands of the same terrorists that it’s accused of backing.

India, US, Japan annual Malabar naval drills

All of these hostile narratives against Pakistan explain why the US wants the world to think that “the prospect for an Indo-Pakistani military conflict [which] could lead to a nuclear exchange remains a key concern requiring consistent diplomatic attention”, as the thinly veiled inference is that Islamabad is solely responsible for this dangerous state of affairs. It’s predictable that Washington would weave such a one-sided storyline because it envisions New Delhi as its 21^st-century partner for ‘containing China’, with its strategists writing that the US “will deepen [its] strategic partnership with India and support its leadership role in Indian Ocean security and throughout the broader region”.

Concerning Central Asia, the NSS says that the US “will encourage the economic integration of Central and South Asia to promote prosperity and economic linkages that will bolster connectivity and trade”, and since it’s improbable that this is an oblique statement of support for CPEC, the only realistic conclusion is that it’s an American endorsement for the Central Asian component of India’s Chabahar project. As even the most inexperienced observer would know, this port is based in Iran, so the US will have to work overtime in crafting a semi-cohesive explanation for why it doesn’t mind India working with Washington’s hated nemesis in Tehran, though the answer could probably be simplistically summed up as ‘realpolitik’ for ‘containing China’.

Another point to mention is that the US says that it “seeks Central Asian states that are resilient against domination by rival powers, are resistant to becoming jihadist safe havens, and prioritize reforms”, and that it “will work with the Central Asian states to guarantee access to the region to support [its] counterterrorism efforts.” Evidently, the US is aiming to exploit the new Daesh threat to the region that it helped transfer from “Syraq” to Afghanistan as an excuse for reestablishing the military partnerships that it used to have with Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, possibly up to the point of once again basing its troops on their territory. While pretending that this is only in the interests of “counterterrorism efforts”, the real motivation would be to boost their “resilien[cy] against domination by rival powers”, or in other words, try to dislodge them from the joint Russian-Chinese multipolar orbit of the SCO.

Western Hemisphere

The US claims that “democratic states connected by shared values and economic interests will reduce the violence, drug trafficking, and illegal immigration that threaten [their] common security”, but in reality it’s only concerned about leveraging its economic connectivity with Latin American states to counter the three mentioned threats and doesn’t actually care too much about “democratic states” or “shared values”. After all, the US supports the Honduran government of Juan Orlando Hernandez despite the OAS requesting an electoral redo after the incumbent was suspected of stealing the election and then openly resorting to deadly force to suppress opposition protests against him. The Trump Administration’s visceral hatred of anything socialist is also on full display in condemning Cuba and Venezuela, which it believes have served as magnets for inviting Chinese and Russian influence into the region via economic and military means, respectively.

The NSS emphasizes the US’ “regional efforts to build security and prosperity through strong diplomatic engagement” and its desire to “isolate governments that refuse to act as responsible partners in advancing hemispheric peace and prosperity”, suggesting that the incipient anti-Venezuelan coalition model that’s forming could be replicated against the similarly multipolar-aligned ALBA states of Bolivia and Nicaragua due to their socialist ideals and in the event that they forcibly react against any forthcoming Hybrid War provocations against them. The declaration that the US “will encourage further market-based economic reforms and encourage transparency to create conditions for sustained prosperity” adds credence to the claims that it will probably expand its “Operation Condor 2.0” unconventional campaign of restoring its hegemonic hemispheric influence against those states and possibly other ones as well.

US President Donald Trump attends a working dinner with Latin American leaders in New York

On the economic front, the document says that the US “will modernize [its] trade agreements and deepen [its] economic ties with the region and ensure that trade is fair and reciprocal”, which is just a reaffirmation of Trump’s well-known intent to renegotiate NAFTA, but which could also extend to the US’ other hemispheric multilateral trade deal of CAFTA-DR and the bilateral ones that it has with Chile, Colombia, and Peru (the latter three of which plus NAFTA-member Mexico constitute the four states of the Pacific Alliance trading bloc). The phrasing about “deepening economic ties with the region” might indicate the US’ plans to reach bilateral trade deals with the Mercosur members, probably beginning with Brazil and then having the rest of the bloc fall in line afterwards. Altogether, the interweaving of bilateral trade deals all throughout the hemisphere would represent the de-facto fulfillment of the long-sought “Free Trade Area of the Americas” (FTAA).

Africa

The final section of the NSS’ regional context review is the most direct about the US’ intentions to “contain China” and obstruct its Silk Road strategy. The authors confidently write that Africa “represent[s] potential new markets for U.S. goods and services”, the demand of which “is high and will likely grow” because of what it hints as being the desire of many countries to replicate its political and economic models. This is obviously the infowar narrative that will be spun in serving as the ‘carrot’ for attracting African partners (subordinates), while the ‘stick’ is the equally weaponized storyline that “some Chinese practices undermine Africa’s long-term development by corrupting elites, dominating extractive industries, and locking countries into unsustainable and opaque debts and commitments.”

US President Donald Trump congratulates African leaders

In case there was any doubt that the US wants to challenge China’s dominance in Africa, the document unambiguously announces that the US “will offer American goods and services, both because it is profitable for [it] and because it serves as an alternative to China’s often extractive economic footprint on the continent.”

To this end, the US “seeks sovereign African states that are integrated into the world economy”, which is a just another way of saying that it wants its partners to abandon the Chinese model of state-driven development and open up their economies to Western businessmen and their Indo-Japanese partners instead. “Support[ing] economic integration among African states” could be seen as developing an anti-Chinese trading bloc in the future, though this is unlikely since all existing economic organizations on the continent are closely aligned with the People’s Republic, as are most of the countries that are party to the massive 2015 Tripartite Free Trade Area in China’s most active “sphere of Silk Road influence”.

However, where the US is most capable of making African inroads is through military-security relations in “partner[ing] with governments, civil society, and regional organizations to end long-running, violent conflicts”, which carries with it a whiff of “Lead From Behind” “nation-building” that America is much more experienced with (for better or for worse) than China. By using the existing anti-terrorist pretext present throughout most of Africa to degree or another and especially in the transregional Sahel, the US will probably seek to leverage its military advantages to “stabilize” these states in exchange for them disengaging from China and/or clinching profitable trade deals with the US afterwards, since it will otherwise be exceptionally difficult for the US to economically counterbalance China any other way.

Global Trends

 After examining the Trump Doctrine in all of its regional contexts, it’s possible to detect several interconnected global trends that are present in the US’ National Security Strategy:

Demonization Of Strategic Rivals:

The US is hell-bent on framing its strategic multipolar rivals of Russia, China, and Iran as responsible for global destabilization in order to deflect attention from it and its partners’ responsibility for this state of affairs, with the distinct possibility that Pakistan will soon be added to this list of adversaries as America moves towards making India its top international ally in the future.

Assembling “Lead From Behind” Coalitions:

The demonization of the US’ strategic rivals provides it with the ‘plausible pretext’ for assembling regional coalitions against them all throughout the Eurasian supercontinent and potentially even in Latin America too if it gets its way against Venezuela, thus formalizing a new model of unipolar proxy control that has flexibly adapted to multipolar challenges.

Building “Missile Defense Shields”:

One of the most prominent state-to-state manifestations of “Lead From Behind” cooperation between the US and its subordinates is the construction of “missile defense shields” on trumped-up pretexts in order to undermine Russia and China’s nuclear second-strike capabilities, with the possibility existing that the same model can one day be implemented in South Asia to support India against Pakistan.

Exploiting Non-State Threats:

Another way in which the US plans to utilize its “Lead From Behind” coalitions is to exploit the prevalence of threatening non-state actors such as jihadists and transnational criminal organizations by using them as a ‘plausible pretense’ for setting up a range of differently sized regional bases in its partnered countries to support special forces raids against these shared menaces.

Stopping The Silk Road:

The combination of demonizing infowars, “Lead From Behind” coalitions, and multidimensional partnerships with its allies naturally leads one to the conclusion that the US plans to employ all instruments of its power (Hybrid War) in stopping China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity so as to counter multipolarity and indefinitely preserve the declining unipolar system.

Will Macedonia Be Removed From The Map In 2018?

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Oriental Review,

The future looks very grim for Macedonia as the newly installed pro-Western coup “government” wastes no time in dismantling the country’s identity and selling out sovereignty to some of its hostile neighbors, both of which could have the cumulative effect of erasing what is constitutionally known as the Republic of Macedonia from the world map by sometime next year and replacing it with a domestically reconstituted “federalized” (internally partitioned) entity internationally recognized by a “politically correct” “compromise” moniker.

Backdrop To The Balkans

The tiny South-Central Balkan country of the Republic of Macedonia is in dire straits right now, but most of Europe – let alone the rest of the world – has no idea that this is the case because the Mainstream Media narrative is that the state’s two-year-long political crisis was “resolved” when the patriotic VMRO-DPMNE government of Nikola Gruevski was replaced in a “constitutional/electoral coup” that followed Color Revolution and even Hybrid War provocations. The author wrote about this in a Sputnik piece at the time from May 2017 titled “The Macedonian Crisis Isn’t Over, and a Bigger Balkan One is Just Beginning”, and the reader should review that article and also skim through his Oriental Review & Sputnik archives on the topic if they’re not already familiar with the contextual backdrop of what happened and why.

In a nutshell, the Republic of Macedonia was targeted for Hybrid War destabilization in order to offset Russia and China’s Balkan megaprojects of the Balkan Stream gas pipeline and Balkan Silk Road, respectively, that are expected to transit through the country, though with the former possibly being redirected to Bulgaria instead. In any case, a trumped-up “surveillance” scandal was used as the Color Revolution “trigger event” for attempting to coerce a Regime Tweak (political concessions), the failure of which forced the external conspirators and their internal Soros-backed SDSM “opposition” collaborators to move towards the next step of Regime Change, though eventually the decision was made for a Regime Reboot (constitutional change) to fundamentally cripple the country and forever prevent its key integration in the emerging Multipolar World Order.

The point of this piece isn’t to chronicle all of the author’s previous analyses on the topic, nor to reiterate his explanation about what’s previously been happening and why, but to engage in forward-focused reporting and scenario forecasting in raising awareness about the fraught future that awaits the Republic of Macedonia.

The Great Partition

The newly installed pro-Western coup “government” of Zoran Zaev and his Soros-backed SDSM cohorts has swiftly moved to cut a serious of external and internal deals that are bound to endanger the country’s existence by next year. For starters, despite denying it all throughout the 2016 campaign, his party is now aggressively trying to push through “bilingualism” in setting the institutional precedent for what logically seems to be the country’s inevitable forthcoming “federalization” (internal partition). Concurrently with this, he also signed a “treaty” with neighboring Bulgaria that essentially makes Macedonia a junior-rank partner susceptible to being swallowed up by its civilizationally similar brethren to the east in the event of a serious domestic crisis, such as the one that could be sparked on command by the country’s “federalization” and de-facto partial absorption into the revived Nazi-era geopolitical project of “Greater Albania”.

The formal international partition of the Republic of Macedonia between Albania and Bulgaria is what the author predicted back in May 2015 and which was even indirectly responded to by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at the time during the height of the country’s Color Revolution crisis, but this process has since taken on an unofficial form as well if Macedonia is “federalized” into an Albanian western half simultaneously with its eastern one being socio-economically subsumed by Bulgaria, with this latter scenario being facilitated by the Albanian “bilingualism” push and recent “treaty” with Bulgaria. Some Macedonians have keenly picked up on this plot, but that’s why the ruling authorities have sought to imprison patriotic citizens and political figures in order to intimidate the rest of the population into passively allowing this anti-constitutional and even treasonous process of state dismantlement to continue.

Zaev’s “Dictatorship Of The Proletariat”

At the same time as SDSM is locking up its political opponents, it’s also trying to pass through a controversial “amnesty” proposal for freeing convicted criminals, which might even apply to Daesh terrorists who are returning to the country. Despite the “government’s” heavy American-ordered pressure on civil society, the Republika online information outlet was brave enough to write about this appalling dichotomy in pointing out how imprisoned terrorists and free patriots are poised to switch places if Zaev gets what he wants. This alone speaks to the silent “lustration” process that’s being carried out in the country right now to “cleanse” its permanent military, intelligence, and diplomatic bureaucracies (“deep state”), as well as academic, media, and other institutions, of all opposition to the coup-imposed authorities.

Interestingly, SDSM is establishing a sort of “dictatorship of the proletariat” in Macedonia, seeing as how the party presents itself as a “leftist-socialist” one, and true to the tradition of this ideological camp, it’s using the cover and slogans of the working class (“proletariat”) to set up an actual dictatorship in the country. Just like it’s usually happened in the past, “leftist-socialist” demagogues are distracting the masses with high-sounding platitudes and crafting a media-acceptable narrative for their external backers to hide behind in “justifying” the seizure of power by an elite group of individuals who are far removed from the actual concerns of the working class. History has a curious way of repeating itself, as the EU is the warped ideological successor of the Soviet Union taken to its most dystopian socio-cultural and dictatorial extremes, so there’s a certain “logic” behind why this faux “leftist-socialist” “government” is so fawning towards Brussels.

But unlike during the Soviet period of the Old Cold War when any ideologically aligned country could join the Eastern Bloc, in the “EuroLiberal” era of the New Cold War there are certain bureaucratic obstacles that prevent the free accession of aspirant states to both the EU and NATO, namely – pun intended – the Republic of Macedonia’s constitutional name. The aforementioned post-modern unipolar structures occupying Western Eurasia are set up in such a way that new admissions must be consensually agreed upon by all existing members, and in this case Greece is adamantly opposed to Macedonia joining either of these two. What might have at one time been viewed as a “curse” in the chaotic international uncertainty immediately following the dissolution of Yugoslavia, this “veto right” has actually turned into a “blessing” because it formally kept Macedonia out of both organizations until the present day.

Name Games

Nevertheless, the US-installed coup “government” of Zaev’s SDSM wants to change that, but the only way that he can do so is if he gets rid of Macedonia’s constitutional name and therefore erases the country from the map. It doesn’t matter if it’s called “New Macedonia”, “Northern Macedonia”, or “The Central Balkan Republic” like has been speculatively reported, or even the author’s own admittedly absurd prediction of the “Federation of Vardar Albania”, but the fact of the matter is that it won’t be the Republic of Macedonia, a name which has taken on a semi-sacred aura as the torchbearer of Macedonian identity across its rich history. The EU Commissioner signaled that he expects Zaev to change Macedonia’s name by next year, which would then allow the country to be fast-tracked into both the EU and NATO and thus formalize its occupation by the Western elite.

All of this should rightly enrage any Macedonian, but Zaev and his fellow underlings are unfazed because they don’t have any patriotic affiliation to their homeland. Just like their Soviet predecessors, their loyalty lies with an ideology, not a nation, which is why they’re literally selling Macedonia out to Albania, Bulgaria, and the EU in order to please Greece and therefore fulfill the US’ grand strategic vision of annexing their country to its hegemonic unipolar institutions in order to more effectively disrupt, control, or influence China’s (and possibly Russia’s) Balkan megaproject(s). The final step is to remove Macedonia’s constitutional name and replace it with a “compromise” one, but the run-up to dealing a deathblow to this ancient country is the destruction of the monuments to Macedonia’s civilizational heritage that were built as the flagships of the former VMRO government’s Skopje 2014 project.

Monument Mockery

To add insult to injury, the “Cultural Marxist” erasure of all visible signs of Macedonia’s historical uniqueness will probably be directly supervised by Hoyt Brian Yee, Victoria Nuland’s successor and expected replacement of current US Ambassador to Macedonia Jess Baily. Yee was just as responsible for Macedonia’s coup as Nuland was for Ukraine’s, yet at least the Eastern European country wasn’t totally humiliated to the point of having her officially oversee the destruction of its monuments to Lenin, the founder of Ukraine’s first-ever statehood no matter how “politically incorrect” it is for its ultra-nationalists to ever acknowledge. In Macedonia’s case, however, the Balkan country is being forced to endure the shame of having the man most directly responsible for their coup placed in charge of seeing out the destruction of monuments representing a much older civilizational heritage than just the past 100 years.

If the Skopje 2014 monuments, especially the horseman in the city center that’s clearly supposed to be Alexander the Macedonian, are destroyed, then it will probably be impossible to prevent Macedonia’s name change and its subsequently swift annexation into the EU and NATO alongside the state-supported suppression of its people’s culture, history, and civilization. The “government’s” plan to make a mockery of Macedonia’s monuments and disown its very identity could function as an emergency “trigger event” for sparking a “reverse-Color Revolution”, which the author previously analyzed as the creative utilization of Color Revolution techniques by patriotic individuals for multipolar and pro-sovereignty purposes, just like what was attempted in May when concerned citizens unsuccessfully tried to prevent their parliament’s takeover by a former Albanian separatist-terrorist who was designed by Zaev as that body’s “speaker”.

A Third Force Is Calling

If Macedonians don’t band together to stop what is being falsely marketed as an “apolitical and anti-corruption municipal decision”, then it might be inevitable that their country will cease to exist in its present name and possibly even state (per an internal and/or external partition) by next year. If the monuments fall, Macedonia falls, once and for all, which is why the last chance to save Macedonia is to save its monuments. VMRO has the greatest potential to organize legal and peaceful demonstrations in support of this pressingly important issue, but some of the party elite are unfortunately partly compromised due to what can only be postulated is American blackmail pressure against them, be it the threat of physical violence or illegal arrest on fake pretexts (“anti-corruption”, “abuse of power”, etc.) by the coup “government”. As such, a Third Force needs to eventually emerge, possibly growing out of VMRO and the various civil society movements aligned with it, in order to counteract the limitations being imposed on the former ruling party and serve as a bridge for attracting “moderate” SDSM supporters who were misled during the last election.

The protection of Macedonia’s monuments – and accordingly its statehood, civilization, and identity – mustn’t be framed as a partisan political issue, which isn’t at all what VMRO is doing but its potentially pivotal role in being the organizational center of such a civil society movement might make it easier for SDSM and its American-Soros backers to manipulate the perception that it is, which is why it’s essential that a Third Force develop in leading the way during this historically crucial moment. Whatever it’s called and however it’s formed, this Third Force will be the vanguard actor protecting Macedonia from dismantlement, with its members understanding that it’s now or never to safeguard their state because its very existence is incompatible with the EU and NATO’s plans expansionist plans. The Republic of Macedonia is slated to be removed from the map so that its people and territory can be formally annexed to these two unipolar structures under Zaev’s “dictatorship of the proletariat”, and all indications point to 2018 being the make-or-break year where Macedonia’s patriots will either prevail or the country itself will perish.

A Europe We Can Believe In

Via Oriental Review,

In early October a group of European intellectuals published a conservative manifesto with 36 tenets defending "old Europe" and its values, which we are republishing today in full:

1. Europe is our home.

Europe belongs to us, and we belong to Europe. These lands are our home; we have no other. The reasons we hold Europe dear exceed our ability to explain or justify our loyalty. It is a matter of shared histories, hopes and loves. It is a matter of accustomed ways, of moments of pathos and pain. It is a matter of inspiring experiences of reconciliation and the promise of a shared future. Ordinary landscapes and events are charged with special meaning—for us, but not for others. Home is a place where things are familiar, and where we are recognized, however far we have wandered. This is the real Europe, our precious and irreplaceable civilization.

2. A false Europe threatens us.

Europe, in all its richness and greatness, is threatened by a false understanding of itself. This false Europe imagines itself as a fulfilment of our civilization, but in truth it will confiscate our home. It appeals to exaggerations and distortions of Europe’s authentic virtues while remaining blind to its own vices. Complacently trading in one-sided caricatures of our history, this false Europe is invincibly prejudiced against the past. Its proponents are orphans by choice, and they presume that to be an orphan—to be homeless—is a noble achievement. In this way, the false Europe praises itself as the forerunner of a universal community that is neither universal nor a community.

3. The false Europe is utopian and tyrannical.

The patrons of the false Europe are bewitched by superstitions of inevitable progress. They believe that History is on their side, and this faith makes them haughty and disdainful, unable to acknowledge the defects in the post-national, post-cultural world they are constructing. Moreover, they are ignorant of the true sources of the humane decencies they themselves hold dear—as do we. They ignore, even repudiate the Christian roots of Europe. At the same time they take great care not to offend Muslims, who they imagine will cheerfully adopt their secular, multicultural outlook. Sunk in prejudice, superstition and ignorance, and blinded by vain, self-congratulating visions of a utopian future, the false Europe reflexively stifles dissent. This is done, of course, in the name of freedom and tolerance.

4. We must defend the real Europe.

We are reaching a dead-end. The greatest threat to the future of Europe is neither Russian adventurism nor Muslim immigration. The true Europe is at risk because of the suffocating grip that the false Europe has over our imaginations. Our nations and shared culture are being hollowed out by illusions and self-deceptions about what Europe is and should be. We pledge to resist this threat to our future. We will defend, sustain and champion the real Europe, the Europe to which we all in truth belong.

5. Solidarity and civic loyalty encourage active participation.

The true Europe expects and encourages active participation in the common project of political and cultural life. The European ideal is one of solidarity based on assent to a body of law that applies to all, but is limited in its demands. This assent has not always taken the form of representative democracy. But our traditions of civic loyalty reflect a fundamental assent to our political and cultural traditions, whatever their forms. In the past, Europeans fought to make our political systems more open to popular participation, and we are justly proud of this history. Even as they did so, sometimes in open rebellion, they warmly affirmed that, despite their injustices and failures, the traditions of the peoples of this continent are ours. Such dedication to reform makes Europe a place that seeks ever-greater justice. This spirit of progress is born out of our love for and loyalty to our homelands.

6. We are not passive subjects.

A European spirit of unity allows us to trust others in the public square, even when we are strangers. The public parks, central squares and broad boulevards of European towns and cities express the European political spirit: We share our common life and the res publica. We assume that it is our duty to take responsibility for the futures of our societies. We are not passive subjects under the domination of despotic powers, whether sacred or secular. And we are not prostrate before implacable historical forces. To be European is to possess political and historical agency. We are the authors of our shared destiny.

7. The nation-state is a hallmark of Europe.

The true Europe is a community of nations. We have our own languages, traditions and borders. Yet we have always recognized a kinship with one another, even when we have been at odds—or at war. This unity-in-diversity seems natural to us. Yet this is remarkable and precious, for it is neither natural nor inevitable. The most common political form of unity-in-diversity is empire, which European warrior kings tried to recreate in the centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire. The allure of the imperial form endured, but the nation-state prevailed, the political form that joins peoplehood with sovereignty. The nation-state thereby became the hallmark of European civilization.

8. We do not back an imposed, enforced unity.

A national community takes pride in governing itself in its own way, often boasts of its great national achievements in the arts and sciences, and competes with other nations, sometimes on the battlefield. This has wounded Europe, sometimes gravely, but it has never compromised our cultural unity. In fact, the contrary has been the case. As the nation states of Europe became more established and distinct, a shared European identity became stronger. In the aftermath of the terrible bloodshed of the world wars in the first half of the twentieth century, we emerged with an even greater resolve to honor our shared heritage. This testifies to the depth and power of Europe as a civilization that is cosmopolitan in a proper sense. We do not seek the imposed, enforced unity of empire. Instead, European cosmopolitanism recognizes that patriotic love and civic loyalty open out to a wider world.

9. Christianity encouraged cultural unity.

The true Europe has been marked by Christianity. The universal spiritual empire of the Church brought cultural unity to Europe, but did so without political empire. This has allowed for particular civic loyalties to flourish within a shared European culture. The autonomy of what we call civil society became a characteristic feature of European life. Moreover, the Christian Gospel does not deliver a comprehensive divine law, and thus the diversity of the secular laws of the nations may be affirmed and honoured without threat to our European unity. It is no accident that the decline of Christian faith in Europe has been accompanied by renewed efforts to establish political unity—an empire of money and regulations, covered with sentiments of pseudo-religious universalism, that is being constructed by the European Union.

10. Christian roots nourish Europe.

The true Europe affirms the equal dignity of every individual, regardless of sex, rank or race. This also arises from our Christian roots. Our gentle virtues are of an unmistakably Christian heritage: fairness, compassion, mercy, forgiveness, peace-making, charity. Christianity revolutionized the relationship between men and women, valuing love and mutual fidelity in an unprecedented way. The bond of marriage allows both men and women to flourish in communion. Most of the sacrifices we make are for the sake of our spouses and children. This spirit of self-giving is yet another Christian contribution to the Europe we love.

11. Classical roots encourage excellence.

The true Europe also draws inspiration from the Classical tradition. We recognize ourselves in the literature of ancient Greece and Rome. As Europeans, we strive for greatness, the crown of the Classical virtues. At times, this has led to violent competition for supremacy. But at its best, an aspiration toward excellence inspires the men and women of Europe to craft musical and artistic works of unsurpassed beauty and to make extraordinary breakthroughs in science and technology. The grave virtues of the self-possessed Romans and the pride in civic participation and spirit of philosophical inquiry of the Greeks have never been forgotten in the real Europe. These inheritances, too, are ours.

12. Europe is a shared project.

The true Europe has never been perfect. The proponents of the false Europe are not wrong to seek development and reform, and there is much that has been accomplished since 1945 and 1989 that we should cherish and honor. Our shared life is an ongoing project, not an ossified inheritance. But the future of Europe rests in renewed loyalty to our best traditions, not a spurious universalism demanding forgetfulness and self-repudiation. Europe did not begin with the Enlightenment. Our beloved home will not be fulfilled with the European Union. The real Europe is, and always will be, a community of nations at once insular, sometimes fiercely so, and yet united by a spiritual legacy that, together, we debate, develop, share—and love.

13. We are losing our home.

The true Europe is in jeopardy. The achievements of popular sovereignty, resistance to empire, cosmopolitanism capable of civic love, the Christian legacy of humane and dignified life, a living engagement with our Classical inheritance—all this is slipping away. As the patrons of the false Europe construct their faux Christendom of universal human rights, we are losing our home.

14. A false freedom prevails.

The false Europe boasts of an unprecedented commitment to human liberty. This liberty, however, is very one-sided. It sells itself as liberation from all restraints: sexual freedom, freedom of self-expression, freedom to “be oneself.” The Generation of ’68 regards these freedoms as precious victories over a once almighty and oppressive cultural regime. They see themselves as great liberators, and their transgressions are acclaimed as noble moral achievements, for which the whole world should be grateful.

15. Individualism, isolation, and aimlessness are widespread.

For Europe’s younger generations, however, reality is far less gilt with gold. Libertine hedonism often leads to boredom and a profound sense of purposelessness. The bond of marriage has weakened. In the roiling sea of sexual liberty, the deep desires of our young people to marry and form families are often frustrated. A liberty that frustrates our heart’s deepest longings becomes a curse. Our societies seem to be falling into individualism, isolation and aimlessness. Instead of freedom, we are condemned to the empty conformity of consumer- and media-driven culture. It is our duty to speak the truth: The Generation of ’68 destroyed but did not build. They created a vacuum now filled by social media, cheap tourism and pornography.

16. We are regulated and managed.

At the same time that we hear boasts of unprecedented liberty, European life is more and more comprehensively regulated. Rules—often confected by faceless technocrats in league with powerful interests—govern our work relationships, our business decisions, our educational qualifications, our news and entertainment media. And Europe now seeks to tighten existing regulations on freedom of speech, an aboriginal European freedom—freedom of conscience made manifest. The targets of these restrictions are not obscenity or other assaults on decency in public life. Instead, Europe’s governing classes wish to restrict manifestly political speech. Political leaders who give voice to inconvenient truths about Islam and immigration are hauled before judges. Political correctness enforces strong taboos that deem challenges to the status quo beyond the pale. The false Europe does not really encourage a culture of freedom. It promotes a culture of market-driven homogeneity and politically enforced conformity.

17. Multiculturalism is unworkable.

The false Europe also boasts of an unprecedented commitment to equality. It claims to promote non-discrimination and the inclusion of all races, religions and identities. Here, genuine progress has been made, but a utopian detachment from reality has taken hold. Over the past generation, Europe has pursued a grand project of multiculturalism. To demand or even promote the assimilation of Muslim newcomers to our manners and mores, much less to our religion, has been thought a gross injustice. A commitment to equality, we have been told, demands that we abjure any hint that we believe our culture superior. Paradoxically, Europe’s multicultural enterprise, which denies the Christian roots of Europe, trades on the Christian ideal of universal charity in an exaggerated and unsustainable form. It requires from the European peoples a saintly degree of self-abnegation. We are to affirm the very colonization of our homelands and the demise of our culture as Europe’s great twenty-first century glory—a collective act of self-sacrifice for the sake of some new global community of peace and prosperity that is being born.

18. Bad faith grows.

There is a great deal of bad faith in this thinking. Most in our governing classes doubtless presume the superiority of European culture—which must not be affirmed in public in ways that might offend immigrants. Given that superiority, they think that assimilation will happen naturally, and quickly. In an ironic echo of the imperialist thinking of old, Europe’s governing classes presume that, somehow, by the laws of nature or of history, ‘they’ will necessarily become like ‘us’—and it is inconceivable that the reverse might be true. In the meantime, official multiculturalism has been deployed as a therapeutic tool for managing the unfortunate but ‘temporary’ cultural tensions.

19. Technocratic tyranny increases.

There is more bad faith at work, of a darker kind. Over the last generation, a larger and larger segment of our governing class has decided that its own self-interest lies in accelerated globalization. They wish to build supranational institutions that they are able to control without the inconveniences of popular sovereignty. It is increasingly clear that the ‘democratic deficit’ in the European Union is not a mere technical problem to be remedied by technical means. Rather, this deficit is a fundamental commitment, and it is zealously defended. Whether legitimated by supposed economic necessities or autonomously developing international human rights law, the supra-national mandarins of the EU institutions confiscate the political life of Europe, answering all challenges with a technocratic answer: There is no alternative. This is the soft but increasingly real tyranny we face.

20. The false Europe is fragile and impotent.

The hubris of the false Europe is now becoming evident, despite the best efforts of its partisans to shore up comfortable illusions. Above all, the false Europe is revealed to be weaker than anyone imagined. Popular entertainment and material consumption do not sustain civic life. Shorn of higher ideals and discouraged from expressing patriotic pride by multiculturalist ideology, our societies now have difficulty summoning the will to defend themselves. Moreover, civic trust and social cohesion are not renewed by inclusive rhetoric or an impersonal economic system dominated by gigantic international corporations. Again, we must be frank: European societies are fraying badly. If we but open our eyes, we see an ever-greater use of government power, social management and educational indoctrination. It is not just Islamic terror that brings heavily armed soldiers into our streets. Riot police are now necessary to quell violent anti-establishment protests and even to manage drunken crowds of football fans. The fanaticism of our football loyalties is a desperate sign of the deeply human need for solidarity, a need that otherwise goes unfulfilled in the false Europe.

21. A culture of repudiation has taken hold.

Europe’s intellectual classes are, alas, among the chief ideological partisans of the conceits of the false Europe. Without doubt, our universities are one of the glories of European civilization. But where once they sought to transmit to each new generation the wisdom of past ages, today most within the universities equate critical thinking with a simpleminded repudiation of the past. A lodestar of the European spirit has been the rigorous discipline of intellectual honesty and objectivity. But over the past two generations, this noble ideal has been transformed. The asceticism that once sought to free the mind of the tyranny of dominant opinion has become an often complacent and unreflective animus against everything that is our own. This stance of cultural repudiation functions as a cheap and easy way of being ‘critical.’ Over the last generation, it has been rehearsed in the lecture halls, becoming a doctrine, a dogma. And to join in professing this creed is taken to be the mark of ‘enlightenment,’ and of spiritual election. As a consequence, our universities are now active agents of ongoing cultural destruction.

22. Elites arrogantly parade their virtue.

Our governing classes are advancing human rights. They are at work fighting climate change. They are engineering a more globally integrated market economy and harmonizing tax policies. They are monitoring progress toward gender equality. They are doing so much for us! What does it matter by what mechanisms they inhabit their offices? What does it matter if the European peoples grow more sceptical of their ministrations?

23. There is an alternative.

That growing scepticism is fully justified. Today, Europe is dominated by an aimless materialism that seems unable to motivate men and women to have children and form families. A culture of repudiation deprives the next generation of a sense of identity. Some of our countries have regions in which Muslims live with an informal autonomy from local laws, as if they were colonialists rather than fellow members of our nations. Individualism isolates us one from another. Globalization transforms the life prospects of millions. When challenged, our governing classes say that they are merely working to accommodate the inevitable, adjusting to implacable necessities. No other course is possible, and it is irrational to resist. Things cannot be otherwise. Those who object are said to suffer nostalgia—for which they deserve moral condemnation as racists or fascists. As social divisions and civic distrust become more apparent, European public life grows angrier, more rancourous, and no one can say where it will end. We must not continue down this path. We need to throw off the tyranny of the false Europe. There is an alternative.

24. We must turn back ersatz religion.

The work of renewal begins with theological self-knowledge. The universalist and universalizing pretensions of the false Europe reveal it to be an ersatz religious enterprise, complete with strong creedal commitments—and anathemas. This is the potent opiate that paralyzes Europe as a political body. We must insist that religious aspirations are properly the province of religion, not politics, much less bureaucratic administration. In order to recover our political and historical agency, it is imperative that we re-secularize European public life.

25. We must restore a true liberalism.

This will require us to renounce the mendacious language that evades responsibility and fosters ideological manipulation. Talk of diversity, inclusion and multiculturalism is empty. Often, such language is deployed as a way to characterize our failures as accomplishments: The unravelling of social solidarity is ‘actually’ a sign of welcome, tolerance, and inclusion. This is marketing language, a language meant to obscure reality rather than illuminate. We must recover an abiding respect for reality. Language is a delicate instrument, and it is debased when used as a bludgeon. We should be patrons of linguistic decency. Recourse to denunciation is a sign of the decadence of our present moment. We must not tolerate verbal intimidation, much less mortal threats. We need to protect those who speak reasonably, even if we think their views mistaken. The future of Europe must be liberal in the best sense, which means committed to robust public debate free from all threats of violence and coercion.

26. We need responsible statesmen.

Breaking the spell of the false Europe and its utopian, pseudo-religious crusade for a borderless world means fostering a new kind of statesmanship and a new kind of statesman. A good political leader stewards the commonweal of a particular people. A good statesman views our shared European inheritance and our particular national traditions as magnificent and life-giving, but also fragile gifts. He does not reject that inheritance, nor does he chance losing it all for utopian dreams. Such leaders covet the honors bestowed upon them by their people; they do not lust for the approbation of the ‘international community,’ which is in fact the public relations apparatus of an oligarchy.

27. We should renew national unity and solidarity.

Recognizing the particular character of the European nations, and their Christian mark, we need not be perplexed before the spurious claims of the multiculturalists. Immigration without assimilation is colonization, and this must be rejected. We rightly expect that those who migrate to our lands will incorporate themselves into our nations and adopt our ways. This expectation needs to be supported by sound policy. The language of multiculturalism has been imported from America. But America’s great age of immigration came at the turn of the twentieth century, a period of remarkably rapid economic growth, in a country with virtually no welfare state, and with a very strong sense of national identity to which immigrants were expected to assimilate. After admitting large numbers of immigrants, America closed its doors very nearly shut for two generations. Europe needs to learn from this American experience rather than adopt contemporary American ideologies. That experience tells us that the workplace is a powerful engine of assimilation, that a generous welfare system can impede assimilation and that prudent political leadership sometimes dictates reductions in immigration—even drastic reductions. We must not allow a multicultural ideology to deform our political judgments about how best to serve the common good, which requires national communities with sufficient unity and solidarity to see their good as common.

28. Only empires are multicultural.

After World War II, Western Europe cultivated vital democracies. After the collapse of the Soviet Empire, Central European nations restored their civic vitality. These are among Europe’s most precious achievements. But they will be lost if we do not address immigration and demographic change in our nations. Only empires can be multicultural, which is what the European Union will become if we fail to make renewed solidarity and civic unity the criteria by which to assess immigration policies and strategies for assimilation.

29. A proper hierarchy nourishes social well-being.

Many wrongly think Europe is being convulsed only by controversies over immigration. In truth, this is but one dimension of a more general social unraveling that must be reversed. We must recover the dignity of particular roles in society. Parents, teachers and professors have a duty to form those under their care. We must resist the cult of expertise that comes at the expense of wisdom, tact and the quest for a cultured life. There can be no renewal of Europe without a determined rejection of an exaggerated egalitarianism and the reduction of wisdom to technical knowledge. We endorse the political achievements of the modern era. Each man and woman should have an equal vote. Basic rights must be protected. But a healthy democracy requires social and cultural hierarchies that encourage the pursuit of excellence and give honor to those who serve the common good. We need to restore a sense of spiritual greatness and give it due honour so that our civilization can counter the growing power of mere wealth on the one hand and vulgar entertainment on the other.

30. We must restore moral culture.

Human dignity is more than the right to be left alone, and doctrines of international human rights do not exhaust the claims of justice, much less of the good. Europe needs to renew a consensus about moral culture so that the populace can be guided toward a virtuous life. We must not allow a false view of freedom to impede the prudent use of the law to deter vice. We must be forgiving of human weakness, but Europe cannot flourish without a restoration of a communal aspiration toward upright conduct and human excellence. A culture of dignity flows from decency and the discharge of the duties of our stations in life. We need to renew the exchange of respect between social classes that characterizes a society that values the contributions of all.

31. Markets need to be ordered toward social ends.

While we recognize the positive aspects of free-market economics, we must resist ideologies that seek to totalize the logic of the market. We cannot allow everything to be for sale. Well functioning markets require the rule of law, and our rule of law should aim at more than mere economic efficiency. Markets also function best when they are nested within strong social institutions organized on their own, non-market principles. Economic growth, while beneficial, is not the highest good. Markets need to be oriented toward social ends. Today, corporate giganticism threatens even political sovereignty. The nations need to cooperate to master the arrogance and mindlessness of global economic forces. We affirm the prudent use of government power to sustain non-economic social goods.

32. Education needs to be reformed.

We believe Europe has a history and culture worth sustaining. Our universities, however, too often betray our cultural heritage. We need to reform educational curricula to foster the transmission of our common culture rather than indoctrinating young people into a culture of repudiation. Teachers and mentors at every level have a duty of memory. They should take pride in their role as a bridge between generations past and generations to come. We must also renew the high culture of Europe by setting the sublime and the beautiful as our common standard and rejecting the degradation of the arts into a kind of political propaganda. This will require the cultivation of a new generation of patrons. Corporations and bureaucracies have shown themselves to be poor stewards of the arts.

33. Marriage and family are essential.

Marriage is the foundation of civil society and the basis for harmony between men and women. It is the intimate bond organized around sustaining a household and raising children. We affirm that our most fundamental roles in society and as human beings are as fathers and mothers. Marriage and children are integral to any vision of human flourishing. Children require sacrifice from those who bring them into the world. This sacrifice is noble and must be honoured. We endorse prudent social policies to encourage and strengthen marriage, childbearing, and childrearing. A society that fails to welcome children has no future.

34. Populism should be engaged.

There is great anxiety in Europe today because of the rise of what is called ‘populism’—though the meaning of the term seems never to be defined, and it is used mostly as invective. We have our reservations. Europe needs to draw upon the deep wisdom of her traditions rather than relying on simplistic slogans and divisive emotional appeals. Still, we acknowledge that much in this new political phenomenon can represent a healthy rebellion against the tyranny of the false Europe, which labels as ‘anti-democratic’ any threat to its monopoly on moral legitimacy. The so-called “populism” challenges the dictatorship of the status quo, the ‘fanaticism of the centre,’ and rightly so. It is a sign that even in the midst of our degraded and impoverished political culture, the historical agency of the European peoples can be reborn.

35. Our future is the true Europe.

We reject as false the claim that there is no responsible alternative to the artificial, soulless solidarity of a unified market, a transnational bureaucracy, and glib entertainment. Bread and circuses are not enough. The responsible alternative is the true Europe.

36. We must take responsibility.

In this moment, we ask all Europeans to join us in rejecting the utopian fantasy of a multicultural world without borders. We rightly love our homelands, and we seek to hand on to our children every noble thing that we have ourselves received as our patrimony. As Europeans, we also share a common heritage, and this heritage asks us to live together in peace as a Europe of nations. Let us renew national sovereignty, and recover the dignity of a shared political responsibility for Europe’s future.

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Signers:

Philippe Bénéton (France)

Rémi Brague (France)

Chantal Delsol (France)

Roman Joch (Czech Republic)

Lánczi András (Hungary)

Ryszard Legutko (Poland)

Pierre Manent (France)

Janne Haaland Matlary (Norway)

Dalmacio Negro Pavón (Spain)

Roger Scruton (United Kingdom)

Robert Spaemann (Germany)

Bart Jan Spruyt (Netherlands)

Matthias Storme (Belgium)

 

Soros & The Myth Of European Democracy: A Shocking Revelation

Authored by Alex Gorka via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

It’s an open secret that the “Soros network” has an extensive sphere of influence in the European Parliament and in other European Union institutions.

The list of Soros has been made public recently. The document lists 226 MEPs from all sides of political spectrum, including former President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz, former Belgian PM Guy Verhofstadt, seven vice-presidents, and a number of committee heads, coordinators, and quaestors. These people promote the ideas of Soros, such as bringing in more migrants, same-sex marriages, integration of Ukraine into the EU, and countering Russia. There are 751 members of the European Parliament. It means that the Soros friends have more than one third of seats.

George Soros, a Hungarian-American investor and the founder and owner of Open Society Foundations NGO, was able to meet with President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker with “no transparent agenda for their closed-door meeting”, and pointed out how EU proposals to redistribute quotas of migrants across the EU are eerily familiar to Soros’s own self-published plan for dealing with the crisis.

The billionaire financier believes that the European Union should receive millions of immigrants from the Middle East and Northern Africa, provide each one with an annual 15,000 EUR in aid, and resettle these migrants in member-states where they do not wish to go and are not necessarily welcome.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has accused the EU of “eating out of the hand” of Soros. He believes that the billionaire open borders campaigner is behind the attacks on Hungary. The reason is the government’s attempts to take legal action over a new law which requires foreign-supported ‘civil society’ organizations — many funded by Soros — to list their big overseas donors in a public register and be transparent about their funding sources in their publications. The Hungarian government is applying efforts to close the Budapest-based Central European University founded by Soros.

“The whole of the European Union is in trouble because its leaders and bureaucrats adopt decisions like this,” said Orbán.

 

“The people support the ideal of the European Union. At the same time, they can’t stand the leadership of the EU, because it insults the Member-States with things like this, and it abuses its power. Everyone in Europe can see that. This is why the European leadership is not respected.”

The Visegrad group is trying to stand tall under the EU pressure on migrants’ policy. The European Commission of Migration and Home Affairs is pushing a new bill to make migrants quotas obligatory. At least 30 Soros supporters work for the commission.

Many people listed in the document are known for attacks on Russia. For instance, Rebecca Harms, a MEP from German Green Party, regularly calls the European Parliament to toughen the sanctions regime against Moscow. Guy Verhofstadt blames Russia for almost each and every thing going wrong in Europe. His article Putting Putin in his Place made a lot of noise last year. In 2012, former Croatian Primer Tonino Picula, who was the head of an observer mission from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), slammed the Russian presidential election of 2012 as unfair, saying it was “skewed” in Vladimir Putin’s favor.

The Soros list sheds light on the question of what makes the EU leadership implement policies, which run counter to the interests of Europeans. The answer is corruption. The politicians bribed by Soros dance to his tune. They fight against the attempts of national leaders to protect the interests of their peoples. Quite often those who oppose such policies have to face the resistance of political elites of their own countries. The standoff between Hungarian PM Orbán and the Soros network is a good example to illustrate how it works. The European Parliament under the influence of Soros friends is pushing Europe to suicide by letting millions of migrants in.

It shows that the much-vaunted European democracy is a façade to hide the activities of power structure close to feudal system with local lord holding the reins. It can hardly be called the power of people. The publication of Soros list provides a clue to understanding who rules the EU and who instigates anti-Russia sentiments in Europe. Actually, this is the case when EU member countries like Hungary happen to be in the same boat with Russia opposing the very same US-based forces, while protecting their sovereignty and independence. This is the time for Europeans to think about transforming the system to do away with outside pressure.

If You Want To Understand The Next 10 Years, Study Spain

Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Some of you may be confused as to why a U.S. citizen living in Colorado has become so completely obsessed with what’s going on in Spain. Bear with me, there’s a method to my madness.

I believe what’s currently happening in Spain represents a crucial microcosm for what we’ll see sweep across the entire planet over the next ten years.

Some of you will want to have a discussion about who’s right and who’s wrong in this particular affair, but that’s besides the point. It doesn’t matter which side you favor, what matters is that Madrid/Catalonia is an example of the forces of centralization duking it out with forces of decentralization.

Madrid represents the nation-state as we know it, with its leaders claiming Spain is forever indivisible according to the constitution. Madrid has essentially proclaimed there’s no possible avenue to independence from a centralized Spain even if various regions decide in large number they wish to be independent. This sort of attitude will be seen as unacceptable and primitive by increasingly large numbers of humans in the years ahead. Catalonia should be seen as a canary in the coal mine. The forces of decentralization are rising, but entrenched centralized institutions and the bureaucrats running them will become increasingly terrified, panicked and oppressive.

As I’ve discussed, this isn’t coming out of nowhere. Humanity’s current established centralized institutions and nation-states have become clownishly corrupt, merely existing to protect and enrich the powerful/connected as opposed to benefiting the population at large. As such, legitimacy has been shattered and people have begun to demand a new way. Whether we see this with the rising popularity of Bitcoin, or the UK decision to leave the EU, evidence is everywhere and we’ve already passed the point of no return. This is precisely why EU leaders are rallying around Madrid. They’re scared to death and fear they might be next. They’re probably right.

Before we continue, I want to revisit something I pointed out in last week’s post, Surprisingly, I’m Quite Optimistic About the Future:

Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll see sufficient change in this regard without hardship. This hardship is likely to occur as the old paradigm becomes more authoritarian and paranoid as it lashes out in an attempt to solidify and expand control. Of course, we’re already seeing this all around us, but it’s likely to get even worse in the years ahead. Don’t be afraid of it, understand that it’s coming and accept that this is all part of the change process. Did you really think control-freak authoritarians would give up without a fight?

If you want to see how a control-freak authoritarian responds to a situation, just look at how Spanish PM Mariano Rajoy has responded to Catalonia. People like him simply can’t help themselves, it’s in their nature and all they know is the fist of violence. As I noted in last week’s post on the topic, those in favor of Catalan independence have thus far played the situation flawlessly. For this to turn out positively for the forces of decentralization, the Spanish authorities must be encouraged to act increasingly thuggish, which will in turn bolster more and more popular support for independence. This has already started to happen, and will likely accelerate in the weeks ahead as Rajoy is about to make the biggest mistake of all by activating Article 155.

It’s really important to understand how irresponsibly aggressive Madrid is about to become before moving on. Here’s some background courtesy of Bloomberg:

Rajoy on Saturday shocked many observers with plans to clear out the entire separatist administration in Barcelona and take control of key institutions including public media and the regional police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra. Spain’s chief prosecutor said that if Puigdemont declares independence he would face as much as 30 years in jail and signaled that he could be arrested immediately.

 

“Catalan government officials and many within the Mossos and Catalan media are not just going to stand down without a fight,” said Caroline Gray, a lecturer in politics and Spanish at Aston University in the U.K. who specializes in nationalist movements. “The big question for me, really, is how Madrid is actually going to implement its proposed actions in Catalonia.”

 

Rajoy is wielding the untested powers of Article 155 of Spain’s 1978 Constitution to try to impose central government control on Catalonia. The aim ultimately is to trigger regional elections within six months.

Madrid is making a mistake of enormous historical significance here. First, you don’t need to be a genius to see that him forcibly taking over control over key aspects of Catalan civil society will only make the independence movement grow in strength, passion and numbers. Second, does Rajoy really think he’s going to be able to make this happen without enormous amounts of civil unrest? Not a chance.

Here’s some of what’s already being planned, according to Bloomberg:

Catalan separatists are mobilizing a human shield to block efforts by the Spanish authorities to take control of the breakaway region as both sides prepare to escalate the political conflict.

 

Groups will concentrate their activists around the regional government’s headquarters in Barcelona’s Gothic quarter and the nearby parliament building, according to two people familiar with the plans, asking not to be identified by name. They expect Spanish police to use force to try to shut down the administration and will put their bodies on the line, said one person.

 

“We are calling for a peaceful and democratic defense of the institutions,” Lluis Corominas, the leader of the main separatist group in the Catalan Parliament, said at a press conference in Barcelona. Regional President Carles Puigdemont has called for similar action.

 

The separatists have shown they can rally support. A crowd estimated by local police at around 450,000 joined him to protest in central Barcelona after Rajoy announced his plans. CUP, a pro-secessionist party, on Monday called for mass civil disobedience in Catalonia, Ara newspaper reported.

The key dates this week will be on Thursday and Friday. Thursday’s when the Catalan assembly is set to meet to prepare a response to Spain taking over the region by force. Friday is when Spain’s national Senate will vote to implement direct rule. In my opinion, it would be a big mistake for the Catalan government to declare independence at this stage. Madrid needs to continue to be seen as the unreasonable aggressor, which is what will happen if article 155 is activated Friday. For Catalonia to succeed, the public must become even more outraged than it already is. Any attempt by Madrid at taking over Catalan civil society by force will achieve this in spades.

If I’m correct in my forecast, the entire world will be looking at similar forces of decentralization battling it out with discredited, entrenched centralized power structures over the next decade or so. I think this will result in virtually all of our current institutions collapsing and being replaced by a completely different paradigm. In my view, the new paradigm will be increasingly defined by decentralized structures. Terms like “peer-to-peer,” “distributed” and “direct democracy” will become increasingly ubiquitous as we begin to lay down the foundations for a far less top-down, centralized and authoritarian approach to human affairs.

This isn’t to say the process will be easy or smooth, but that’s where I think all of this is headed. The struggle between Madrid and Catalonia represents a high-profile and early example of this struggle and those of us who wish for a more decentralized world need to pay very close attention since many lessons can be learned from this historic crisis.

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All Hail Chinese Emperor Xi Jinping: Will He 'Make China Great Again'?

Perhaps no event embodies the unyielding abstruseness and the unforgiving hierarchy of China’s ruling Communist Party as much as its Party Congress, the government’s most important leadership conference. Attended by some twenty-three hundred delegates from across the country, it is held every five years in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People—and when the weeklong meeting finally begins, one can be certain that the crucial politicking has already concluded. What proceeds is a choreographed spectacle bearing fastidiously scripted speeches, pro-forma elections of what has heretofore been determined (a leadership reshuffle in the seven-member Politburo, the highest echelon of power), and, in the case of the 19th Communist Party Congress, which opened today, high-spirited, propagandistic posters reminding the masses that “Life in China Is Good! Everyday Is Like a Holiday!”

This is a message that Xi Jinping, who was appointed President at the previous Party Congress, in 2012, is eager to instill in a country that continues to grapple with a vertiginous pace of change and the outsize influence of politics in everyday life. Xi is almost certainly guaranteed another five-year term, if not longer. Since taking office, he has sought to launch the greatest ideological campaign since the days of Mao.

Xi has made clear from the outset, he is intent on both defining a new world order and restoring to Chinese culture its former esteem.

Yet Xi’s mission should be regarded in the context of a collective and profound post-traumatic stress disorder, the result of almost two centuries of cataclysmic events in China. For every Tang Taizong, who ushered in the golden years of the Tang Dynasty, there were many others like Empress Dowager Cixi, who usurped the throne, crippled the path of progress, and contributed to the downfall of the Qing Dynasty.

As Xi made clear today, during his three-hour address to the Party Congress, he sees this moment as “a new historic juncture in China’s development”—and himself as the man to seize it. He seems to believe that the more power he amasses, the easier it will be for him to enact the kind of monumental changes necessary to transform China into the world’s leading superpower. In this sense, he is positioning himself as a savior with a cause noble enough to justify his autocratic turn. The logic is akin to that which animated the ambition of many of the Middle Kingdom’s five-hundred-odd emperors. Sure, Xi has rerouted all tributaries of power to run upstream to him, but isn’t it in the service of rejuvenation?

Xi has also used his growing power to curb that of his citizens. Under his rule, China has become increasingly repressive. The media is censored and civil society has been muted. Activists have been silenced and human-rights lawyers arrested. More than a million officials have been disciplined. Despite paying lip service to the constitution—the Party devoted an entire plenary session during the 18th Congress to a discussion of “judicial independence”—Xi is steering the country away from the rule of law and toward the rule of the Party.

Xi’s vision for China’s future suggests a great leap backward, in which old lessons remain unlearned.