Tag Archives: Russian Leadership - Page 2

Russia: Rebuilding an Empire While It Can | STRATFOR

Posted by Matt on November 1, 2011 1 comment

This could set the stage for a new version of the Cold War, though it would not be as long-lived as the previous one. Putin’s other reason for re-establishing some kind of Russian empire is that he knows the next crisis to affect Russia most likely will keep the country from ever resurging again: Russia is dying. The country’s demographics are among some of the world’s worst, having declined steadily since World War I. Its birth rates are well below death rates, and it already has more citizens in their 50s than in their teens. Russia could be a major power without a solid economy, but no country can be a global power without people. This is why Putin is attempting to strengthen and secure Russia now, before demographics weaken it. However, even taking its demographics into account, Russia will be able to sustain its current growth in power for at least another generation. This means that the next few years likely are Russia’s last great moment — one that will be marked by the country’s return as a regional empire and a new confrontation with its previous adversary, the United States.

Russia: Rebuilding an Empire While It Can | STRATFOR

If the next few years represent the last of a great Russia, then America is living in the most danger period in all its history.

The Russian leadership surely knows that the country is dying, and it may be hundreds of years before it rises again. Will it be tempted to take America down with it?

Signs Russia Would Have No Problem Nuking America

Posted by Matt on August 28, 2011 16 comments

Given the state of the world today, how is it even possible to think about a Russian nuclear attack on the US? Why would Russia want to attack the US?

What I want to show is that the Russian leadership (Putin) is quite capable of launching a nuclear attack against America and absorbing the resulting counter-attack. We need to get into the mind of Putin and find out what he is like. If he is capable of such an attack, then why, and when, would he do it?

Very briefly, Putin hates America. In effect he has told us this many times. Next we will learn that Putin thinks Stalin wasn’t all that bad. Now that should make you take notice.

How likely is Russia to initiate a nuclear war? Did you know it almost did in the last Russia-Georgia war? If the West had supported Georgia militarily, then Russia was ready to launch a nuclear attack. So you get a sense that the Russian leadership has already crossed the line mentally. It is already prepared to start a nuclear war and absorb the resulting losses in order to achieve its goals. Let’s just say the resulting losses in Russia are a necessary evil to eliminate the United States.

Russia’s military is falling apart fast, so it has to rely heavily on its nuclear forces. The problem is that much of its nuclear forces are starting to age and must be decommissioned in the not too distant future. This presents Russia with a problem: How much longer can it fend off the United States? Over the next 10 to 20 years will Russia become vulnerable to an American first strike?

Russia itself is starting to fall apart. The conditions that existed before the fall of the Soviet Union exist today. There is a danger of another Russian collapse. With Russia on its back, Putin may feel that a nuclear strike on America at this time would produce optimal results. If Russia waits then the outcome could be much worse as its condition deteriorates.

The concept of a Russian nuclear attack on America should not shock you. But what would trigger it? I explained how the Russia-Georgia war almost triggered it. So a direct conflict between Russia and an American backed ally could trigger it. Another option is a conflict between an ally of Russia and an ally of America. For example, a nuclear war between Israel and Syria. This is actually the best case scenario for Russia, because it would leave the Americans completely off-guard.

2008 Russia-Georgia War: Military help for Georgia is a ‘declaration of war’, says Moscow

Posted by Matt on August 9, 2011 9 comments

Moscow has issued an extraordinary warning to the West that military assistance to Georgia for use against South Ossetia or Abkhazia would be viewed as a “declaration of war” by Russia.

The extreme rhetoric from the Kremlin’s envoy to NATO came as President Dmitry Medvedev stressed he will make a military response to US missile defence installations in eastern Europe, sending new shudders across countries whose people were once blighted by the Iron Curtain.

Military help for Georgia is a ‘declaration of war’, says Moscow in extraordinary warning to the West | Mail Online

In this case Russia has effectively declared nuclear war should NATO get involved in this war. If the Russian leadership is willing to launch a nuclear war over this event, then surely its only a matter of time before some other event happens that is nuclear worthy. Putin has crossed a threshold in thinking and is willing to wipe out most of the Russian population in order to get his way.

The lesson here is that with Putin in charge, the West should be prepared for nuclear war. Unfortunately, the West believes that a nuclear war against America and Europe is just about impossible. They are preparing for the eventual elimination of all nuclear weapons. They are acting precisely the wrong way to avoid a nuclear war.

Moscow to Annex South Ossetia as U.S.-Russia “Reset” Crumbles? | The Enterprise Blog

Posted by Matt on August 6, 2011 Comments Off

While events in the Middle East continue to dominate headlines, one of the cornerstones of the Obama administration’s foreign policy is coming loose—and few are paying attention.

U.S.-Russia relations have witnessed a flurry of activity in recent weeks that threatens to undermine one of President Obama’s central foreign policy initiatives—the “reset.” The administration claims that its reset—or fresh start—with Russia has boosted cooperation with Moscow on a number of issues, including Iran’s nuclear program, the stabilization of Afghanistan, and even Libya. But the reset seems to be unraveling.

Moscow to Annex South Ossetia as U.S.-Russia “Reset” Crumbles? « The Enterprise Blog

Let’s not forget the sneering “parasite” comment by Putin:

2011-08-01 | US a ‘parasite’ on world economy, says Putin

Russia is going to do what it wants in its neighborhood. In the past Russian leadership has implied that if America interferes, then prepare for war.

The Kremlin’s Dance in Japan’s Ring of Fire | Opinion | The Moscow Times

Posted by Matt on February 13, 2011 Comments Off

Why is the Russian leadership taking such a strong and sudden interest in the Kurils, which had never been visited by any high-ranking officials in the past? And why are the Japanese so intent on regaining the four southernmost Kuril Islands while laying no claim to any of the 52 others? Finally, why is the squabble occurring in a context of generally improving economic relations, with trade rising to about $30 billion in 2009?

The Kremlin’s Dance in Japan’s Ring of Fire | Opinion | The Moscow Times

The Case for Nuclear War

Posted by Matt on November 15, 2010 Comments Off

The article below shows a Russia very much thinking about nuclear war with the West. Here is the thinking of Russian leadership: Stay out of our backyard, or prepare for an all-out nuclear war.

Russia challenges west with nuclear overhaul | World news | The Guardian [Published Sept., 2008]

“This is very significant. Right now the present Russian leadership believes that a war with Nato is very much possible,” Pavel Felgenhauer, a Moscow-based defence analyst, told the Guardian. “This is the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union that the Russian military is actually preparing for an all-out nuclear war with America.”

He added: “I believe we [the Russians] are sending the west a serious message. The message is treat us with respect, and if you don’t go into our backyard we won’t go into yours. Russia wants to divide the world into spheres of influence. If not, we will prepare for nuclear war.”

Felgenhauer said Russia’s military was old but still effective. “Our military is backward in its development. But we still have a sizeable nuclear potential. It can kill a hell of a lot of people,” he said.

Russia challenges west with nuclear overhaul | World news | The Guardian

Let’s fast forward to November 8, 2010. A mystery missile is launched off the coast of California. The US government or military did not launch a missile at that time. There was no plane in the area at that time. There was no navy ship in the area at that time. However, several experts viewing a video of the launch believe that the mystery missile was in fact a submarine launched ballistic missile.

There can be only one logical explanation for the submarine launch of a ballistic missile off of our coast: It is a warning. While this particular missile was never a danger to America, it was never intended to be. The only logical explanation is that it was intended to be a warning from China.

Here is the thinking of the Chinese leadership: Stay out of our backyard, or prepare for an all-out nuclear war. The backyard that China is referring to is the South China Sea.

China Throws Strategic Challenge At US In South China Sea

China placing South China Sea under the category of “core national interest” along with Taiwan, Tibet, and Xingjian clearly indicates that China has placed this issue in the category of “non-negotiable issues” and that China would use force if necessary against any nation disturbing its sovereignty over the South China Sea. This is an assertion which provides a strategic challenge to the United States and of concern to China’s neighbors.

Read More…

China Threats Merit Shifting of U.S. Defense Dollars, House’s McKeon Says | Boomberg News

“While China today may not intend to attack our carriers, neutralize our bases in Japan and Guam, or push back our naval presence out of the South China Sea, they are without question making the investments and developing capabilities to do just that,” California Representative Howard McKeon says in remarks prepared for delivery today at a meeting sponsored by the Washington-based Foreign Policy Initiative research group.

China Threats Merit Shifting of U.S. Defense Dollars, House’s McKeon Says | Boomberg News

Historically, when a new power challenges an existing one, war has occurred six out of seven times. Will the rise of China lead to conflict with the US?

Great power rivalries in history:

1. Spain versus Holland in the 16th century.
2. Holland versus England in the 17th century.
3. Britain versus France in both the 18th and 19th centuries.
4. France and Britain versus Germany in the 20th century.
5. Germany versus Russia in 1914.
6. Germany versus Russia (Soviet Union) in 1941.
7. Soviet Union versus the US and its allies in the Cold War after 1945. Obviously this did not lead to war.

Is China gearing up to start World War III?

So, put it all together. China has four times our population. They have an economy going gangbusters, but will likely need more oil than exists on the planet, and they have an irrational anger at us for our role in keeping Taiwan out of their clutches. Plus, we owe them trillions of dollars.

It makes for a potent and volatile cocktail, doesn’t it?

Read More…

The Big Picture

Historian Niall Ferguson has identified the decline of an empire as one of the three signs that are present before a major war starts – the three Es: Empires in decline, economic volatility and ethnic conflict: The Axis of Upheaval. With the global economic crisis starting in 2008, the “age of upheaval” has started.

Ethnic conflict serves as a catalyst to start a much larger war. The ethnic conflict that we need to worry about is in the Middle East. Should a conflict involving Israel and its neighbors escalate to the point that a lot of deaths occur, then the potential for further escalation involving other powers is real.

The conditions present right before World War I are present today: Sinking Globalization. In Sinking Globalization the author points out great power rivalry is one cause of war. This is particularly true when one power is in decline or overstretched. Historically, when one power is challenged by another then this leads to war six out of seven times: America-China Rivalry: Six out of seven times war has occurred.

Empires very often collapse quickly: Complexity and Collapse. You can watch highlights of a speech given by Niall Fergusion: Niall Ferguson: Empires on the Edge of Chaos [Length: 3:55 min]. The full version of the talk is available too and lasts over an hour. Niall implies that the US may be on the edge of collapse due to excessive debt. Another article by historian Niall Ferguson argues that America is at risk: An Empire at Risk.

How to think about the future

Imagine a forest that was just obliterated by a very large forest fire that wiped out everything. Would you be worrying about a large fire a couple of years later? How about 10 or 20 years later? You might be worried 65 years later. Over time the forest has time to build up and fill in gaps. Thus the forest positions itself for the next collapse.

That’s nice, but what do forests have to do with anything?

It turns out that forests, sandpiles, earthquakes, financial markets, wars and more have a lot in common. They all experience collapses for a similar reason and follow a power law distribution. If you plot the size of collapse by number of collapses at that size, then you get a straight line which is a power law distribution. For example, the distribution of wars and attacks within wars follow a power law distribution giving a straight line with slope of about -2.5.

The reason that societies collapse into war, financial markets collapse, forests collapse through fire, is due to system feedback. System feedback causes herding in financial markets, forces new trees to grow in open land, causes new grains of sand to land on top of prior grains and changes the thinking in society that make it susceptible to war. When you make decisions that at least partially include historical information, then that is system feedback. For example, do you consult a chart of historical prices before you buy a stock or mutual fund?

When a society experiences a major crisis, like World War II, it profoundly affects the people alive at that time. However, gradually over time as new generations are born the crisis has less and less of an effect. Over about 80 to 100 years the new generations become susceptible to another crisis. If the start of the last crisis was around 1925, then 80 years later is 2005. The next crisis period is from 2005 to 2025: Winter is Coming for Boomers

Russia’s Economic Crisis and U.S.-Russia Relations: Troubled Times Ahead

Posted by Matt on November 2, 2009 Comments Off

Rising Unemployment and Growing Social Unrest

The crisis has also exacerbated social tensions in Russia. So far, no serious threat to the regime has materialized, despite a wave of spontaneous strikes and the use of SWAT teams to put down a demonstration in Vladivostok. Notably, the Russian leadership showed the limits to its tolerance of public displays of dissatisfaction and its willingness to use force when it flew in riot police to put down the protest in Vladivostok.[14] Since this widely reported event, there have been additional protests and spontaneous strikes.
According to the World Bank, the number of people in Russia below the poverty line increased by 1.1 million in 2008 and will increase by 4.7 million in 2009.[15] Thus, according to official measurements, 15.5 percent of the population will be poor by the end of 2009.[16]

Putin and other politicians understand that the crisis could threaten regime stability, thus providing a social safety net has become the top Kremlin priority. Nevertheless, the regime is simultaneously increasing defense spending and procurement.[17]

Russia’s Economic Crisis and U.S.-Russia Relations: Troubled Times Ahead

Russia Defends Stalin’s Deal with Hitler

Posted by Matt on August 20, 2009 Comments Off

Ryzhkov asks why today’s Russia, which has a democratic constitution and new democratic legitimacy, should justify the division of Europe between Hitler and Stalin.

He says that this view is now included in Russian history text books and has caused “enormous moral damage” to Russia’s reputation, particularly in the countries of Eastern Europe that were the main victims of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Ryzhkov says the only explanation for the Russian leadership’s position on the issue is what he calls “sympathy for Stalin.”

Public opinion surveys suggest many ordinary Russians share at least some of their government’s views.

VOA News – Russia Defends Stalin’s Deal with Hitler

Turkey and Russia on the Rise

Posted by Matt on March 17, 2009 Comments Off

Here are a couple of interesting paragraphs about Russia:

Russia faces a hard-wired demographic time bomb. Put simply, Russia is an ascending power in the short run, but it is a declining power in the long run.

The Russian leadership is well aware of this coming crisis, and knows it is going to need every scrap of strength it can muster just to continue the struggle to keep Russia in one piece.

Russia’s primary challenge, however, is time. In the aftermath of the Soviet collapse, the bottom fell out of the Russian birthrate, with fewer than half the number of babies born in the 1990s than were born in the 1980s. These post-Cold War children are now coming of age; in a few years, their small numbers are going to have a catastrophic impact on the size of the Russian population. By contrast, most non-Russian minorities — in particular those such as Chechens and Dagestanis, who are of Muslim faith — did not suffer from the 1990s birthrate plunge, so their numbers are rapidly increasing even as the number of ethnic Russians is rapidly decreasing. Add in deep-rooted, demographic-impacting problems such as HIV, tuberculosis and heroin abuse — concentrated not just among ethnic Russians but also among those of childbearing age — and Russia faces a hard-wired demographic time bomb. Put simply, Russia is an ascending power in the short run, but it is a declining power in the long run.

The Russian leadership is well aware of this coming crisis, and knows it is going to need every scrap of strength it can muster just to continue the struggle to keep Russia in one piece. To this end, Moscow must do everything it can now to secure buffers against external intrusion in the not-so-distant future. For the most part, this means rolling back Western influence wherever and whenever possible, and impressing upon states that would prefer integration into the West that their fates lie with Russia instead. Moscow’s natural gas crisis with Ukraine, August 2008 war with Georgia, efforts to eject American forces from Central Asia and constant pressure on the Baltic states all represent efforts to buy Russia more space — and with that space, more time for survival.

The full article is below.

By Reva Bhalla, Lauren Goodrich and Peter Zeihan

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev reportedly will travel to Turkey in the near future to follow up a recent four-day visit by his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gul, to Moscow. The Turks and the Russians certainly have much to discuss.

Russia is moving aggressively to extend its influence throughout the former Soviet empire, while Turkey is rousing itself from 90 years of post-Ottoman isolation. Both are clearly ascendant powers, and it would seem logical that the more the two bump up against one other, the more likely they will gird for yet another round in their centuries-old conflict. But while that may be true down the line, the two Eurasian powers have sufficient strategic incentives to work together for now.

Russia challenges west with nuclear overhaul

Posted by Matt on October 6, 2008 Comments Off

“This is very significant. Right now the present Russian leadership believes that a war with Nato is very much possible,” Pavel Felgenhauer, a Moscow-based defence analyst, told the Guardian. “This is the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union that the Russian military is actually preparing for an all-out nuclear war with America.”

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