The New Cold War With Russia

[American Patriot]

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/RT

Russian political dissident Boris Kagarlitsky described RT as a "continuation of the old Soviet propaganda services."^[5] The channel is also accused of having close ties with the Russian state authorities^[9] and of helping the Kremlin to project an overtly positive image of Russia by refraining from criticizing the government, particularly Vladimir Putin.^[10][11]

Russia Today is the only international news organisation that promotes conspiracy theories on an industrial scale. For example there is a compilation of, originally no less than 56 Russia Today YouTube videos on 9/11 (7 now deleted).^[16] The majority publicise, and clearly support, conspiracy theories. The remainder involve other criticisms of the United States.

[American Patriot]

What is Russia Today and Who Is Paying the Bills?

BY Christian Sager / POSTED March 15, 2014
© Dzhavakhadze Zurab/ITAR-TASS Photo/Corbis
The most popular video on YouTube last week was an on-air recording of Liz Wahl quitting her position as a correspondent for RT-America. Wahl denounced the news organization because of how it covered President Vladimir Putin’s decisions regarding Ukraine. While quitting she said, “I cannot be a part of a network funded by the Russian government that whitewashes the actions of Putin.”


My first thought was, “What the heck is RT-America?”


My second was, “Is it really funded by the Russian government?”


I get my news from online newspapers, RSS feeds and blogs so it’s possible I just missed this network’s existence entirely. After a little research it turns out the channel is available to 120 million viewers across the world. In the United States it’s available to 20 million people because Time Warner Cable added it to their New York City regional digital package. When I asked others about it, they said they’d only seen it in hotels when visiting New York. Reports indicate it’s also now available in Washington D.C., San Francisco and Chicago.


RT called Wahl’s statement a “self-promotional stunt.” They responded to her with the following: “When a journalist disagrees with the editorial position of his or her organization, the usual course of action is to address those grievance with the editor, and, if they cannot be resolved, to quit like a professional.”


We tend to have unreasonable expectations of objectivity from our news, but this is much more complicated than whether an organization leans right or left politically. In the interest of knowing more about the complex ecosystem of our news media I’d like to address my initial questions here.


What is RT?
RT actually stands for “Russia Today,” and on their website they claim to be an autonomous non-profit organization.” It turns out that Russia’s state-owned news agency RIA-NOVOSTI launched RT in 2005 in an effort to improve Russia’s image abroad. It’s currently broadcasting in English, Spanish and Arabic.


Russia Today launched with a mission to cover international news with a Russian outlook and while insiders have praised its staff’s work, many seem to be in agreement that objectivity is not the network’s goal. It’s been accused of both a strident anti-American stance and towing the Kremlin line by repeating government talking points. Regardless, RT is more successful than any other foreign broadcast stations that are available in the United States.


Is Russia Today State Sponsored?
Without a doubt RT is receiving its funding from the Russian government. In 2005 they started with a $30 million budget that has recently skyrocketed to over $300 million. So saying they’re an “autonomous nonprofit organization” is like saying the same thing about the Pentagon. Citing a Western news bias against Russia, the channel sees itself as balancing the equation. During a studio visit, Putin himself said that RT’s goal was to “break the monopoly of the Anglo-Saxon mass media.”


So… what Liz Wahl said when she quit RT was basically an open secret about the network. Some insiders say the Kremlin supplies RT with a stop list of political opponents and government critics that are barred from the channel. Others say there isn’t actually a list per say, but that RT’s informal mission is simply public relations for Russia. When asked about a stop list, the Kremlin says there’s no such thing. Their contention is that government detractors just don’t appear on television because they’re not newsworthy.


When RT says that Wahl should have addressed her grievances with an editor, instead of announcing them on-air, the buck would have stopped with Margarita Simonyan, the Director General of Russia Today. Simonyan’s been quoted saying the station’s aim is to counter “the Anglo-Saxon domination of global television news” offered by organizations like the BBC and CNN. At the same time she’s maintained the station has independence from the Kremlin, despite its funding. Her argument is that western reporters are incapable of seeing the truth about Russia, so RT offers an alternative view.


Is U.S. Media Biased Against Russia?
Let’s step back and consider Simonyan’s claim that western news is inherently biased. In a 2012 editorial piece for Salon.com, Glenn Greenwald pointed out that while RT is funded by the Kremlin, there are also news organizations owned by the U.S. and British governments. He also argued that we also get news from media companies owned by weapons manufacturers, banking corporations and loyalists to political parties. So if RT’s journalistic integrity is in question, what about these other stations?


In a 2012 journal article examining how television programs cover post-communist nations, researchers Ivan Katchanovski and Alicen Morley found that American broadcasts favored U.S. allies (Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic) to non-allies (Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan). Their study also indicates that these broadcasts have a prevalent anti-Russian bias, dominated by negative stories about tense diplomatic relationships, crime, spying and undemocratic developments. They cite that previous studies conducted between 1992 and 2006 show that such media coverage affects the attitudes of both the American public and the United State’s foreign policy agenda toward Russia.


So where does that leave us? Well, Wahl wasn’t wrong. RT is a Kremlin sponsored network with a stated mission to provide an alternative to western media. While RT may be guilty of pro-Putin bias, there seems to be evidence that their competitors aren’t objective saints of journalism either.


One last thing to keep in mind is that many news sources are closing their bureaus in Russia and reducing their foreign correspondents to the region. That makes it tremendously difficult to provide well-researched investigative journalism about Russia. So audiences (whether they’re in Moscow or New York) are inevitably going to turn to a biased organization like RT for information when international crises occur in Russia, Ukraine or Crimea. Because at the end of the day they’re one of the few providing deeper (albeit subjective) coverage in these post-communist states.

[Malsua]

RT does a pretty good job of covering stories in the US that the US media ignores, but by the same token they are Putin apologists, so just like everything else, you have to balance their reporting with information from other sources.

[American Patriot]

Yes, precisely. But if you look at some of the stories they cover over here, in particular the whole "racial divide" thing you will see they poke and prod at the US for being racist and they are definitely leaning towards the commie infiltrators who keep making it sound worse than it truly is.

I have used them as well as a source, but when the material is directly related to Russia or American politics, you can bet your ass it's skewed

[Avvakum]

For those who may wish to know what Vladimir Putin's actual political philosophy is, or who his biggest influence is on his political philosophy, one need look further than this man right here, the Conservative philosopher Ivan Ilyin (I'll emphasize in bold);

Ivan Ilyin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about the Russian philosopher. For the Austrian philosopher, see Ivan Illich. For the novella, see The Death of Ivan Ilyich.
Ivan Ilyin


Ivan Alexandrovich Ilyin (Russian: Ива́н Алекса́ндрович Ильи́н; March 28, 1883 – December 21, 1954) was a Russian religious and political philosopher, White emigre publicist and an ideologue of the Russian All-Military Union.
Contents

• 1 Young years
• 2 Before the revolution
• 3 Revolution and exile
• 4 Emigration
• 5 Doctrine
  
  • 5.1 Ilyin's works about Russia
  • 5.2 The concept of conscience of law
  • 5.3 Attitude towards monarchy
  • 5.4 Attitude towards fascism
  • 5.5 Antisemitism
  • 5.6 Democracy and totalitarianism in Russia
  
  
• 6 Influence
• 7 Major works
• 8 See also
• 9 Notes
• 10 References
• 11 External links

Young years

Ivan Ilyin was born in Moscow in an aristocratic family of Rurikid descent. His father, Alexander Ivanovich Ilyin, had been born and spent his childhood in the Grand Kremlin Palace since Ilyin's grandfather had served as the commandant of the Palace. Alexander Ilyin's godfather had been emperor Alexander III of Russia. Ivan Ilyin was brought up also in the centre of Moscow not far from the Kremlin in Naryshkin Lane. In 1901 he entered the Law faculty of the Moscow State University. Ilyin generally disapproved of the Russian Revolution of 1905 and did not participate actively in student riots. While a student Ilyin became interested in philosophy under influence of Professor Pavel Ivanovitch Novgorodtsev (1866-1924), who was a Christian philosopher of jurisprudence and a political liberal. In 1906 Ilyin graduated with a law degree, and from 1909 he began working there as a scholar.
Before the revolution

In 1911, Ilyin moved for a year to Western Europe to work on his thesis: "Crisis of rationalistic philosophy in Germany in the 19th century". He then returned to work in the university and delivered a series of lectures called "Introduction to the Philosophy of Law". Novgorodtsev offered Ilyin to lecture on theory of general law at Moscow Commerce Institute. In total, he lectured at various schools for 17 hours a week.
At that time, Ilyin studied the philosophy of Hegel, namely Hegel's philosophy of state and law. He regarded this work not only as a study of Hegel but also as preparation for his own work on theory of law. His thesis on Hegel was finished in 1916 and published in 1918.
In 1914, after the breakout of World War I, Professor Prince Evgeny Trubetskoy arranged a series of public lectures devoted to the "ideology of the war". Ilyin contributed to this with several lectures, the first of which was called "The Spiritual Sense of the War". He was an utter opponent of any war in general but believed that since Russia had already been involved in the war, the duty of every Russian was to support his country. Ilyin's position was different from that of many Russian jurists, who disliked Germany and Tsarist Russia equally.
Revolution and exile

At first Ilyin perceived the February Revolution as the liberation of the people. Along with many other intellectuals he generally approved of it. However, with the October Revolution complete, disappointment followed. On the Second Moscow Conference of Public Figures he said, "The revolution turned into self-interested plundering of the state". Later, he assessed the revolution as the most terrible catastrophe in the history of Russia, the collapse of the whole state. However, unlike many adherents of the old regime, Ilyin did not emigrate immediately. In 1918, Ilyin became a professor of law in Moscow University; his scholarly thesis on Hegel was published.
After April 1918, Ilyin was imprisoned several times for alleged anti-communist activity. His teacher Novgorodtsev was also briefly imprisoned. In 1922, he was eventually expelled among some 160 prominent intellectuals, on the so-called "philosophers' ship" the same year.
Emigration

Between 1923 and 1934 Ilyin worked as a professor of the Russian Scientific Institute in Berlin. He was offered the professorship in the Russian faculty of law in Prague under his teacher Novgorodtsev but he refused. He became the main ideologue of the Russian White movement in emigration and between 1927 and 1930 was a publisher and editor of the Russian-language journal Kolokol (Bell). He lectured in Germany and other European countries.
In 1934, the German Nazis fired Ilyin and put him under police surveillance. In 1938 with financial help from Sergei Rachmaninoff he was able to leave Germany and continue his work in Geneva, Switzerland. He died in Zollikon near Zürich on December 21, 1953. Russian President Vladimir Putin was personally involved in moving his remains back to Russia, and in 2009 consecrated his grave.^[1]
Doctrine

Ilyin's works about Russia

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v t e

Ivan Ilyin was a conservative Russian monarchist in the Slavophile tradition. Starting from his 1918 thesis on Hegel's philosophy, he authored many books on political, social and spiritual topics pertaining to the historical mission of Russia. One of the problems he worked on was the question: what has eventually led Russia to the tragedy of the revolution? He answered that the reason was "the weak, damaged self-respect" of Russians. As a result, mutual distrust and suspicion between the state and the people emerged. The authorities and nobility constantly misused their power, subverting the unity of the people. Ilyin thought that any state must be established as a corporation in which a citizen is a member with certain rights and certain duties. Therefore Ilyin recognized inequality of people as a necessary state of affairs in any country. But that meant that educated upper classes had a special duty of spiritual guidance towards uneducated lower classes. This did not happen in Russia.
The other point was the wrong attitude towards private property among common people in Russia. Ilyin wrote that many Russians believed that private property and large estates are gained not through hard labour but through power and maladministration of officials. Therefore property becomes associated with dishonest behaviour.
The concept of conscience of law

The two above mentioned factors led to egalitarianism and to revolution. The alternative way of Russia according to Ilyin was to develop due conscience of law (правосознание) of an individual based on morality and religiousness. Ilyin developed his concept of the conscience of law for more than 20 years until his death. He understood it as a proper understanding of law by an individual and ensuing obedience to the law. During his life he refused to publish his major work About the Essence of Conscience of Law (О сущности правосознания) and continued to rewrite it. He considered the conscience of law as essential for the very existence of law. Without proper understanding of law and justice, the law would not be able to exist.
Attitude towards monarchy

Another major work of Ilyin, "On Monarchy", was not finished. He planned to write a book concerning the essence of monarchy in the modern world and its differences from the republic consisting of twelve chapters, but he died having written the introduction and seven chapters. Ilyin argued that the main difference lay not in legal matters but in the conscience of law of common people. According to Ilyin, the main distinctions were the following:

• in monarchy, the conscience of law tends to unite the people within the state, but in a republic, the conscience of law tends to disregard the role of the state for the society;
• monarchical conscience of law tends to perceive the state as a family and the monarch as a pater familias, but the republican conscience of law denies this notion. Since the republican conscience of law praises individual freedom in the republican state, people do not recognize the people of the state as a family;
• monarchical conscience of law is very conservative and prone to keeping traditions while republican conscience of law is always eager to rapid change.

Ilyin was a monarchist. He believed that monarchical conscience of law corresponds to such values as religious piety and family. His ideal was the monarch who would serve for the good of the country, would not belong to any party and would embody the union of all people whatever they beliefs are.
However he was critical about the monarchy in Russia. He believed that Nicholas II was to a large degree the one responsible for the collapse of Imperial Russia in 1917. His abdication and the subsequent abdication of his brother Mikhail Alexandrovich were a crucial mistake which led to the abolition of monarchy and consequent troubles.
He was also critical of many figures of the emigration including the Grand Prince Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovich of Russia, who had proclaimed himself the new tsar in exile.
Attitude towards fascism

A number of Ilyin's works^[2][3] (including those written after the German defeat in 1945) treated the subject of fascism. However, Ilyin was staunchly opposed to Nazism in his writings, particularly its xenophobic character.
Antisemitism

Although Ilyin was related by marriage to several notable Jewish families he was accused of antisemitism by Roman Gul, a fellow émigré writer. According to a letter by Gul to Ilyin the former expressed extreme umbrage at Ilyin's suspicions that all those who disagreed with him were Jews.^[4]
In his article "About the important"("О главном") of "Our Tasks"("Наши задачи") Ilyin writes: "It is impossible to build the great and powerful Russia on any hatred: social class hatred (social-democrats, communists, anarchists), not in racial hatred (racists, antisemits), not in political hatred." (Original text: "Великую и сильную Россию невозможно построить на ненависти, ни на классовой (социал-демократы, коммунисты, анархисты), ни на расовой (расисты, антисемиты), ни на политическо-партийной.")
Democracy and totalitarianism in Russia

In his 1949 article, Ilyin argued against both totalitarianism and "formal" democracy in favor of a "third way" of building a state in Russia:^[5]

Facing this creative task, appeals of foreign parties to formal democracy remain naive, light-minded and irresponsive.

---

Перед лицом такой творческой задачи -- призывы зарубежных партий к формальной демократии остаются наивными, легкомысленными и безответственными.

Influence

Ilyin's views influenced other 20th-century Russian authors such as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as well as many Russian nationalists. As of 2005, 23 volumes of Ilyin's collected works have been republished in Russia.
The Russian filmmaker Nikita Mikhalkov, in particular, was instrumental in propagating Ilyin's ideas in post-Soviet Russia. He authored several articles about Ilyin and came up with the idea of transferring his remains from Switzerland to the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow, where the philosopher had dreamed to find his last retreat. The ceremony of reburial was held in October 2005.
Following the death of Ilyin's wife in 1963, Ilyin scholar Nikolai Poltoratzky had Ilyin's manuscripts and papers brought from Zurich to Michigan State University, where he was a professor of Russian. In May 2006, MSU transferred Ilyin's papers to the Russian Culture Fund, affiliated with the Russian Ministry of Culture.^[6]
Major works

• Resistance to Evil By Force (О сопротивлениии злу силою, 1925).
• The Way of Spiritual Revival (1935).
• Foundations of Struggle for the National Russia (1938).
• The Basis of Christian Culture (Основы христианской культуры, 1938).
• About the Future Russia (1948).
• On the Essence of Conscience of Law (О сущности правосознания, 1956).
• The Way to Insight (Путь к очевидности, 1957).
• Axioms of Religious Experience (Аксиомы религиозного опыта, 2 volumes, 1953).
• On Monarchy and Republic (О монархии и республики, 1978).

See also

• Russian philosophy

Notes

• Brooks, David. "Putin Can't Stop". New York Times.
• "I. Ilyin, National-Socialism: The New Spirit. 1933 (Национал-социализм. Новый дух)". Iljinru.tsygankov.ru. Retrieved 2014-08-15.
• "I. Ilyin, On Fascism, 1948 (О фашизме)". Ru-contra.nm.ru. Retrieved 2014-08-15.
• [1]^{[dead link]}
• About the future Russia. What is a state, a corporation or an institution? (О грядущей России. Что есть государство — корпорация или учреждение?), Ivan Ilyin, January 10–17, 1949
• "Michigan State University returning papers of late dissident Russian philosopher Ivan Il’in". Newsroom.msu.edu.

References

• History of Russian Philosophy «История российской Философии »(1951) by N. O. Lossky. Publisher: Allen & Unwin, London ASIN: B000H45QTY International Universities Press Inc NY, NY ISBN 978-0-8236-8074-0 sponsored by Saint Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary.

External links

• Ilyin's online shrine
• New York Times on Ilyin's reburial

[Ryan Ruck]

Russian Leaders Seek To Revisit History As Tension With U.S. Grows

December 25, 2014

A leading Russian elected official on Thursday called for an investigation of the United States' atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II as a "crime against humanity."

The effort to reconsider history by Sergei Naryshkin, the parliament's lower house speaker, comes on the heels of two similar calls by colleagues earlier in the week to revisit significant events involving Russia during the 20th century.

On Wednesday, lawmaker Frants Klintsevich of the ruling United Russia faction called upon his colleagues to reconsider and even annul a 1989 statement of the then-Soviet Union's Congress of People's Deputies denouncing its military invasion in Afghanistan that had gone on for 10 years and led to the deaths of about 15,000 Soviet servicemen and hundreds of thousands of Afghans.

Earlier in the week, upper house speaker Valentina Matviyenko sought to officially void the 1954 handover of Crimea from the Russian Federation to the then-Soviet republic of Ukraine. That action was in effect annulled in March when Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the annexation of Crimea after a referendum whose fairness was questioned by many analysts.

The revisionist efforts come at a time when relations between Putin and the West are growing increasingly frosty as the former Cold War rivals escalate their rhetoric and actions over the fate of Russian neighbor Ukraine. Critics warn that efforts by the Kremlin to rewrite history were a hallmark of the Soviet communist era of totalitarian rule.

The late Soviet leader Josef "Stalin was very good at rewriting contemporary history, but even he never abolished any of the decrees issued by Emperor Nicolas II," Gleb Pavlovsky, president of the Efficient Policy Foundation, a Moscow think tank and a former Kremlin advisor, said.

The 1945 nuclear bombings of the two Japanese cities days before the end of World War II were similar to Nazi crimes, Naryshkin argued at a history science conference in Moscow on Thursday.

"I think that we should discuss this topic together with lawyers and international law experts because crimes against humanity have no limitation period," Naryshkin said, according to the Itar-Tass news service.

"As we well know, the bombings of the two peaceful Japanese cities could not be explained from a military point of view," Naryshkin said. "The atomic bombings … were solely an intimidation demonstration resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of peaceful residents."

A day earlier, Klintsevich contended that the Congress' decision in 1989 to denounce the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan had "nothing to do with historical truth."

The vote, promoted by a democratic faction that included the future Russian President Boris Yeltsin, determined that a 1979 decision by Leonid Brezhnev's Communist Party Politburo to deploy troops in neighboring Afghanistan was a political mistake which "deserved moral and political condemnation."

Klintsevich argued that the 1989 vote was itself politically motivated.

"We had managed to slow down the spreading of the terrorist plague clad in Islamic clothes across the world," Klintsevich told reporters in parliament. "It can be said that we took the initial blow upon ourselves, and the war in Afghanistan gave the world community a certain break which unfortunately was not taken advantage of for a number of reasons."

On Tuesday, Matviyenko declared that it had been illegitimate for then-Soviet Communist Party leader Nikita Khrushchev to hand over Crimea to Ukraine.

Russia annexed Crimea in March following the referendum that took place after thousands of Russian troops in unmarked uniforms had taken over strategic sites across the peninsula. In a March 18 speech, Putin praised the "historic reunification" and in his Dec. 4 state of the union address said Crimea will remain Russian forever.

On Thursday, Putin announced the cancellation of a long-standing Russian tradition, a prolonged New Year's holiday, for an undisclosed number of officials, explaining that "people have a right to take a rest but we can't allow such long vacations for the government."

Political analyst Andrei Piontkovsky denounced this week's looks at history as "delirious ravings aimed to distract the people's attention from their daily economic woes connected with the falling ruble and Western sanctions."

"The Soviet invasion in Afghanistan was exactly the factor which caused the initial spreading of Islamic fundamentalist extremism across the world," said Piontkovsky, a senior researcher at the Academy of Sciences' System Analysis Institute. "In their zeal to condemn the United States and the West in general for anything they can and the way they are going now, the next call would be to denounce the 1945 Dresden bombing as a crime against humanity."

Pavlovsky said the statements are examples of people "intoxicated by their own propaganda which has nothing or little in common with the real picture of the world or its history."

[American Patriot]

Last night before going to bed someone pointed out that the Russians were on the move. Sometime yesterday, they moved thousands of troops and tanks into the Ukraine.

After all the waving of the left hand saying "We're doing nothing", the right hand moved in the military force.

[American Patriot]

Severe fights go on near Donetsk airport, more Russian troops reportedly enter Ukraine

Print version
Jan. 19, 2015, 4:59 p.m. | Kyiv Post+ — by Kyiv Post+, Oksana Grytsenko

A picture taken on Jan. 19 shows a hospital, which was destroyed after shelling between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk. Fighting eased in the Donetsk region after Ukraine launched a major offensive and claimed to clear pro-Russian rebels from most of the airport outside the key eastern city. There were a number of sporadic explosions overnight, but the violence seemed to be far less than in previous days, when heavy clashes shook the area around the airport and shelling moved closer toward the city centre, killing at least 10 civilians. AFP PHOTO/ ALEKSANDER GAYUK



​​Editor's Note: ​Kyiv Post+ is a public service offering special coverage of Russia's war against Ukraine and the aftermath of the EuroMaidan Revolution. All articles, investigative reports and opinions published under this heading are free for republication during Ukraine's time of national emergency. Kyiv Post+ is a collaboration of the Kyiv Post newspaper and the affiliated non-profit Media Development Foundation.


Russia's escalation of its war against Ukraine intensified over the weekend, with the Ukrainian army using tanks on Jan. 17 to break through an encirclement of Donetsk international airport and military helicopters to evacuate the wounded.
However, each time Russian troops and their proxies in eastern Ukraine face battlefield setbacks, the Kremlin reinforces their military position. And Jan. 19 proved no exception. Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council reported that two battalion-sized tactical groups of the Russian army crossed the Ukrainian eastern border. (A battalion in Russia reportedly can range in size from a few hundred to about 1,500 soldiers.) Earlier, Ukrainian officials reported the presence of more than 7,000 Russian troops fighting in Ukraine.
The Ukrainian army's counteroffensive allowed it to regain control over the new terminal of the Donetsk airport and advance to regain control of the territory.
As of 8 p.m. on Jan. 18, the Ukrainian troops advanced two kilometers inside Donetsk, a Kyiv Post source in 95th airborne brigade that is fighting in the airport said. To stop them, the Russian-backed separatists blew up a bridge in Donetsk, closing entrance to the city from the north.
Official sources, however, didn’t confirm this report.
“There were no tasks to enter Donetsk. Our task is only to free the airport, which has to be Ukrainian, based on Minks agreements,” Andriy Lysenko, spokesman of Ukraine’s anti-terrorist operation, told the Kyiv Post.
The Ukrainian forces took the Donetsk airport in late May and since then they have resisted the constant attempts by insurgents to take it over, becoming the pride of the nation and earning the nickname “cyborgs” for their super-human capabilities. The video filmed by drone last week showed that the Donetsk airport was destroyed almost to the ground and it now has more symbolic than strategic significance.
The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed in its statement on Jan. 18 that the airport should be given to the separatists, according to the Minsk agreements. Aleksandr Zakharchenko, prime minister of self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, claimed in his statement on Jan. 19 that Ukraine’s forces made six attacks with infantry and armored vehicles, but failed.
Zakharchenko said the Ukrainian army sustained heavy losses and claimed that three Ukrainian soldiers were captured by separatists, when the tank column advanced into Donetsk. But Russian human rights activist Elena Vasiliyeva reported about 382 soldiers of the Russian regular army were killed and about 500 wounded over three last day in eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian soldiers of different units claimed that there were Russian tanks used in the fights near Donetsk airport.
Lysenko said that three Ukrainian soldiers were killed and 66 wounded over the last 24 hours, without elaborating the exact losses in fights by Donetsk airport. On Jan. 17, Ukrainian troops evacuated three killed and 23 wounded soldiers from Donetsk airport, Yuriy Biriukov, an adviser of Ukraine’s president wrote on his Facebook page. The 14 wounded Ukrainian soldiers were evacuated from Donetsk airport on Jan. 18, volunteer Tetiana Rychkova reported.
Lysenko said that now the Ukrainian troops were trying to regain control over the old terminal of the airport. The most severe fights were going on in the village of Pisky, located in 1.5 kilometers from the airport, the place, from which the Ukrainian defenders of Donetsk airport were receiving supply with weapons and people for all the months of standoff.
Fighter of the Dnipro 1 volunteer battalion with the nickname “Sergeant Major” told the Kyiv Post that his comrades, who were defending the bridge near Pisky, were in desperate situation under fire from Russian tanks. “The tanks are directly firing to the bridge, while our guys have nothing except grenade launchers,” he said. “They need reinforcement.”
Zakharchenko predicted that separatist forces would gain total control over the village by the end of the day.
Alla Megil, spokeswoman of 5th battalion of the Right Sector, another volunteer group that is fighting near the Donetsk airport, confirmed that the situation is very tense in Pisky and the village of Tonenke located nearby. “The shelling doesn’t stop there,” she said. Megil added that three fighters of the Right Sector were wounded over the week end and claimed that Ukrainian forces managed to burn down six tanks near Pisky over the weekend.
These grim events were happening just at the moment when Ukrainian diplomats were preparing for the new round of peace negotiations with Russian side this week with mediation of German and French foreign affairs ministers in Berlin on Jan. 21.
But the ongoing escalation could “threatened to completely unravel a hard-won September 2014 cease-fire,” Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon said in his statement on Jan. 18.

[American Patriot]

Ukraine Accuses Russia of Sending More Troops and Artillery to Aid Rebels

By ANDREW E. KRAMERJAN. 19, 2015

Photo

A separatist soldier inspected the damage to a hospital in Donetsk, Ukraine, on Monday after it had been hit by artillery fire. Credit Manu Brabo/Associated Press

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MOSCOW — In as clear a sign as any of the unraveling peace process in eastern Ukraine, the authorities in Kiev accused Russia on Monday of again sending regular army soldiers into Ukraine to prop up pro-Russian separatists who were losing a battle.
About 700 soldiers crossed Russia’s western border into the snowy war zone in eastern Ukraine, the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council said in a statement that was not possible to verify independently.
They came armed with a wide array of heavy weapons, Prime Minister Arseniy P. Yatsenyuk told journalists in Kiev, the capital. The country’s intelligence agencies “confirm that men and equipment entered from Russia,” he said. Howitzers and other artillery and antiaircraft systems were said to have crossed the border.
“These items cannot be bought in a market in Donetsk or the Russian Federation,” Mr. Yatsenyuk said. “They can only come from the stock of the Russian Defense Ministry.”

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Related Coverage

• 
  Rebels Claim to Have Control of Ukraine AirportJAN. 16, 2015
  
  
• 
  10 Are Killed in Ukraine as Diplomacy Hits a WallJAN. 13, 2015
  
  

The accusation followed a weekend of escalating and bloody mayhem alarming even by the standards of eastern Ukraine.

Continue reading the main story

Ukraine Crisis in Maps

The latest updates to the current visual survey of the continuing dispute, with maps and satellite imagery showing rebel and military movement.

After first being partly pushed from the ruins of the main terminal of the Donetsk airport last week, the Ukrainian military counterattacked with tanks over the weekend and claimed to have recaptured all the lost ground.
At least four Ukrainian soldiers were killed and scores wounded in the fighting, and human rights groups in Donetsk were investigating reports that up to 10 civilians had been killed by stray shells.
Beyond the immediate conflict zone, an explosion outside a courthouse in Kharkiv, another eastern city, wounded 12 people in the latest in a string of politically hued bombings and assassinations in eastern Ukraine that the authorities have labeled terrorist acts.
Bombs have detonated in centers where volunteers collect goods for the army, in bars frequented by activists who support Ukraine’s government and outside hospitals treating wounded soldiers.
On Sunday, an unexplained explosion destroyed nine parked cars in a district of Kiev.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry accused Ukraine on Monday of making a disingenuous offer to reinstate the cease-fire negotiated on Sept. 5. The ministry said the authorities in Kiev had first ignored peace overtures in a letter from President Vladimir V. Putin that was sent late last week. Ukraine’s president, Petro O. Poroshenko, proposed an immediate recommitment to a cease-fire in the east. “Ukraine is ready to sign a cease-fire agreement if the sides stick to the Minsk accords,” he said, referring to the talks in Belarus that led to the cease-fire. “Ukraine wants peace.”
Both sides in the conflict concede that what they are now fighting over is chiefly a symbol, and a battered, ugly one at that: the ruins of the airport.
For the Ukrainians, the airport forms the army’s toehold in the rebel capital city, Donetsk, illustrating to residents there that a breakaway region will never really be viable or independent.
For Russia, the continual rebel efforts to seize the ruins achieve substantially the same goal: highlighting the perpetual state of insecurity Ukraine will live in, so long as Russia’s interests are not reckoned with. Russia’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement over the weekend saying Ukraine should voluntarily hand over the airport to separatist control.
Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story
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European foreign ministers meeting Monday opted to keep economic sanctions against Russia in place, despite suggestions in an internal European Union policy document leaked last week that European nations should seek to revive some cooperation with Russia.
Fighters with the Donetsk People’s Republic, one of the separatist forces, seized control of the airport’s runway and taxiways last week, according to Ukrainian accounts, while the terminal buildings were the setting of bitter, close combat. Pro-Russian groups controlled the second floor and above in the main terminal building, while the Ukrainian forces held lower floors and access tunnels. Stairwells and even holes in the floors became front lines.
In the tank assault on Sunday, Ukraine’s army claimed to have expelled the separatists from the runway, allowing the army to move new forces into the terminal and evacuate casualties.
That success soon led to a reversal. Ukrainian and separatist authorities both reported Monday that the separatists had collapsed the second floor in an explosion, wounding or killing an unknown number of Ukrainians below.
Yuri Biryukov, an adviser to Mr. Poroshenko, wrote on Facebook that “the debris fell on the fighters” and that “there are many wounded.”
Despite the Ukrainian claims, there was no indication on Monday that newly arrived Russian forces were involved in the battle for the airport.

[Ryan Ruck]

Russia's Medvedev: We Are in 'a New Cold War'

February 13, 2016

Russia and the U.S. clashed over how to carry out a day-old cease-fire plan for Syria, underscoring the tenuous level of trust between the two powers as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said peace efforts are at a pivotal stage.

On stage at a security conference in Germany, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov suggested that the U.S. is reneging on the agreement and put the chances of success at less than 50 percent. Secretary of State John Kerry, addressing the meeting separately, demanded an end to Russian bombing of groups opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

“This is a hinge point,” Kerry told the Munich Security Conference on Saturday. “We hope this week can be a week of change. It is critical for all of us to take advantage of this moment to make this cessation of hostilities work.”

All major outside powers in Syria’s five-year-old conflict, including the U.S., Russia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran, on Friday backed a truce that’s set to start on Feb. 19, with airdrops of humanitarian aid to begin as soon as this weekend. Peace efforts intensified as Russian President Vladimir Putin’s almost six-month bombing campaign backing Assad delivers results, with government forces threatening to drive rebels out of Aleppo, one of their strongholds.

Lavrov said the agreement reached in Munich before the conference will fail unless there’s constant military coordination between Russia and the U.S. in Syria. “If we have a practical goal of a cease-fire, then without cooperation between our militaries, this won’t lead to anything,” he said on a panel with his colleagues from Germany and the U.K.

Kerry warned Russia to stop bombing Assad opponents that aren’t jihadists. “To date, the vast majority -- in our opinion -- of Russia’s attacks have been against legitimate opposition groups,” he said in his speech. “We think it is critical that the Russians’ targeting changes.”

Air Campaigns

The U.S. has refused to coordinate its coalition’s airstrikes against Islamic State in Syria with the Russian bombing campaign because of accusations Russia isn’t focused on the jihadists but the Assad opposition. The U.S. has only agreed to an accord to avoid incidents in the skies above Syria.

The U.S. and Russia plan to chair a meeting with military officials in Geneva next week to seek agreement on which areas of Syria can be bombed. The cessation of hostilities is due to apply to all sides in the conflict apart from Islamic State, the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front and any other groups designated as terrorist by the UN Security Council.

Russia’s military intervention since September has upended U.S.-backed efforts to force Assad from power, raised speculation that U.S. allies Saudi Arabia and Turkey may escalate their involvement in the conflict and added to the flow of refugees that’s straining unity in the European Union.

In other signs of the tension between Russia and the U.S. and its allies, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev spoke of a new cold war and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said Russia is using its nuclear arsenal to intimidate Europe.

“The political line of NATO toward Russia remains unfriendly and closed,” Medvedev told the Munich conference. “It can be said more sharply: We have slid into a time of a new cold war.”

Russia Sanctions

Kerry sought to maintain pressure on Putin over Russia’s encroachment on Ukraine, which led to sanctions on Russia and a peace plan brokered by Germany and France last year in Minsk, Belarus, that has stalled. With the armed standoff between pro-Russian separatists and government troops in eastern Ukraine unresolved, Lavrov met his counterparts from Germany, France and Ukraine on the conference’s sidelines on Saturday.

“Russia has a simple choice: fully implement Minsk or continue to experience economically damaging sanctions,” Kerry said in Munich.

[vector7]

The Secret U.S. Army Study That Targets Moscow

April 15 2016 at 3:42 PM

A quarter century after the Cold War, the Pentagon is worried about Russia’s military prowess again.

By Bryan Bender
April 14, 2016



Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster has a shaved head and gung-ho manner that only add to his reputation as the U.S. Army’s leading warrior-intellectual, one who often quotes famed Prussian general and military theorist Carl Von Clausewitz. A decade ago, McMaster fought a pitched battle inside the Pentagon for a new concept of warfare to address the threat from Islamist terrorists and insurgents in Afghanistan, Iraq and other trouble spots. Now, his new mission is more focused. Target: Moscow.

POLITICO has learned that, following the stunning success of Russia’s quasi-secret incursion into Ukraine, McMaster is quietly overseeing a high-level government panel intended to figure out how the Army should adapt to this Russian wake-up call. Partly, it is a tacit admission of failure on the part of the Army — and the U.S. government more broadly.

“It is clear that while our Army was engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq, Russia studied U.S. capabilities and vulnerabilities and embarked on an ambitious and largely successful modernization effort,” McMaster told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week. “In Ukraine, for example, the combination of unmanned aerial systems and offensive cyber and advanced electronic warfare capabilities depict a high degree of technological sophistication.”

In Ukraine, a rapidly mobilized Russian-supplied rebel army with surprisingly lethal tanks, artillery and

anti-tank weapons has unleashed swarms of unmanned aerial vehicles and cyberattacks that shut down battlefield communications and even GPS.

The discussions of what has been gleaned so far on visits to Ukraine—and from various other studies conducted by experts in and out of government in the U.S. and Europe—have highlighted a series of early takeaways, according to a copy of a briefing that was delivered in recent weeks to the top leadership in the Pentagon and in allied capitals.

U.S. military and intelligence officials worry that Moscow now has the advantage in key areas. Lighter armored vehicles like those the Army relied on heavily in Iraq and Afghanistan are highly vulnerable to its new weapons. And main battle tanks like Russia’s T-90—thought to be an anachronism in recent conflicts—are still decisive.

McMaster added that “Russia possesses a variety of rocket, missile and cannon artillery systems that outrange and are more lethal than U.S. Army artillery systems and munitions.” Its tanks, meanwhile, are so improved that they are “largely invulnerable to anti-tank missiles,” says retired General Wesley Clark, who served as NATO commander from 1997 to 2000 and has been sounding the alarm about what the Ukraine conflict means for the U.S. military.

Also on display in Ukraine to an alarming degree: Moscow’s widespread political subversion of Ukrainian institutions, part of what experts are now calling “hybrid warfare” that combines military power with covert efforts to undermine an enemy government. Russia has since then also intervened with ground forces and airstrikes in Syria—apparently somewhat successfully—and flexed its muscles in other ways. This week, two Russian fighter jets and a military helicopter repeatedly buzzed a U.S. Navy warship in the Baltic Sea, despite radio warnings.

McMaster’s response is the Russia New Generation Warfare Study, whose government participants have already made several unpublicized trips to the front lines in Ukraine. The high-level but low-profile effort is intended to ignite a wholesale rethinking—and possibly even a redesign—of the Army in the event it has to confront the Russians in Eastern Europe.

It is expected to have profound impact on what the U.S. Army will look like in the coming years, the types of equipment it buys and how its units train. Some of the early lessons will be road tested in a major war game planned for June in Poland. Says retired Army Chief of Staff General Gordon Sullivan: “That is all designed to demonstrate that we are in the game.”

Among those who have studied the Russian operation in Ukraine closely is Phillip Karber, president of the Potomac Foundation and former Marine who has made 22 trips to Ukraine since 2014. “Few in the West have paid much attention to Russia’s doctrinal pivot to ‘New Generation War’ until its manifestation in Ukraine,” says Karber. Another surprise, he adds, “is the relative lack of Western attention, particularly given the unexpected scale and duration of the conflict, as well as the unanticipated Russian aggressiveness in sponsoring it.

Karber says the lethality of new Russian munitions has been striking, including the use of scatterable mines, which the U.S. States no longer possesses. And he counts at least 14 different types of drones used in the conflict and reports that one Ukrainian unit he was embedded with witnessed up to eight drone flights in a single day. “How do you attack an adversary’s UAV?” asks Clark. “Can we blind, disrupt or shoot down these systems? The U.S. military hasn’t suffered any significant air attacks since 1943.”

The new Army undertaking is headed by Brigadier General Peter L. Jones, commandant of the U.S. Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia. But it is the brainchild of McMaster, who as head of the Army Capabilities Integration Center at Fort Eustis, Virginia, is responsible for figuring out what the Army should look like in 2025 and beyond.

Clark describes McMaster’s effort as the most dramatic rethinking since the collapse of the Soviet Union. “These are the kind of issues the U.S. Army hasn’t worked since the end of the Cold War 25 years ago.”

The question is why the U.S. government—and the Army in particular—has once again allowed its attention to be diverted for so long that it has been caught by surprise by a major development like Russia’s enhanced capabilities.

While Russian President Vladimir Putin undertook an aggressive military buildup, the U.S. Army actually drew up plans to shrink the active-duty force by some 40,000, from about 490,000 to 450,000 over the next several years. That plan is now in question. A bill recently proposed in the House of Representatives would halt the reduction. And last month, the Alaska delegation successfully got the Pentagon to back down on its plans to deactivate an airborne brigade. One of the justifications that were cited: a newly belligerent Russia.

There is also a question about whether McMaster is the general for the job. For most of his career, McMaster has been a controversial figure. In a book he published earlier in his career, Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam, he attacked the generals of the Vietnam era for not admitting frankly that the war was unwinnable. Yet later, when McMaster pushed for a complex strategy of counterinsurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan, critics said McMaster and his fellow so-called “COIN-dinistas” misrepresented and oversold their own war-fighting strategy. Counterinsurgency calls not just for fighting insurgents but for a kind of “hearts-and-minds” campaign to win over local populations through reconstruction, policing and economic progress that usually takes at least a decade.

But the U.S. never intended to stay in Afghanistan or Iraq for that long.

Now reality is taking McMaster in precisely the direction that some of his critics said he and the other COIN specialists needed to focus on more in the first place: orienting the Army to what it does best, confronting conventional adversaries. The question is whether the U.S. military is able to adopt a realistic approach to Russian aggression without getting the nation into World War III.

Oddly enough, the model for the new effort is the Army’s detailed study of a war fought 43 years ago, one that most people have forgotten about. As a guide to this new major review, Politico has learned, McMaster is dusting off the Army’s landmark after-action review of the Yom Kippur War between Israel and Moscow’s then-proxies, Egypt and Syria.

***
In October 1973, as America's painful odyssey in the jungles of Vietnam was winding down, a war broke out thousands of miles away that would profoundly change the U.S. Army.

Tank losses in the first six days of the Yom Kippur War were greater than the entire U.S. tank inventory stationed in Europe to deter the Soviet Union when Egypt and Syria launched the surprise attack on Israel. In the most recent major armored battles, during World War II three decades earlier, opposing tank armies faced off at an average of 750 yards. In the Yom Kippur War, it was 3,000 yards or more, a far bigger killing field.

In the aftermath, Army Chief of Staff General Creighton Abrams dispatched a pair of generals to walk the battlefields of smoldering armor, obtain damaged Russian equipment and find out what the Army “should learn from that war.”

“The Yom Kippur War had a shock effect on the U.S. Army,” recalls Karber, who participated in what came to be known as the Starry-Baer panel, named for the officers who oversaw it. “It challenged decades of accumulated assumptions.”

What the Army learned from the Yom Kippur War was that “powerful new antitank weapons, swift-moving formations cutting across the battlefield, and interaction between ground formations and the air arm showed how much the world around our Army had changed as we focused on Vietnam,” as one summary of the Starry-Baer report put it. General Donn Starry’s own description of the circumstances four decades ago could easily describe what the Army is confronting today, if the word Vietnam were replaced with Iraq or Afghanistan, and the Soviet Union with Russia.

“Military attention turned back to the nation’s commitment to NATO Europe,” Starry wrote back then. “We discovered the Soviets had been very busy while we were preoccupied with Vietnam. They had revised operational concepts at the tactical and operational levels, increased their fielded force structure and introduced new equipment featuring one or more generations of new technology.”

Fast forward to 2016. After a decade and a half of counterinsurgency operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and beyond—longer than even in Vietnam—decades of assumptions about warfare are once again being re-evaluated. McMaster and other top generals have concluded that while the United States was bogged down in the Middle East, Moscow focused its energies on rebuilding its own forces to potentially counter America’s tactics.


http://www.politico.com/magazine/sto...t-study-213811

[Ryan Ruck]

A surprisingly decent article from Politico? What'd they do, let the single guy there with a brain out of his sub-basement cubicle?

[vector7]

Obama Requests Military Support for Possible War Against Russia

Originally appeared at Off Guardian

According to an April 23rd article carried by Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten (German Economic News), U.S. President Barack Obama is “demanding the active deployment of the Bundeswehr [Germany’s armed forces, including their Army, Navy, and Air Force] to NATO’s eastern borders� at Poland and the Baltic republics, to join the quadrupling of America’s forces there, on and near the borders of Russia. This is an extreme violation of what Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to when he ended the Soviet Union and its NATO-mirror organization the Warsaw Pact, but it’s actually culminating a process that began shortly after he agreed to America’s terms, which included that NATO “not move one inch to the east.�

Furthermore, DWN reports that on April 25th, the U.S. President will hold a summit meeting in Hannover, Germany with the leaders of Germany (Angela Merkel), Italy (Matteo Renzi), France (Francois Hollande), and Britain (David Cameron). The presumed objective of this meeting is to agree to establish in the NATO countries bordering on Russia a military force of these five countries, a force threatening Russia with an invasion, if or when NATO subsequently decides that the ‘threat from Russia’ be ‘responded to’ militarily.

NATO’s encirclement of Russia with forces hostile to it is supposedly defensive — not an offensive operation — against Russia and is presented as such by our media. During the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, J. F. Kennedy didn’t consider Nikita Khrushchev’s plan to base nuclear missiles in Cuba to be ‘defensive’ on the USSR’s part — and neither does Russia’s President Vladimir Putin consider America’s far bigger operation of surrounding Russia with such weapons to be ‘defensive’. The U.S. government, and NATO, act as if Russia is threatening them rather than them threatening and encircling Russia — and their news media transmit this lie as if it were a truth and one worthy of being taken seriously. In actual fact, NATO has already expanded right up to Russia’s western borders.

Obama is thus now adding to the economic sanctions against Russia that he had imposed because of Russia’s alleged ‘seizure’ of Crimea from Ukraine after the US and EU engineered coup overthrew Russia’s ally Viktor Yanukovych who had led Ukraine until the coup in February 2014.

Even though Western-sponsored polls in Crimea, both before and after the coup, had shown higher than 90% support by Crimeans for rejoining with Russia, right after Crimeans voted overwhelmingly to rejoin Russia, Obama slapped sanctions against Russia. Nuclear weapons were prepared, both on the U.S.-EU side and on the Russian side, for a possible nuclear war.

This is no mere restoration of the Cold War (which was supposedly based on the capitalist-communist ideological disagreement); it’s getting forces into position for a possible invasion of Russia, pure-and-simple — raw conquest — though no major news-media in the West are reporting it as being such.

The current preparation doesn’t necessarily mean a nuclear war will result from them. Russia might accept whatever the demands ‘the West’ makes of it and thus lose its sovereignty. Alternatively, if Russia stands-its-ground and refuses to yield up its national sovereignty,‘the West’ (the U.S.leadership, and the leaderships in its allied countries) could cease with its evermore-ominous threats and simply withdraw from Russia’s borders.

Basically, by 2013 the U.S. leadership had decided to take over Ukraine and refused to acknowledge the rights of the Crimean people to reject the new dispensation in Kiev and decide on its own future — and, by late February 2014, Russia’s leadership decided toprotect them against the type of invasion that subsequently occurred in Ukraine’s former Donbass region, where the opposition to Obama’s coup was even more intense.

The West keeps asserting that Russia is somehow in the wrong here. However, since even the head of Stratfor has called what Obama did in Ukraine “the most blatant coup in history�, and since the fact that it was a U.S. coup has been documented extensively on cellphone and other videos, and in the most thorough academic investigation that has been performed of the matter — and was even acknowledged by Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko, a participant in the coup, to have been a coup — and since evidence survives on the Internet of the U.S. Embassy’s preparations as early as 1 March 2013 for the February 2014 coup; and since even the U.S. government’s hired polls showed that Crimeans rejected overwhelmingly the U.S. coup and supported rejoining Russia; the question still needs to be answered: What is the basis of the West’s aggressive actions threatening Russia’s national security other than its own imperialist ambitions towards Russia camouflaged with the lies about an aggressive Russia and an aggressive President Putin the Western mass media have been bombarding the public with? And, that’s a very worrisome basis — worrisome regarding, essentially, a type of dictatorshipin the West, rather than any dictatorship outside it. The aggression and the threat here seem clearly to be coming from the West, against the East.

Back in January, Russian President Vladimir Putin had once again called out American President Barack Obama on Obama’s big lie that America’s “ABM� weapons to disable in-flight nuclear missiles were being installed in Europe in order to protect Europe against Iranian nuclear missiles. Now, however, while the U.S. acknowledges that Iran doesn’t have, and won’t have, any nuclear missiles, Obama is stepping up (instead of ending) those same ABM installations in Europe, close to Russia’s borders. The only real reason they have been installed, as Putin argues, is in order to enable a sudden nuclear attack against Russia capable of disabling Russia’s retaliatory capacity in a matter of minutes.

The only rational response by the Western public to what Obama and his foreign allies are doing is to recognize what is actually happening and to take action against their own leaders, before this increasingly high-stakes confrontation becomes terminal. In this instance, the people of the countries that comprise the political West need to defend themselves against their own national leaders. This is a situation that is frequently encountered in dictatorships.

The key questions are not being asked in the Western press, however; they are being ignored by it. Unless these questions are publicly dealt with — and soon — the answer to them all could well be terminal for millions of civilians in Europe and elsewhere.

The closer things get to a nuclear war, the more difficult it is for either side to back down from it — and this is especially the case with the aggressor, most especially when it falsely claims that it is being aggressed-against.

This is the reason why the lies peddled by the political leadership of the West urgently need to be exposed.

[Ryan Ruck]

Top Navy Official: Russian Sub Activity Expands To Cold War Level

April 19, 2016

Russia is deploying its ballistic missiles and attack submarines in numbers, range and aggression not seen in two decades, according to a top U.S. Navy official.
In an exclusive interview, the commander of U.S. Naval Forces in Europe told CNN that the buildup reflects an alarming strategic world view.

"NATO is viewed as an existential threat to Russia, and in the post-Cold War period, the expansion of NATO eastward closer to Russia and our military capability they view as a very visceral threat to Russia," Adm. Mark Ferguson said.

Ferguson spoke from his base in Naples, Italy, home to U.S. Naval forces in Europe and the Navy's 6th Fleet.

Adding to U.S. apprehension, Russia is deploying new submarines that are harder for U.S. naval forces to track and detect following years and billions of dollars in investment.

They are quieter, better armed and have a greater range of operation.

"The submarines that we're seeing are much more stealthy," Ferguson said. "We're seeing (the Russians) have more advanced weapons systems, missile systems that can attack land at long ranges, and we also see their operating proficiency is getting better as they range farther from home waters."

The U.S. currently has 53 submarines in its inventory, but because of decommissioning and budget decisions, Ferguson said that figure will drop to 41 by the late 2020s.

"We cannot maintain 100% awareness of Russian sub activity today," retired Adm. James Stavridis, a former NATO supreme allied commander and current dean of the Fletcher School, told CNN. "Our attack subs are better, but not by much. Russian subs pose an existential threat to U.S. carrier groups."

The increased Russian sub activity is backed by a much broader military expansion.

Russia is adding or upgrading some 12 naval bases across the Arctic Circle -- expanding its capability to send subs in numbers through the crucial Greenland-Iceland-U.K. gap into the Atlantic -- and closer to U.S. and NATO territorial waters.

They country also stationed six submarines in the Black Sea recently, giving them greater reach in the Mediterranean.

More worrying to the U.S., Moscow is also adding entirely new categories of submarines with greater capabilities to its arsenal.

"They have increased the readiness levels of the force," Ferguson said. "They are operating it with more ... out-of-area deployments, and what we are seeing is an improvement in the readiness of that force as well."

The U.S. believes the new activity is designed to achieve multiple objectives, including denying NATO and the U.S. the ability to operate within Russia's so-called "near abroad."

Ferguson said that one important goal for Russia "is to build their own naval capability in the undersea domain to begin to deny NATO and the United States the ability to maneuver on the maritime flanks of NATO."

Increasingly alarmed by Russia's new sub developments, the U.S. and its NATO allies are launching new training exercises in anti-submarine warfare and deploying new systems, including the P8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft.

Russia's growing military activity extends above the surface as well.

A Russian fighter jet's fly-by of the USS Donald Cook this week -- coming within 30 feet laterally and 100 feet vertically -- is behavior U.S. naval commanders have not witnessed since the Cold War.

"We had radio calls in both English and Russian and the aircraft didn't respond and proceeded on a course directly at the ship," Ferguson said. "While we had seen these interactions before, this one was different because of the proximity to the ship, and the altitude and the flight path that it took."

[Ryan Ruck]

Russia Is Harassing U.S. Diplomats All Over Europe

June 27, 2016

Russian intelligence and security services have been waging a campaign of harassment and intimidation against U.S. diplomats, embassy staff and their families in Moscow and several other European capitals that has rattled ambassadors and prompted Secretary of State John F. Kerry to ask Vladimir Putin to put a stop to it.

At a recent meeting of U.S. ambassadors from Russia and Europe in Washington, U.S. ambassadors to several European countries complained that Russian intelligence officials were constantly perpetrating acts of harassment against their diplomatic staff that ranged from the weird to the downright scary. Some of the intimidation has been routine: following diplomats or their family members, showing up at their social events uninvited or paying reporters to write negative stories about them.

But many of the recent acts of intimidation by Russian security services have crossed the line into apparent criminality. In a series of secret memos sent back to Washington, described to me by several current and former U.S. officials who have written or read them, diplomats reported that Russian intruders had broken into their homes late at night, only to rearrange the furniture or turn on all the lights and televisions, and then leave. One diplomat reported that an intruder had defecated on his living room carpet.

In Moscow, where the harassment is most pervasive, diplomats reported slashed tires and regular harassment by traffic police. Former ambassador Michael McFaul was hounded by government-paid protesters, and intelligence personnel followed his children to school. The harassment is not new; in the first term of the Obama administration, Russian intelligence personnel broke into the house of the U.S. defense attache in Moscow and killed his dog, according to multiple former officials who read the intelligence reports.

But since the 2014 Russian intervention in Ukraine, which prompted a wide range of U.S. sanctions against Russian officials and businesses close to Putin, harassment and surveillance of U.S. diplomatic staff in Moscow by security personnel and traffic police have increased significantly, State Department press secretary John Kirby confirmed to me.

“Since the return of Putin, Russia has been engaged in an increasingly aggressive gray war across Europe. Now it’s in retaliation for Western sanctions because of Ukraine. The widely reported harassment is another front in the gray war,” said Norm Eisen, U.S. ambassador the Czech Republic from 2011 to 2014. “They are hitting American diplomats literally where they live.”

The State Department has taken several measures in response to the increased level of nefarious activity by the Russian government. All U.S. diplomats headed for Europe now receive increased training on how to handle Russian harassment, and the European affairs bureau run by Assistant Secretary Victoria Nuland has set up regular interagency meetings on tracking and responding to the incidents.

McFaul told me he and his family were regularly followed and the Russian intelligence services wanted his family to know they were being watched. Other embassy officials also suffered routine harassment that increased significantly after the Ukraine-related sanctions. Those diplomats who were trying to report on Russian activities faced the worst of it.

“It was part of a way to put pressure on government officials who were trying to do their reporting jobs. It definitely escalated when I was there. After the invasion of Ukraine, it got much, much worse,” McFaul said. “We were feeling embattled out there in the embassy.”

There was a debate inside the Obama administration about how to respond, and ultimately President Obama made the decision not to respond with similar measures against Russian diplomats, McFaul said.

A spokesman for the Russian Embassy in Washington sent me a long statement both tacitly admitting to the harassment and defending it as a response to what he called U.S. provocations and mistreatment of Russian diplomats in the United States.

“The deterioration of U.S.-Russia relations, which was not caused by us, but rather by the current Administrations’ policy of sanctions and attempts to isolate Russian, had a negative affect on the functioning of diplomatic missions, both in U.S. and Russia,” the spokesman said. “In diplomatic practice there is always the principle of reciprocity and, indeed, for the last couple of years our diplomatic staff in the United States has been facing certain problems. The Russian side has never acted proactively to negatively affect U.S. diplomats in any way.”

Evelyn Farkas, who served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia until last year, said that there is no equivalence between whatever restrictions Russian diplomats are subjected to in the United States and the harassment and intimation that U.S. diplomats suffer at the hands of the Russian security services. The fact that the Russian government stands accused of murdering prominent diplomats and defectors in European countries adds a level of fear for Russia’s targets.

“When the Russian government singles people out for this kind of intimidation, going from intimidation to harassment to something worse is not inconceivable,” Farkas said.

Kirby told me that the State Department takes the safety and well-being of American diplomatic and consular personnel abroad and their accompanying family members extremely seriously. “We have therefore repeatedly raised our concerns about harassment of our diplomatic and consular staff with the Russians, including at the highest levels,” he said.

Kerry raised the issue directly with Putin during his visit to Moscow in March. Putin made no promises about ending the harassment, which continued after Kerry returned to Washington. The U.S. ambassadors to Europe are asking the State Department to do more.

Leading members of Congress who are involved in diplomacy with Europe see the lack of a more robust U.S. response as part of an effort by the Obama administration to project a veneer of positive U.S.-Russian relations that doesn’t really exist.

“The problem is there have been no consequences for Russia,” said Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio), who serves as president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. “The administration continues to pursue a false narrative that Russia can be our partner. They clearly don’t want to be our partner, they’ve identified us as an adversary, and we need to prepare for that type of relationship.”

[American Patriot]

Hmmmmm

[Ryan Ruck]

Russia Suspends US Embassy Use of Diplomatic Properties in Moscow

July 28, 2017

Russia is suspending the use of all warehouses in Moscow by the US embassy starting from August 1, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

"The Russian side is suspending as of August 1 the use by the US embassy in Russia of all warehouses on the Dorozhnaya Street in Moscow and the dacha compound in Serebryanyy Bor," the ministry said in a statement.

The move comes following the US Senate's approval of a new set of sanctions against Russia, Iran and North Korea, which is yet to be signed by President Donald Trump. The bill limits Trump's ability to lift the restrictions on Moscow.

Moscow also offered to Washington to cut the number of its diplomatic staff by September 1 commensurate to the number of Russian diplomats. The Russian Foreign Ministry offered to the United States to limit the number of its diplomats in Russia to 455 people.

"We are offering to the US side to bring the numbers of US diplomatic and technical staff working in the US embassy in Moscow, in general consulates in St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg and Vladivostok to reflect the exact number of Russian diplomats and technical staff who are in the United States. This means that the total number of employees in US diplomatic and consular agencies in Russia will be cut to 455," the ministry said in a statement.

Russia will give a "mirror response" should the United States introduce new unilateral measures to cut the numbers of Russian diplomats in the country.

Russia reserves the reciprocal right to respond to the latest sanctions bill passed in the US Senate by hitting US interests, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

"We reserve the right in a manner of reciprocity to other measures that may affect the interests of the United States," the ministry said in a statement.

In late 2016, the Obama administration slapped a new batch of sanctions on Russia and expelled 35 Russian diplomats on the pretext of Moscow's alleged meddling in the US presidential election.

Trump now has 10 days, excluding Sundays, to decide whether to sign the bill into law or veto the legislation, at which point the Congress could override his veto by a two-thirds majority.

The bill passed the House of Representatives on Tuesday by a vote of 419 to three.

"The new bill seeks to create unfair competitive advantages for the US in the global economy via political tools," the ministry said.

The bill has already prompted criticism within the European Union. France and Germany have so far spoken out against the bill that the US House passed overwhelmingly on Tuesday as one that adversely affects European industries while advancing US commercial interests.

Despite that, Moscow is doing everything in its power to normalize bilateral ties with the United States.

"It is well known that Russia did and continues doing everything possible to normalize bilateral relations, to develop ties and cooperation with the United States on crucial issues of the international agenda, including before all the fight against terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, illegal drug trafficking, illegal migration, cybercrime, etc. We believed and we continue to believe that global issues could only be resolved jointly. We are sure that most people on the planet share this approach," the statement read.

The statement noted that the idea of Russophobia and confrontation has taken root within "certain circles" in the United States.

"Despite Washington’s constant attacks, we acted and continue acting responsibly and reservedly and have not responded to certain provocations until now. However, the latest events evidence that Russophobia and policy of open confrontation with our country have established themselves in certain circles in the United States," the statement read.

[Ryan Ruck]

Vladimir Putin Cuts American Diplomatic Staffers By 755 In Response To Sanctions

July 30, 2017

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday ordered a reduction of 755 U.S. diplomatic staff in Russia.

Putin made the announcement in a clip shown on state-run Rossiya 1 television.

"Over 1,000 employees — diplomats and technical workers — worked and continue to work today in Russia; 755 will have to stop this activity," he said, according to both the clip shown on television and a transcript provided by the Interfax news agency. "We waited for quite some time that maybe something will change for the better, had such hope that the situation will somehow change, but, judging by everything, if it changes, it will not be soon."

The move appears to make good on a promise Moscow made on Friday threatening to cut American diplomatic staff by 455 — the number of Russians employed at diplomatic missions in the U.S. — in response to the new sanctions legislation.

Russia also said it would seize two U.S. diplomatic properties in retaliation to the legislation.

When the bill becomes law, Trump will be unable to ease sanctions against Russia unless he gets congressional approval to do so. The legislation cleared Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support, by a 98-2 vote in the Senate and 419-3 in the House.

The legislation is part of a larger response to Russia's meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a conclusion reached with high confidence by the U.S. intelligence community — and something Putin has strongly denied. The bill also sanctioned Russia for its interference in Ukraine and invasion of Crimea.

According to the New York Times, Putin ordered an overall staff reduction — not an expulsion of staff. Not all of those leaving the posts would be Americans expelled from Russia.

Russia's deputy foreign minister said his country's retaliation over U.S. actions against Russia was "overdue."

"I think this retaliation is long, long overdue," Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on ABC's "This Week" earlier on Sunday.

"We have a very rich toolbox at our disposal. It would be ridiculous on my part to start speculating on what may or may not happen," Ryabkov said. "I can assure you that different options are on the table and consideration is being given to all sorts of things, both symmetrical or asymmetrical, to use a very popular word in the world of diplomacy."