World War Three Thread....

[American Patriot]

SHOCKING and URGENT Terror Update! Danger: ISIS Prepares to Blow Up an ENTIRE U.S. City Soon! America is Now in the Most Dangerous Position EVER! Top WH Officials: ISIL a Brutal & Imminent Threat! (Video) (Video) Please Do NOT Miss This and Do Share!


Friday, August 22, 2014 14:52




Urgent Terror Update!!! Danger ISIS Prepares to Blow Up An Entire US City Soon!


Aug 22 2014



More vital info in this professional video, Please alert your friends and loved ones! Are you ready to do battle against these diabolical terrorists?!



The ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee in the U.S. Senate is warning that ISIS terrorists, those who this week beheaded an American journalist, are trying to develop the capability of blowing up an entire American city. The comments from Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., came in an interview with the Fox affiliate in Oklahoma City.



He said the U.S. now is in “the most dangerous position we’ve ever been in.” Responding to questions about terror and the threat facing Americans, he said: “They’re crazy out there. And they are rapidly developing a method of blowing up a major U.S. city. You just can’t believe that’s happening.” He told the station the threat is significant, and he blamed it on the cuts in defense spending made by President Obama. “He’s going to have to come up with something we’re going to do because they’re holding another hostage … and the problem is the president, he says all these things and he never does them.” ISIS members, he said, are “really bad terrorists.” “They’re so bad that al-Qaida’s afraid of them.” The threat to the U.S. should not be underestimated, he said. “This idea they’re coming in, infiltrating the United States. Sure some are coming in that are associated with ISIS, but a majority of them are still over there and they are undoing a lot of the good that has been done,” he said. Read more after the video below

[American Patriot]

U.S. vessel fires at Iranian boat in Persian Gulf

AP 2:08 p.m. EDT August 27, 2014

(Photo: Tory Hargro, USA TODAY)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A U.S. Coast Guard vessel fired in self-defense on an Iranian boat in the Persian Gulf, the Navy said Wednesday, an encounter that could exacerbate tensions between the two countries as they work to hammer out a lasting deal over Iran's nuclear program.


Cmdr. Kevin Stephens, a spokesman for the U.S. Navy's Bahrain-based 5th Fleet, said personnel on a small boat dispatched from the U.S. Coast Guard patrol boat Monomoy fired a single shot when it saw crew on a nearby Iranian dhow training one of its two .50-caliber machine guns on them and preparing to fire.


"This action by the dhow's crew demonstrated hostile intent which resulted in the defensive fire by the Coast Guardsmen," he said.


Dhows are traditional wooden boats common to the region that are typically used for trade.


No Americans were wounded in the encounter, which happened in international waters around 11:30 a.m. local time Tuesday, Stephens said.


The Monomoy was operating on "a routine maritime security operation" when it contacted the dhow's bridge. After initial contact, the Iranian vessel stopped communicating and the Coast Guard ship deployed small boat to investigate, Stephens said.


It was not clear if the shot hit the Iranian vessel or if anyone onboard was injured. Iranian officials could not immediately be reached for comment.


American, Iranian and other countries' military vessels routinely patrol the Gulf, a key route for international oil shipments, usually without incident.


Speed boats from Iran's Revolutionary Guard, however, have passed close to U.S. ships in incidents that have raised alarm in Washington.


In early 2008, then-President George W. Bush accused Iran of a "provocative act" after five small Iranian craft buzzed around the destroyer USS Hopper.


Tuesday's encounter happened as the U.S. and other world powers negotiate with Iran over its controversial nuclear program, and just days after Iran claimed it shot down a purported Israeli drone shot down near a nuclear facility. Israeli officials have not commented on the incident.


The West and Israel believe the program is aimed at building a nuclear weapon. Iran denies the charge, saying its nuclear activities are for peaceful purposes only, such as power generation and medical research.

[American Patriot]

Army unit prepares for deployment to Syria

46th Infantry Group has been training in Glen of Imaal for patrols in Golan Heights

Members of the 46th Infantry Group training for deployment to Syria, in the Glen of Imaal today. Photograph: Tim O’Brien

Tim O'Brien

• Topics:
• News
• Major Derek Lamb
• Owen Mcnally
• Tim O Brien
• Defence Forces
• Un
• Wicklow
• Infantry
• Israel
• Syria

Wed, Aug 27, 2014, 17:09
First published: Wed, Aug 27, 2014, 17:09

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The Defence Forces this afternoon used the Wicklow mountains to put on display some of the training and tools the 46th Infantry Group will be using on deployment in the Golan Heights between Syria and Israel, next month.
The 130 strong peacekeeping group is being deployed to a UN-controlled ‘area of separation’, in the Golan Heights region on the border of Syria and Israel.
The soldiers will provide medical, technical and engineering support, patrolling the area of separation, checking roads and rough terrain for landmines, hidden bombs, snipers and other threats.
But today under the watchful eyes of company commander Owen McNally and a five-camera, robot bomb dismantler, soldiers in explosion-proof suits patrolled the lanes around Coolmoney Camp, in the Glen of Imaal.
Looking like a character from the movie Star Wars, the low-level, six-wheel robot with eye-like cameras, rolled into position, it extendable probes controlled remotely from a lorry parked a safe distance away.
While the capabilities of the robot were ideal for the area of separation in the Golan Heights, the army explained it is just as useful at home. The bomb disposal unit, or Explosive Ordnance Disposal Team to be more correct, was called out 250 times in 2013 - nearly five times a week on average - to issues which included dealing with 85 viable bombs.
With a bang that shook assembled media, the robot detonated a controlled explosion, the patrol moved safely on, the watching media treading more carefully in its wake.
Further up the hill as “snipers” fired on a patrol, at least five Mowag armoured personnel carriers thundered down the lane.. Suddenly the air was filled with multi-coloured smoke and the sound of gunfire, as the snipers position was identified. As sheep grazed seemingly unperturbed, and a photographer with a telephoto lens stood by, a group from an armoured Mowag ran across the grass and “neutralised” the menace.
Sgt Major Derek Lamb, the senior NCO with the group said while the danger the unit would experience in the Golan Heights was very real, the 127 men and seven women had all been well trained and well briefed about their upcoming tour of duty.

[American Patriot]

THE ROAD TO WORLD WAR 3: RUSSIA AND UKRAINE ARE NOW ENGAGED IN A SHOOTING WAR

August 28, 2014 Qronos 16 Leave a comment Go to comments
Russian soldiers and Ukrainian soldiers are now shooting at each other in eastern Ukraine

[IMG]http://hw.********.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/russian-troops.jpg[/IMG]
Source: MICHAEL SNYDER | ECONOMIC COLLAPSE |



Russian soldiers and Ukrainian soldiers are now shooting at each other in eastern Ukraine. Could this conflict ultimately lead us down the road to World War 3? This week, a very robust force of “tanks, artillery and infantry” has opened up a “third front” in the Ukrainian civil war in a part of southeastern Ukraine that had not seen much fighting yet. Exhausted Ukrainian forces are suddenly being pushed back rapidly and many outsiders are wondering how the nearly defeated rebels were able to muster such impressive military strength all of a sudden. But it really isn’t much of a mystery. The tanks, artillery and infantry came from inside Russia. In recent days, Ukrainian units have captured ten Russian paratroopers and there have even been funerals for Russian paratroopers that have been killed in action back home in Russia. Even though it has become exceedingly obvious that Russia is now conducting a stealth invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin is still choosing to deny it. But if he did publicly admit it, that would be even more dangerous. Barack Obama would be forced into a position of either having to do something about the Russian invasion or look weak in the eyes of the public. And as the Russians have already shown, they are more than willing to match any move that the Obama administration makes.


There has already been much written about who is to blame for all of this, and I am sure that much more will be written about who is to blame in the future. The western world is blaming “Russian aggression” for the mess in Ukraine. In return, the Russians point out that it was westerners that funded and organized the groups that violently overthrew the democratically-elected government of Ukraine. To the Russians, the current government of Ukraine is made up of neo-Nazi terrorist usurpers that are attempting to brutally oppress millions of ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine.


So the Russians seem themselves as “the good guys” in this conflict and so does the western world. But that is how most wars start. Both sides usually feel morally justified at the start of a conflict.


In the final analysis, however, is it really going to matter very much who was “right” and who was “wrong” if the end result is World War 3?


If the rebels in eastern Ukraine had been able to defeat the Kiev government forces on their own, Putin probably would have been content to let them do that. But instead, they had been pushed back to two major cities and seemed on the verge of defeat.


But now it is the Ukrainian forces that are experiencing “panic and wholesale retreat”…

Tanks, artillery and infantry have crossed from Russia into an unbreached part of eastern Ukraine in recent days, attacking Ukrainian forces and causing panic and wholesale retreat not only in this small border town but a wide swath of territory, in what Ukrainian and Western military officials are calling a stealth invasion.
The attacks outside this city and in an area to the north essentially have opened a new, third front in the war in eastern Ukraine between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists, along with the fighting outside the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk.

How is this happening?
It is the Russians of course.
In fact, if you talk to Ukrainian soldiers, they are very clear on who they are fighting now…

“I tell you they are Russians, but this is what proof I have,” said Sgt. Aleksei Panko, holding up his thumb and index finger to form a zero. Sergeant Panko estimated about 60 armored vehicles crossed near Novoazovsk. “This is what happened: they crossed the border, took up positions and started shooting.”
The Ukrainian Vinnytsia brigade met the cross-border advance over the six miles of countryside separating Novoazovsk from the Russian border, but later retreated to the western edge of town along the Rostov-Mariupol highway, where soldiers were collapsed in exhaustion on the roadside. “This is now a war with Russia,” Sergeant Panko said.

And as I mentioned above, Ukrainian forces have even captured ten Russian paratroopers. Rather than denying who they are, the Russian government is claiming that they wandered into Ukraine by mistake…

Ten Russian soldiers were detained in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, that country’s Security Service said Tuesday, as tensions simmered over the conflict between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian rebels.
The Russian soldiers were captured with documents and weapons on them, the Security Service said.
Moscow has repeatedly denied claims by Kiev that it has sent troops and weapons over the border into Ukraine, where the Ukrainian military is fighting pro-Russian rebels.
Russia’s state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited a source in the Russian Defense Ministry as saying the soldiers had been patrolling the border and “most likely crossed by accident” at an unmarked point.

The denials that Russian forces are actively operating inside eastern Ukraine have become so absurd that even some in the Russian press are openly questioning them. For example, just check out this excerpt from a USA Today article that was posted on Wednesday…

Vedomosti, a liberal business daily, published an editorial Wednesday on events in Ukraine under the headline, “Are We Fighting?”
It noted the recent capture of the Russian soldiers on Ukrainian territory and reports of “mysterious funerals” of Russian soldiers, some of whom are officially counted dying during training exercises.
“The number of questions that hang in the air of the dead and detained Russian troops on the territory of Ukraine has reached a critical number. Does Russia fight in Ukraine and, if so, on what grounds? If not, then who is in those freshly dug graves or giving testimony at SBU (Russian Security service) interrogations?”

A Bloomberg editorial contained some more details about the “mystery funerals” that have been taking place inside Russia…

One such burial, of two soldiers, took place in the village of Vybuty near Pskov in northwestern Russia, where an airborne division is based. Efforts to conceal the deaths produced a fiasco. Though the wife of one paratrooper had reported his death on the Vkontakte social network, when a reporter, Ilya Vasyunin of the Russian Planet website, called the wife’s phone number, a woman who answered stated that the paratrooper was alive and well. Two reporters, from Russian Planet and TV Dozhd, who visited the cemetery where the two fresh graves had been seen were immediately attacked by men in black tracksuits. Local journalists, however, succeeded in photographing the graves. According to the independent TV Dozhd, the soldiers’ names and wreaths have been removed from the graves.
There are other reports of paratrooper funerals, which are hard to conceal. Soldiers have grieving families who do not necessarily share the authorities’ desire for deception. In any case, Ukrainian troops have captured some Russian paratroopers. For the first time since the conflict began in March, they were able to record interviews with them.

Sadly, most Americans are not paying much attention to this conflict.
Most Americans are not really going to care much about a war on the other side of the planet that does not directly involve us.
But they should care.
Because things are about to escalate to a level that we rarely saw even during the darkest moments of the Cold War. Relations between the United States and Russia are spiraling downhill, and that could end up having a huge impact on all of our lives.
For example, in my previous article entitled “Russia Is Doing It – Russia Is Actually Abandoning The Dollar“, I discussed how this tug of war over Ukraine was causing Russia to think about moving away from the petrodollar. Well, it turns out that now the Russians are actually taking concrete steps toward abandoning the petrodollar for good…

The Russian oil company Gazprom Neft has agreed to export 80,000 tons of oil from Novoportovskoye field in the Arctic; it will accept payment in rubles, and will also deliver oil via the Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean pipeline (ESPO), accepting payment in Chinese yuan for the transfers, the Russian business daily Kommersant reported Wednesday.
The Russian government and several of the country’s largest exporters have widely discussed the possibility of accepting payments in rubles for oil exports.
Last week, Russia began to ship oil from the Novoportovskoye field to Europe by sea. Two oil tankers are expected to arrive in Europe in September. According to Kommersant, the payment for these shipments will be received in rubles.

That is huge news, but you probably haven’t heard a thing about it on the big mainstream news networks.
Meanwhile, one thing that you probably have heard about is how “Russian hackers” attacked JPMorgan Chase earlier this month…

Russian hackers attacked the U.S. financial system in mid-August, infiltrating and stealing data from JPMorgan Chase & Co. and at least one other bank, an incident the FBI is investigating as a possible retaliation for government-sponsored sanctions, according to two people familiar with the probe.
The attack resulted in the loss of gigabytes of sensitive data, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the probe is still preliminary. Authorities are investigating whether recent infiltrations of major European banks using a similar vulnerability are also linked to the attack, one of the people said.

As relations between the United States and Russia continue to decline precipitously, both sides will be looking for ways to hurt one another.
And that won’t be good for any of us.
So let us hope that cooler heads prevail.
But ultimately, this current conflict could end up taking us to a destination that the Cold War never did.
World War 3 will probably not happen next week, next month or even next year, but right now we are on a road which could eventually lead to the unthinkable.
Let us pray that our politicians are able to find the exit ramp at some point.

[American Patriot]

Ok...


This is for real. Russia IS invading the Ukraine RIGHT NOW.


08.28.14
by darcprynce

Russia Invading Ukraine (Video)

Russia Invaded Ukraine This Morning – Yid With Lid
Both the NY Times and Fox News are reporting that Russia has sent troops into Ukrain this morning. Apparently Putin’s forces started firing grad missiles at Ukrainian troops beginning at around 11:00AM Ukraine time (4:00AM EDT) and an hour and half later columns of Russian tanks entered Ukraine territory
The goal apparently is to stave off a defeat of the separatists and begin a war of attrition.

They later entered Ukraine from Veselo-Voznesenka and Maximovo of the Rostov region in Russia.


Ukrainian border guards retreated because they didn’t have heavy equipment.


Meanwhile, a top NATO official said Thursday that at least 1,000 Russian troops have poured into Ukraine with sophisticated equipment and have been in direct “contact” with Ukrainian soldiers, resulting in casualties.


Brig. Gen. Nico Tak told reporters at NATO headquarters that the ultimate aim of Russia was to stave off defeat for the separatists and turn eastern Ukraine into a “frozen conflict” that would destabilize the country “indefinitely.


NATO estimated that another 20,000 Russian troops were right over the Russian border.

A senior defense official told Fox that the Russians have been firing artillery at Ukrainian troops for days but U.S. officials are not ready to declare that Russia has begun invading Ukraine.

U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt posted the following statement in three Twitter messages Thursday: “Russian supplied tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and multiple rocket launchers have been insufficient to defeat Ukraine’s armed forces. So now an increasing number of Russian troops are intervening directly in fighting on Ukrainian territory. Russia has also sent its newest air defense systems including the SA-22 into eastern Ukraine & is now directly involved in the fighting.”

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’s made this address to the country (English translation by Ukraine Today)

Today, due to the deteriorating situation in the southern Donetsk region in the area of Amvrosiivka and Starobeshevo as a result of the deployment of Russian army units on Ukrainian territory, I have decided to cancel my official visit to Turkey. Seven bilateral meetings of great importance to Ukraine were planned, but at this moment the place for the Ukrainian President is here in Kyiv.


Today the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council will meet to develop a plan of action in light of the worsening situation. We will be calling for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council. The world must respond to the sharp deterioration in the situation in Ukraine.


I appeal to our partners in the European Union to call an emergency meeting of European Union member states where we must urgently address the situation in Ukraine.

Though Russia continues to deny any participation in the conflict. Incredibly Aleksandr Zakharchenko, a rebel commander and the prime minister of the Donetsk People’s Republic, said in an interview on Russian state-run television that the Russian soldiers are just spending their vacations at war.

There are active soldiers fighting among us who preferred to spend their vacation not on the beach, but with us, among their brothers, who are fighting for their freedom.

.


.
Early this morning the Administration announced the National Security Council would be meeting today at 3:00PM EDT to discuss the latest ISIS moves. One would suspect that Ukraine will be added to the agenda. Hopefully this time they come up with stronger sanctions than previous punishments which have been the diplomatic equivalent of cutting off Putin’s cable TV for a few days.


UPDATE: CNN says the invasion is the real deal

[American Patriot]

Baltic's are next.

Then Poland.

Folks, this is the shit hitting the fan.

1934-1939. Hitler. History repeats.

2012-2015. Putin. History repeats.


The Middle East has us all "skeered". But Russia is using the backdrop of the Muslim expansion as his ticket to ride into Ukraine, and eventually into the former Soviet Satellites to pull them all back into a Soviet Orbit.

[American Patriot]

Seconds after I wrote the above, I found this:

LUCAS: U.S. should threaten Russia with World War to prevent invasion of Baltic States

Posted on August 29, 2014 by News • Tagged news • Leave a comment

Before Obama’s trip to Estonia a famous English sovietologist Edward Lucas published in the American magazine Politico an article, in which he writes that Obama lacks firmness and determination in relation to Russian.



Mr. Lucas recalls the journey of American President John F. Kennedy in West Berlin in 1961, when the Berlin was threatened by Russian enemy.


Then Kennedy said in German: “Ich bin Berliner! (I am a Berliner!)”, and thus made it clear to Russian aggressor that Berlin is above it’s bend, and World War III will start in case of the slightest pretensions.


The same should be said in Tallinn by Obama:


– Eestlane olen ja eestlaseks jään (I am and will remain an Estonian – the chorus of a popular Estonian patriotic song).

Mr. Lucas says that the protection of the Baltic States in the event of an invasion of the age-old Russian enemy is practically impossible. Russia is able to take the three countries in three hours.


The Baltic States are at the forefront of NATO. They can only rely on deterrence – Russia is too big and too close.


Defending the Baltics is like defending West Berlin during the Cold War: You have to be willing to threaten a global confrontation, or else you give up and go home.


Not having their aircraft and tanks Baltic countries, which are home to 7 million people, as any other state of NATO depends on their friends. From a military point of view, the territory of the Baltic states is a nightmare for the defense and a dream for the aggressor.

[American Patriot]

Ryan? Do you have any analysis yet?

[Ryan Ruck]

Ryan? Do you have any analysis yet?

Sorry, forgot to reply to this last night. Was enjoying my Bell's Mars far too much.


I think the most likely outcome is Georgia 2.0. Lots of handwringing by the West with ultimately nothing being done until Russia has accomplished what it wants, annexing Ukraine. This made all the more convenient by the fact that Ukraine isn't a NATO member. There will be lots of, "Oh, we'd love to help but..."

I think they're more likely to succeed in Ukraine than Georgia because of how many agents of influence they have in Ukraine.

At the least they're going to end up annexing the eastern half of Ukraine.

The Baltic states will be much more problematic if Russia decides to go after them. Ultimately I wouldn't be surprised if they are left to fend for themselves and not only will Russia get to pick them off but they'll also get to prove how hollow NATO is. Poland is a different story... They've spent all the time they've been out from under Russia's heel preparing to fight Russia. They really hate the Russians! That could be "interesting".

[American Patriot]

I'm afraid I think you're right on this one.

By the way... "Beer"... "Analysis".

OBVIOUSLY you chose wisely.... lol

[American Patriot]

Ex-CIA Official Proposes Assassination of Putin

Former intelligence official wants sanctions against Russia to lead to the removal of Putin, "with a bullet hole in the back of his head" if necessary

By Kit Daniels
Global Research, August 29, 2014
28 August 2014







In a recent op-ed, a former CIA official suggested the removal of Russian President Vladimir Putin, by assassination if necessary, should be the primary objective of the Obama administration in its strategy for Ukraine.



Herbert E. Meyer, who served as a Special Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence under the Reagan administration, said the goal of U.S. sanctions against Russia “should be to get the Russians who’ve been keeping Putin in power, or tolerating Putin in power, to throw that knockout punch.”


“If Putin is too stubborn to acknowledge that his career is over, and the only way to get him out of the Kremlin is feet-first, with a bullet hole in the back of his head — that would also be okay with us,” he stated.


To ensure Putin’s removal, Meyer suggested, the Obama administration should strike a wedge between the Russian business elite and the Kremlin that could serve as a catalyst for an attempt on Putin’s life.

“That’s why the sanctions will work if the president and his European counterparts will keep tightening the screws; if they keep making commerce more difficult for Russia’s serious business executives, for instance by blocking their access to capital, and if they keep making life more miserable for Russia’s playboy oligarchs, for instance by canceling their credit cards and denying landing rights to their private jets,”

he added.

“And if the president and European leaders keep telling these Russians – bluntly and publicly – that all this will end the moment Vladimir Putin leaves the Kremlin for good.”

The former CIA official is describing a centuries-old tool of statecraft in which a foreign power creates discontent between the nobles of another country and their ruler to ensure the eventual overthrow of that ruler.


But given today’s explosive increase in tensions between Russia and Ukraine, which could very well lead to another world war, Meyer’s suggestion is particularly disturbing considering is it likely that current Western intelligence officials also share similar views.


And the destabilization of the Russian government with the loss of Putin will only create chaos in the East, chaos which can be exploited by the global financial elite who hold no allegiance to any nationality.


“Every major international crisis for the past century or more has ended with an even greater consolidation of world power into the hands of the few, and this is no accident,” journalist Brandon Smith wrote.

[vector7]

Don't mess with nuclear Russia, Putin says

Fri, Aug 29 11:48 AM EDT




By Alexei Anishchuk

LAKE SELIGER Russia (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin said on Friday Russia's armed forces, backed by its nuclear arsenal, were ready to meet any aggression, declaring at a pro-Kremlin youth camp that foreign states should understand: "It's best not to mess with us."

Putin told the assembly, on the banks of a lake near Moscow, the Russian takeover of Crimea in March was essential to save a largely Russian-speaking population from Ukrainian government violence. He said continued fighting in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian separatists launched an uprising in April, was the result of a refusal by Kiev to negotiate.

Ukraine, and Western governments, accuse Russia of sending troops and armor to back the separatists in a conflict that has already killed over 2,000 people. Russia denies the charge.

"Russia is far from being involved in any large-scale conflicts," he said at the camp on the banks of Lake Seliger. "We don't want that and don't plan on it. But naturally, we should always be ready to repel any aggression towards Russia.

"Russia's partners... should understand it's best not to mess with us," said Putin, dressed casually in a grey sweater and light blue jeans.

"Thank God, I think no one is thinking of unleashing a large-scale conflict with Russia. I want to remind you that Russia is one of the leading nuclear powers."

Putin spoke easily with the students, many of whom looked to be asking scripted questions about demography and history. Other times he accepted gifts or, smilingly, played down their praise.

When a student said that she had not heard a single negative comment about Putin's presidency from camp speakers, he responded with a grin that "objectivity" was important.

His tone darkened when speaking on Ukraine, blaming the United States and the European Union for the "unconstitutional" removal of Kiev's former Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovich and replacement with a pro-European government.

He said eastern Ukraine did not agree with Yanukovich's removal and was now subjected to "crude military force" from government planes, tanks and artillery.

"If those are contemporary European values, then I'm simply disappointed in the highest degree," he said, comparing Ukraine's military operations in the east of the country with the Nazi siege of Leningrad in World War Two.

"Small villages and large cities surrounded by the Ukrainian army which is directly hitting residential areas with the aim of destroying the infrastructure... It sadly reminds me of the events of the Second World War, when German fascist... occupiers surrounded our cities."

[Ryan Ruck]

LOL!

White House To Putin: Don't 'Even Think About Messing Around' With The Baltics

August 29, 2014

President Barack Obama's message to Russian President Vladimir Putin when traveling to Europe next week is to not "even think about messing around" with the Baltic states, the White House said Friday.

Obama is traveling to Europe next week for a meeting in Wales with other NATO leaders. He'll also make a stop in Estonia, where he will meet with the leaders of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in an attempt to reassure allies amid burgeoning Russian aggression in Ukraine.

"The two stops are essentially part of the same effort to send a message to the Russians that their behavior is unacceptable," Charles Kupchan, the White House's senior director for European affairs, said in a conference call with reporters Friday afternoon.

"You have in Estonia a large Russian population, and therefore part of the message that the President will be sending is, we stand with you. Article 5 constitutes an ironclad guarantee of your security. Russia, don’t even think about messing around in Estonia or in any of the Baltic areas in the same way that you have been messing around in Ukraine."

NATO's Article 5 requires that all members of the alliance come to the defense of any member that is attacked or targeted.

Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and it has been one of Russia's goals to keep Ukraine from entering into both NATO and the European Union and thus forge closer ties with the West. Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk said Friday the country would begin the process of seeking NATO membership.

When asked about Ukraine's possible future membership, Kupchan said it was not under discussion by NATO at this time but added that the "door is open" to any country that is "willing to contribute to security in the Euro-Atlantic space."

NATO

Ukraine said it would seek to become a member of NATO.

Russia's neighbors like Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania — which all have substantial Russian-speaking populations — have grown concerned in the face of increasing Russian intervention in Ukraine, which amplified this week.

Pro-Russian separatist rebels have opened a new front in the cities of Amvrosiivka and Starobeshevo, creating a fear is that Russia is attempting to create a land link between Russia and the strategic peninsula of Crimea. Russia annexed the peninsula special forces troops in March.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said Russian troops are leading a separatist counteroffensive in the east, bringing in tanks and firing artillery from inside Ukrainian territory. NATO subsequently backed up his claims, saying more than 1,000 Russian troops had crossed the border and were fighting in Ukraine.

"I think what you’ll see is progress on the defense spending side, progress particularly on increasing the readiness times of NATO forces," Kupchan said.

"Because I think one of the things that we’ve learned from the situation in Ukraine is that oftentimes in this new world that we live in, NATO or individual countries may be facing not armored columns coming across their border, which you can usually see in advance, but guys coming across in masks, you don’t know who they are — what we could call hybrid warfare, or asymmetric warfare. And that requires a very different kind of military response than NATO has traditionally been focused on."

[American Patriot]

Putin: "... Or what, Mr. Obama?"

[American Patriot]

Putin Reportedly Says Russia Could ‘Take Kiev in 2 Weeks’

By ANDREW ROTHSEPT. 2, 2014

Photo

An aide to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia did not deny a report that Mr. Putin had told José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, “if I want, I will take Kiev in two weeks.” Credit Pool photo by Alexey Nikolsky

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MOSCOW — President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia reportedly told a European official that he could “take Kiev in two weeks” if he wanted to, adding a new dimension to the tensions building in Ukraine as Russian forces become more involved in the fighting there.
As NATO leaders gather in Wales for a summit meeting, Mr. Putin’s remarks and the increasing presence of Russian military units in Ukraine have posed a stark new challenge to the alliance about how to respond to Moscow’s apparent willingness to exert military force to achieve its foreign policy goals.
The Kremlin did not deny the remark, which was published in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica on Monday, but on Tuesday it denounced the European official, José Manuel Barroso, for leaking details of what Mr. Putin understood to be a private telephone call.

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“Whether these words were said or not, in my viewpoint, the quote given is taken out of context, and it had an absolutely different meaning,” said Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin aide, according to the Interfax news service.

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Ukraine Crisis in Maps

It was the first Kremlin response to the article, in which Mr. Barroso, the European commissioner, relayed Mr. Putin’s response to his question of whether Russian troops had crossed into eastern Ukraine.
“That is not the question,” Mr. Barroso said Mr. Putin told him. “But if I wanted to, I could take Kiev in two weeks.”
On Tuesday evening, Vladimir Chizhov, the Russian envoy to the European Union, said that Russia had both an audio recording and a written record of the conversation, and he issued Mr. Barroso a two-day ultimatum about their release to “dispel any misunderstandings.”
Mr. Putin is known for littering his public statements with twists of braggadocio, immortalized in a vow he made as prime minister in 1999 to root out terrorism in Russia.
“If we catch them in the toilet, we’ll whack them in the outhouse,” he said of the terrorists then.
On Tuesday, however, Mr. Ushakov said that it was Mr. Barroso who was out of line if he had relayed a diplomatic conversation to the newspaper.
“It appears to me to be simply unworthy of a serious political figure,” he said.
The war of words has expanded across Europe in advance of the NATO summit meeting on Thursday and Friday, when the alliance’s leaders are expected to endorse a rapid-reaction force of 4,000 troops for Eastern Europe.
That prompted a senior Russian military official to announce that the country would revise its military doctrine to account for “changing military dangers and military threats,” including, he said, NATO expansion.
In an interview with the state news agency RIA Novosti released on Tuesday morning, the official, Mikhail Popov, the deputy secretary for Russia’s Security Council, called the expansion of NATO “one of the leading military dangers for the Russian Federation.”
The Kremlin has long bridled over NATO’s expansion into Eastern Europe, with officials angrily accusing Western officials of double-crossing them by admitting countries like Poland and the Baltic States after assuring them it would never happen.
Continue reading the main story
Continue reading the main story
NATO member states have shared a border with the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad since Poland’s accession to the alliance in 1999, and with mainland Russia since the Baltic states of Estonia and Latvia joined in 2004. Poland and the Baltic states have recently lobbied NATO to station alliance troops in the region permanently.
Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov, speaking at a news conference in Moscow, said that a recent initiative by the Ukrainian government to shed the country’s nonaligned status and join the military alliance could scuttle efforts to negotiate a peace settlement between Kiev and separatists in the country’s southeast.
He added that hawkish rhetoric in the Ukrainian government, including talk on Tuesday of a “Great Patriotic War” along the lines of World War II, was being “incited from Washington, some European capitals and more and more often from Brussels and from NATO headquarters, where the North Atlantic alliance secretary general gives statements with and without cause.”
Mr. Popov said that Russia expected NATO leaders this week to try to strengthen their long-term military presence in Eastern Europe by establishing new military bases in the region and deploying tanks in Estonia, a NATO member that borders Russia.
“We believe that the defining factor in our relationship with NATO remains the unacceptability for Russia of plans to move military infrastructures of the alliance to our borders, including by means of expanding the bloc,” Mr. Popov said.
President Obama is scheduled to visit Estonia before the NATO summit meeting to highlight the United States’ commitment to the military alliance and the alliance’s determination to protect all 28 members from aggression — from Moscow or elsewhere.
Mr. Putin has often bristled at NATO expansion in public comments, and has said that the alliance’s potential expansion into a post-revolutionary Ukraine encouraged Russia to annex Crimea.
At a nationally televised call-in show in April, Mr. Putin said that “when the infrastructure of a military bloc approaches our borders, we have grounds for certain apprehensions and questions.”
“We wanted to support the residents of Crimea, but we also followed certain logic: If we don’t do anything, Ukraine will be drawn into NATO sometime in the future,” Mr. Putin said, adding that “NATO ships will dock in Sevastopol, the city of Russia’s naval glory.”
Mr. Popov, the military adviser, also said that Russia believed it had sufficient forces in Crimea, the peninsula that Russia annexed in March, “to repel an invasion from a potential aggressor on the territory of the republic.”
“Crimea today is the territory of the Russian Federation, and armed aggression against Crimea will be seen as aggression against the Russian Federation, with all of the resulting consequences,” Mr. Popov said.

[American Patriot]

Here comes the shit.

Ukraine Cites 15,000 Russian Troops and Rebels Amid Putin's 'Take Kiev' Remark

By Henry Meyer and Daryna Krasnolutska Sep 2, 2014 8:50 AM MT 488 Comments Email Print

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Sept. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Bloomberg’s Hans Nichols reports on how NATO’s expanding involvement in Ukraine may change the ongoing crisis and President Barack Obama’s visit to the region. He speaks on “Bloomberg Surveillance.”

Russia stepped up its criticism of the U.S. over Ukraine as President Barack Obama heads to eastern Europe to reassure NATO members of their security.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Ukraine’s allies are stoking the five-month conflict and should back peace talks, even as President Vladimir Putin sought to calm concern over remarks his army could “take Kiev” in a matter of weeks. Ukrainian Defense Minister Valeriy Geletey said defenses must be strengthened in the face of a “full-scale invasion” by Russia.
“Unfortunately, the rise of the ‘party of war’ in Ukraine is being actively encouraged by Washington and some European capitals and more and more frequently from NATO headquarters in Brussels,” Lavrov told reporters today in Moscow.
Map: Tracking the Ukrainian Conflict
Ukraine, the U.S. and Europe accuse Russia of dispatching soldiers and backing militias to open a new front in a conflict the United Nations estimates has cost at least 2,600 lives. Russia, which is facing further sanctions as early as this week over the unrest, has repeatedly denied involvement. Obama will visit Tallinn, Estonia, on his way to this week’s North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in the U.K.

Photographer: Francisco Leong/AFP via Getty Images

Ukrainian loyalist fighters from the Azov Battalion stand guard on a hill on the... Read More

Ruble Falls

Standoff in Ukraine
The ruble headed for its longest losing streak in almost a month and bonds declined as the European Union weighed tougher sanctions over the conflict with Ukraine.
The currency fell 0.3 percent, depreciating for the sixth day versus the dollar to 37.4300 at 5:32 p.m. in Moscow. The yield on 10-year local-currency bonds rose two basis points to 9.85 percent, the highest since Aug. 8. The Micex Index rose 0.5 percent to 1,399.73, after dropping as much as 0.4 percent earlier.
Putin is in the process of a three-step dismantling of Ukraine, Jan Krzysztof Bielecki, chief economic adviser to Prime Minister Donald Tusk, said today in a television interview.
Bielecki said the first step was the annexation of Crimea in March followed by Russian military action in eastern Ukraine and the third step may be “carving out a land corridor to Crimea” through southeast Ukraine.
Fighting in eastern Ukraine has more than doubled number of internally displaced people in the country to 260,000 yesterday from 117,000 in the first week of August, the United Nations agency for refugees said in a website statement.
New Threats

Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, said any move by Ukraine to join NATO would upset peace talks that are due to continue Sept. 5 in Minsk, Belarus. He was responding to comments by Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk last week that lawmakers should vote on abandoning the nation’s non-aligned status to join NATO.

Photographer: Yuriy Dyachyshyn/AFP via Getty Images

A target depicting a portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin at a shooting range... Read More

Russia will revise its military doctrine to counter new threats, the state-run RIA Novosti news service reported today, citing Security Council Deputy Secretary Mikhail Popov.
Obama is scheduled to meet the leaders of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, three former Soviet republics that are now part of the military alliance. He’ll then head on to Cardiff, Wales, where NATO is gathering amid the Ukrainian conflict and an escalating threat from Islamic extremists in Iraq and Syria.
In Brussels, the European Commission pledged to propose a second round of economic penalties within the week to punish Russia over Ukraine. The bloc stayed united on previous measures against Russia and “will do so again with a new wave of sanctions,” EU President Herman Van Rompuy said today.
‘Strongest’ Response

Italy’s Foreign Minister, Federica Mogherini, who’s taking over as the EU’s foreign-policy chief in December, said the 28-member bloc must apply pressure to find a political solution.

Photographer: Sergei Grits/AP Photo

Ukrainian military hardware outside Mariupol, eastern Ukraine, on Aug. 27, 2014.

“We need to respond in the strongest possible way,” she told reporters in Brussels.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said yesterday that Europeans won’t accept Russia’s military incursion into Ukraine.
“Being able to change borders in Europe without consequences, and attacking other countries with troops, is in my view a far greater danger than having to accept certain disadvantages for the economy,” Merkel said in Berlin.
Regular Russian troops are replacing insurgent forces, with about 1,600 soldiers advancing into the region, according to the government in Kiev. Russian troops and rebels number 10,000 to 15,000, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told TV channel ICTV. Government troops killed 50 rebels in past 24 hours, while 15 servicemen died, according to Lysenko.
Kremlin foreign-policy aide Yuri Ushakov said Russia hadn’t sent troops to Ukraine and sought to calm nerves over comments attributed to Putin in a report yesterday in La Repubblica. Putin told European Commission President Jose Barroso that: “If I want, I could take Kiev in two weeks,” according to the Italian newspaper, which didn’t identify a source for the information.
The remarks were taken out of context, Ushakov told reporters today in Moscow, saying that the disclosure of details from the conversation is undiplomatic and “unworthy of a serious political player.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Henry Meyer in Moscow at hmeyer4@bloomberg.net; Daryna Krasnolutska in Kiev at dkrasnolutsk@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Balazs Penz at bpenz@bloomberg.net Andrew Langley, Torrey Clark

[American Patriot]

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-...to-kiev-remark

Putin's aide confirms '2 weeks to Kiev' remark

September 02, 2014

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MOSCOW, Russia (AP) — A Russian official is complaining that EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso breached confidentiality when he quoted President Vladimir Putin as saying Moscow could take over Kiev in two weeks if it wished.
Yuri Ushakov, a presidential aide, told reporters in Moscow on Tuesday that Putin's statement was "quoted out of context and carried a completely different meaning." Ushakov says it was unworthy of Barroso to speak publicly about a private conversation.
Several European publications earlier this week quoted Barroso saying that Putin had said in a private conversation that Russian forces could take over Ukraine's capital in two weeks' time if they wished.
Pro-Russian rebels have been fighting Ukrainian government troops since mid-April in a conflict that has left more than 2,500 people dead.

[American Patriot]

Ukraine crisis: NATO to create 'high-readiness force,' secretary general says

By Ralph Ellis, Faith Karimi and Victoria Butenko, CNN
September 2, 2014 -- Updated 0550 GMT (1350 HKT)

Your video will begin momentarily.


STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: New NATO unit not a threat to Russia, White House says
• NATO Leader: New unit will "travel light, but strike hard if needed
• Moscow asks Ukrainian military to retreat from civilian locations
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov calls for talks, not threats of sanctions

Kiev, Ukraine (CNN) -- NATO members meeting this week in Wales are expected to create "a very high-readiness force" to deal with Russian aggression in Ukraine and other international conflicts, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Monday.
In a speech on the NATO website, Rasmussen said the fighting force will be part of an overall Readiness Action Plan that "responds to Russia's aggressive behavior -- but it equips the alliance to respond to all security challenges, wherever they may arise."
He said this "spearhead" force would be able to "travel light, but strike hard if needed."
NATO will look at possible upgrades to infrastructure that could include airfields and ports, he said.
Ukrainians brace for rebel attack
Putin: Don't mess with us, we're nuclear
Why did Ukrainian forces leave border?
Russia denies invasion of Ukraine
The White House supports the idea of a rapid response teams for NATO, but National Security Spokesman Caitlin Hayden cautioned that the force would be "defensive" in posture.
The new force is "not intended as a provocation, or as a threat to Russia, but rather as a demonstration of NATO's continued commitment to our collective defense," Hayden said.
New bases will be set up and equipment pre-positioned at bases, a NATO diplomatic source said.
"We are also facing crises to the southeast and south," said a senior NATO official. The plan "needs to be able to deal with all crises that we might be facing in the future from wherever they might come."
Rasmussen said President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine will attend the summit and NATO will "make clear our support for Ukraine."
On the ground, Ukrainian forces appear to be outgunned by Russian rebels.
"We have seen as recently as Saturday, that the Ukrainian army is very, very unarmed compared to the rebels," said Michael Bociurkiw, a spokesman for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is monitoring the situation in Eastern Ukraine.
On Monday, U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament that the presence of Russian soldiers on Ukraine soil is completely unjustified and unacceptable.
"Russia appears to be trying to force to Ukraine to abandon its democratic choices through the barrel of a gun," he said.
Cameron said new sanctions measures will be drawn up by the EU within a week.
Ukraine airfield attack reported
A Russian army tank attacked airfields in eastern Ukraine on Monday, Ukrainian military officials said, amid worsening tensions between Kiev and Moscow.
Photos: Crisis in Ukraine


Russian troops in Ukraine
Russia's message on Ukraine
A battle is under way at the airport of the eastern city of Luhansk, Ukrainian counter terrorism officials said.
"There is a very, very bad situation developing in Luansk," Bociurkiw said. "Ukrainian officials are warning of a humanitarian catastrophe due to the lack of water and electricity."
Shortly before the attack, Russia urged the Ukrainian military to retreat from civilian locations in the east, saying pro-Moscow separatists in the region will not disarm for fear of getting killed.
The same day, Ukraine said one of its patrol boats was capsized and two of its crew are missing off the coast of the city of Mariupol. Officials did not say who was behind the attack.
Poroshenko has said thousands of Russian troops are in his nation's east, helping the separatists.
Though Russia has denied sending its troops to Ukraine, it defended the rebels' action in the east.
"Washington and Brussels need to ask Kiev authorities to stop shelling the houses, schools, hospitals and so on because you leave militia with no choice but to stand up to protect their people," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.
Lavrov: 'Let us sit down and talk'
"Let's not ask militia to lay down their weapons and allow themselves to be killed."
Lavrov said negotiations, not threats, will help resolve the crisis between the two neighbors.
"Let us sit down and talk instead of threatening with sanctions and stubbornly making absolutely unrealistic demands of the militia laying down arms," he said. "This is what the peace plan of Poroshenko is about."
Russian President Vladimir Putin sparked controversy when he talked about "statehood" for eastern Ukraine.
"Substantive meaningful talks related to the issues of society's political organization and statehood in southeastern Ukraine should start immediately in order to protect people living there," Putin said Sunday.
The Kremlin later denied that Putin was calling for statehood in the region, saying he was referring to inclusive talks with all sides represented.
Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in March following the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych the previous month.
Violence broke out in the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions in April when separatist leaders declared independence from the government in Kiev. Since then, the conflict between the pro-Russia rebels and the Ukrainian military has killed 2,500 people, according to the United Nations.
U.S. lawmaker visits Ukraine
A U.S. lawmaker called for the arming of Ukrainian forces along the eastern border.
Sen. Robert Menendez, D-New Jersey, is in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev. He said the conflict in eastern Ukraine is not a rebel uprising, but a Russian invasion.
"We should be providing the Ukrainians with the type of defensive weapons that will impose a cost upon Putin for further aggression," said Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
In the past, U.S. President Barack Obama has opposed supplying Ukraine with weapons. .
Poroshenko warned that his nation's crisis with Russia has worsened, and is inching closer to a "full-scale war."
The European Union has demanded Moscow withdraw its troops or face additional sanctions.
European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said new sanctions are in the works for Russia. Proposals will be ready for consideration in a week, he said over the weekend.

[American Patriot]

Russia Announces Large-Scale Nuclear Exercises In Response To Ukraine

September 4, 2014
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Russia’s defense ministry on Wednesday said it would mobilize more than 4,000 soldiers, 400 technical units and major air support for a large-scale nuclear exercise, just days after Russian President Vladimir Putin made a veiled threat about Russia’s nuclear arsenal amid the ongoing crisis in Ukraine.

The exercise will be conducted in Altai in south-central Russia, according to The Moscow Times, and comes one day before the beginning of a NATO summit in Wales. It will specifically include Supersonic MiG-31 fighter-interceptors and Su-24MR reconnaissance planes, along with Spetsnaz special forces units role-playing as enemy forces.

(RELATED: NATO Releases Satellite Photos Proving Russia Is Lying About Invading Ukraine)

Strategic rocket forces Major Dmitry Andreyev said the simulation will have units ”conducting combat missions in conditions of active radio-electronic jamming and intensive enemy actions in areas of troop deployment” to counter “irregular units” and “high-precision weapons,” according to the report.

Andreyev also said the scale of air power included would be unprecedented for such an exercise.

“I want to remind you that Russia is one of the most powerful nuclear nations,” Putin said Friday at a youth forum, news.com.au reports. ”This is a reality, not just words.”

Ukrainian Defense Minister Valeriy Geletey wrote on Facebook earlier this week that a “great war arrived at our doorstep, the likes of which Europe has not seen since World War II,” adding it could result in “tens of thousands of deaths.”

In a conference call with reporters ahead of this week’s NATO summit, White House Senior Director for European Affairs Charles Kupchan warned Russia against interference in other former Soviet states.

“Russia, don’t even think about messing around in Estonia or in any of the Baltic areas in the same way that you have been messing around in Ukraine,” Kupchan said, according to al-Jazeera America.

Despite the warning, NATO is not expected to intervene in Ukraine, which is not a member nation.

[vector7]

Only Deterrence Can Prevent War
Most aggressors take stupid risks only when they feel they won't be stopped.

By Victor Davis Hanson
September 4, 2014 12:00 AM

Marine Corps AV-8B Harriers over Afghanistan, December 2012 (Corporal Gregory Moore)

The world seems to be falling apart.

Only lunatics from North Korea or Iran once mumbled about using nuclear weapons against their supposed enemies. Now Vladimir Putin, after gobbling up the Crimea, points to his nuclear arsenal and warns the West not to “mess” with Russia.
The Middle East terrorist group the Islamic State keeps beheading its captives and threatening the West. Meanwhile Obama admits to the world that we “don’t have a strategy yet” for dealing with such barbaric terrorists. Not long ago he compared them to “jayvees.”

Egypt is bombing Libya, which America once bombed and then left. Vice President Joe Biden once boasted that a quiet Iraq without U.S. troops could be “one of the great achievements” of the administration. Not now.China and Japan seem stuck in a 1930s time warp as they once again squabble over disputed territory. Why all the sudden wars?

Conflicts rarely break out over needed scarce land — what Adolf Hitler once called “living space” — or even over natural resources. A vast, naturally rich Russia is under-populated and poorly run. It hardly needs more of the Crimea and Ukraine to screw up. The islands that Japan and China haggle over are mostly worthless real estate. Iran has enough oil and natural gas to meet its domestic and export needs without going to war over building a nuclear bomb.

Often states fight about prestigious symbols that their own fears and sense of honor have inflated into existential issues. Hamas could turn its back on Israel and turn Gaza into Singapore — but not without feeling that it had backed down.

Putin thinks that grabbing more of the old Soviet Republics will bring him the sort of prestige that his hero Stalin once enjoyed. The Islamic State wants to return to 7th-century Islam, when the Muslim world had more power and honor.

The great Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges once summed up the Falklands War between his country and Britain as a fight “between two bald men over a comb.” In fact, Britain went to war over distant windswept rocks to uphold the hallowed tradition of the British Navy and the idea that British subjects everywhere were sacrosanct. The unpopular Argentine junta started a war to take Britain down a notch.

But disputes over honor or from fear do not always lead to war. Something else is needed — an absence of deterrence. Most aggressors take stupid risks in starting wars only when they feel there is little likelihood they will be stopped. Hitler thought no one would care whether he gobbled up Poland, after he easily ingested Czechoslovakia and Austria.

Saddam Hussein went into Kuwait believing the U.S. did not intervene in border disputes among Arab countries. Deterrence, alliances, and balances of power are not archaic concepts that “accidentally” triggered World War I, as we are sometimes told. They are the age-old tools of advising the more bellicose parties to calm down and get a grip.

What ends wars?

Not the League of Nations or the United Nations. Unfortunately, war is a sort of cruel laboratory experiment whose bloodletting determines which party, in fact, was the stronger all along. Once that fact is again recognized, peace usually follows.

It took 50 million deaths to remind the appeased Axis that Germany, Italy, and Japan in 1941 were all along far weaker than the Allies of Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States. The Falklands War ended when Argentines recognized that boasting about beating the British was not the same as beating the British.

Each time Hamas builds more tunnels and gets more rockets, it believes this time around it can beat Israel. Its wars end only when Hamas recognizes it can’t.
War as a reminder of who is really strong and who weak is a savage way to run the world. Far better would be for peace-loving constitutional governments to remain strong. They should keep their defenses up, and warn Putin, the Islamic State, Iran, North Korea, and others like them that all a stupid war would accomplish would be to remind such aggressors that they would lose so much for nothing.

Even nuclear powers need conventional deterrence. They or their interests are often attacked — as in the case of Britain by Argentina, the U.S. by al-Qaeda, or Israel by Hamas — by non-nuclear states on the likely assumption that nuclear weapons will not be used, and on the often erroneous assumption that the stronger power may not wish the trouble or have the ability to reply to the weaker.

If deterrence and military readiness seem such a wise investment, why do democracies so often find themselves ill-prepared and bullied by aggressors who then are emboldened to start wars?

It is hard for democratic voters to give up a bit of affluence in peace to ensure that they do not lose it all in war. It is even harder for sophisticated liberal thinkers to admit that after centuries of civilized life, we still have no better way of preventing Neanderthal wars than by reminding Neanderthals that we have the far bigger club — and will use it if provoked.



— Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University

http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...r-davis-hanson