Why Zhirinovsky Doesn't Know Russia.

Obviously, the leader of the LDPR, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, IS the party, which is the party of one man and is destined to evaporate from Russia's political stage once its flamboyant leader retires. Zhirk (as he is called on Russian streets), as always is for the drastic measures in any area, and in his conversation with Putin (do not forget to turn on captions) is about exiling trouble makers to Siberia. 

Here Zhirik exposes his ignorance of Russia, because he doesn't understand that the majority of "opposition"-class (not all, but majority), which is so beloved and, incidentally, often financed by the combined West is nothing more than a collection of infants from Russia's office plankton. Most of those people are not capable of real productive or even truly creative labor and Putin's use of Zvezda shipyard is a good example. Nobody needs "specialists" in marketing, economists or whatever "managers". Everybody needs good bookkeepers, CNC operators, tool and die makers, welders, and the host of other productive or important service sector people who DO add value. Those trouble-makers Zhirik is talking about overwhelmingly are people without serious life and professional skills who would contribute absolutely nothing to Russia's development anywhere. 

One of the defining traits of Russia's opposition snowflakes is their classic narcissism which makes them feel that they "deserve" much more in life just because they feel like that and that is what drives them to all kinds "opposition" orgs such as defunct now Navalny's operation or many other similar ones, whose main "specialization" is media, where they go because they are incapable of doing anything else. Putin does understand the issue, Zhirik doesn't. In the end, what kind of "exile to Siberia" is scary enough today? Well, I agree about Magadan, but being "exiled" to Irkutsk, Novosibirsk, Vladivostok or Khabarovsk, which are modern, comfortable and large cities which offer everything anyone would want from the modern city, that is not an exile anymore. One, of course, can exile someone to Krasnoyarsk with its horrible environment--but they are working on that too and this million plus size city is as good as anything in terms of living in it, its air quality being an exception, of course. 

So, Putin is spot on here and economic development which is in plans and is being implemented already, especially with de facto Mishustin and Belousov firming their grip on off-shores, as was told to Russian big industrialists at the meeting few days ago, and now Putin de facto reviving a Gosplan--those trouble-makes will be even more marginalized with the country re-industrializing with an enormous speed. Not surprisingly, Russian National Team took the first place in Austria few days ago at EuroSkills Graz 2021--the competition among people of working professions ranging from CNC operators, welders, hairdressers, bricklayers, robots use, concrete, cooks, lab technicians, other industries to name a few (in Russian). That's the future.  In related news, the Zvezda shipyard mentioned by Putin started construction yesterday of the fifth ARC 7 LNG carrier. 

Those are magnificent vessels capable to navigate in Arctic and they are very large: 300 meters long and 49 meters wide with the dead-weight of 81,000 tons. Damn, Russia is declining especially dramatically today.

Oh, Not Again.

Will start with this. This is Fiona Hill. 

She noticed that:

Russian President Vladimir Putin brought an attractive female translator to a meeting with Donald Trump at the G20 Summit in Osaka in 2019 as a way to distract his American counterpart, a former White House aide has claimed. In her not-yet-published memoirs, Stephanie Grisham claims that Fiona Hill, former Senior Director for Europe and Russia of the National Security Council, observed Putin’s subtle attempt to throw Trump off guard.“As the meeting began, Fiona Hill leaned over and asked me if I had noticed Putin’s translator, who was a very attractive brunette woman with long hair, a pretty face, and a wonderful figure,” Grisham writes, according to an excerpt published in The New York Times. “She proceeded to tell me that she suspected the woman had been selected by Putin specifically to distract our president.”

This is Stephanie Grisham who writes about it.

Stephanie Grisham needs to sell as many books as possible and in this case any BS about her tenure in Trump's Administration is worth making up or embellishing. 

Both Grisham and Hill identify the interpreter present from Russian side, Daria Boyarskaya as  "very attractive" and, supposedly, being specifically there to "distract" Trump. Here is Daria. 

This whole thing shows to what degree both Grisham and Hill are ignorant about Russia, as well as jealous, because while Boyarskaya is by no means an ugly woman and even fairly attractive, she is a run of the mill woman in Russia. If they wanted to see really attractive Russian women (as my son has to have his jaw lifting from the ground when visiting Russia because of the girls passing him by on Moscow or St.Peterburg's streets), they should have visited and studied Russia more. Again, nothing against very pleasant and feminine Boyrskaya.

She is very pleasant when wears a makeup, as most women will be, but she is nothing super-pooper special. It has to be admitted, as it was by many, in general Slavic women are beautiful physically. When you add to that a good content of character, yes, they become a desired prize. As a demonstration, take, for example, Ukraine's deputy foreign minister, a rabid Russophobe Olena Zerkal. Whatever one may say about her, but she is definitely a very attractive woman. 

Did Ukrainians promote Zerkal into this position to impress EU bureaucracy she deals with? I don't think so, but the fact that she IS a very attractive woman certainly did not hurt. Zerkal is your almost archetypal Slavic woman which projects both intellect and femininity, which many Western women in politics do not have. It is not just how you look, which, of course, matters--it is what you project and how which plays a role. Everybody knows Maria Zakharova, who does, indeed, have a star quality to her despite being not the most beautiful woman (those legs, though!), but there are very many men who would count their blessings if loved by a woman of such qualities.  And yes, she is still attractive. As is Natalya Poklonskaya.  

As is Alina Kabaeva (Tatar, though, she is ethnically)
 

Who is being promoted by Western and liberal Russian media constantly to the position of a secret lover and even mother of their child with Putin. And even if it is true--nothing is wrong with that, boy, Alina is still stunning and Putin is divorced for a long time. These are all women in Russian politics who are beautiful, and some are simply drop dead gorgeous, and they went into the politics not to "impress"or "distract" anyone. The point is, in the end, Russia has an abundance of beautiful women including in the top political and administrative positions and they are not there to be bimbos but to do their job, while remaining very attractive and feminine--a true secret to attraction between the man and the woman.   

Yes, this is Russia and it is not even Moscow. It is Nizhniy Novgorod, I believe. And yes, most of these girls dream about meeting their man, who will become their lover, husband and the father of their children and, hopefully, great provider. Plus, Russian men fight for their women against enemies, in the West... well, fill in the blanks yourself....

Drifting Apart.

The moment I wrote two days ago this: 

What most of German politcos fail to understand, of course, is the fact that Russia is not beholden to Germany or Europe. 

Bang! Germany yesterday made her choice. 

Officials in Moscow have issued a sternly-worded ultimatum to YouTube’s parent company, Google, saying the video streaming site could face restrictions after it took down two channels run by RT’s German-language service. In the statement, released on Wednesday morning, the country’s national media regulator, Roskomnadzor, said that it “demands all restrictions be lifted from the YouTube channels RT DE and Der Fehlende Part (DFP), run by the news outlet RT, as soon as possible.”According to the authorities, failure to do so would be a violation of Russian law and, “for such actions, an internet resource can be designated as breaching fundamental human rights and freedoms,” and can face a formal warning.“In the event that the owner of the platform doesn’t comply with the warning, legislation allows us to take measures including completely or partially blocking access to it,” Roskomnadzor added.

I don't know if Germany was forced to do this or not for sure, but I do lean toward the theory that the new incoming powers that be in Germany did it on their own accord, plus do not forget that any European "left" today is anti-Russian by definition for a number of ideological reasons, and when ideology, Atlanticist and globalist one in this case,  is involved one cannot expect rational behavior from those who follow it. As I already stated many times the paths of Russia and combined West are diverging and this process is going to accelerate. In some sense I am glad that Germany's political class and Germany's mostly Goebbelsonean-style media  finally "came out" and that makes many things clearer. 

 

Rostislav Ischenko today came out with a "let me make historic parallels" article, which I have a number of legitimate professional questions to, but describing this Germany's snafu with RT and trying to predict the possible outcome, which will be a further deterioration of relations, which are now going into the open confrontation, he concludes: 

Россия, конечно, в случае обострения тоже потеряет, и немало. Но это будут потери денег и времени — замедлится развитие. Бутерброд придется есть не с черной, а с красной икрой. У Запада же есть хороший шанс понять, что обозначает словосочетание «лихие девяностые». Как показывает практика и опыт, гибридная война даже менее гуманна, чем обычная. Вроде и линий фронтов нет, и зондеркоманды не зверствуют: не ревут танки, не учиняются ковровые бомбардировки, никого не ведут в Бабий Яр, а на обширных территориях десятки миллионов людей куда-то исчезают вместе с экономикой и даже с цивилизацией.

Читать далее: https://ukraina.ru/opinion/20210929/1032346275.html

Translation: Russia, of course, will also lose in the event of an aggravation, and a lot. But this will be merely a waste of money and time - development will slow down. The sandwich will have to be eaten not with black, but with red caviar. The West, on the other hand, has a good chance to understand what the phrase "dashing nineties" means. As practice and experience show, hybrid warfare is even less humane than conventional war. It seems that there are no front lines, and the Sonderkommando do not commit atrocities: tanks do not roar, carpet bombings are not carried out, no one is led to Babi Yar, and in vast territories tens of millions of people disappear somewhere along with the economy and even with civilization.

I do not believe that Berlin has people who can fully grasp what they did, but when Russia's Foreign Ministry uses the language such as this in its official statement:

Дату реализации плана (не хочется думать, что речь идёт об «Инфобарбаросса»), видимо, подбирали с особым цинизмом, учитывая, что 28 сентября отмечается Международный день всеобщего доступа к информации.

Translation:  The date of the plan's implementation (One doesn't want to think that we are talking about Infobarbarossa), apparently, was chosen with special cynicism, given that September 28 is the International Day of Universal Access to Information.

That is ominous. Read the whole statement (use translator)--I haven't read from ever reserved Russian FM such a tone. A year ago, Lavrov already articulated to EU and Germany her real interests when basically told Germany to make her choices.  Recall that:

Those people in the West who are responsible for foreign policy and do not understand the necessity of mutually respectable conversation--well, we must simply stop for a while to communicate with them. Especially since Ursula von der Leyen states that geopolitical partnership with current Russia's leadership is impossible. If this is the way they want it, so be it. 

And that is the way it will be now. And even a rare lucid moment of departing Frau Kanzlerin when it may have gotten to her what I was writing about from the inception of this blog, among relatively recent: 

I mean Frau Kanzlerin begins to suspect that it is not about Russia or "democracy", it is about devouring Western Europe and putting Germany at the altar of America's desperation to preserve an illusion of own hegemony, for just a little bit longer, as a first sacrificial victim. The rest of Europe will follow. Today she figured it out, sort of...  

This is exactly what is transpiring now and Germany made her choice. Of course, Berlin now denies its role in shutting down RT, but knowing who German "elites" are--I would rather negotiate with Taliban and believe them, than any politican from the West. My impression is that the first thing to go will be Deutsche Welle which carries on a proud tradition of Doctor Goebbels and I think that is who should go first. It is a disgusting outlet of the most primitive Russophobic propaganda and, again, let's not go where Ischenko tries to go in his article. Who cares what the Germany's objective interests were when she made decisions time after time against them for whatever reasons: be that Hitler, be that Wilhelm, or Merkel. What matters is that those decisions were made and, as Ischenko himself admits, Russia can live without Germany, the opposite is not true, however, and it is Germany's choice.  It is 2021, not 1914 or 1941. As I write for years, Russia will settle Germans who will be moving to Russia. In the end, Ischenko's article is titled Germany's Third Fateful Mistake. There are NO new Bismarks in Germany.  

But as I repeat all the time: Russia is not a charity and she is not going to become any time soon, especially for those who obviously continue to think that they are indispensable for Russia. This might have been the case 20 years ago but it is 2021, not 2001 today. Siemens learned this reality the hard way. At this stage, Russia has many big fishes to fry and they are not in Europe. They certainly look genuinely joyful today. 

What is the meaning behind this "fruitful meeting" we will learn later indirectly, but Turkey does move closer to Russia even without the usual media spin. Erdogan is a shrewd politician and knows where the future is. 

WTF Of The Year.

You all know that if I comment on the news, these news are primarily of geopolitical nature, sometimes--culture. I know Johnny Cash was sued by the State of California for starting fires, but this! This is on a whole other level of being far out. 

A California woman professing to be a shaman who was arrested and charged with igniting the wildfire that has thousands of homes under threat claimed the fire was started inadvertently while she was attempting to boil bear urine, authorities said. Alexandra Souverneva, 30, could be sentenced to up to nine years if convicted of starting the Fawn fire, according to officials. The blaze has destroyed roughly 41 homes and 90 small structures while endangering another 2,340, officials said.

OK,  who the fuck boils bear urine? This is a complete violation of shamanistic tradition in which bear urine is always served slightly chilled to unlock a full bouquet. Boiling bear urine is like... is like boiling 1975 Chateau  St. Michelle Sauvignion before drinking. Who does this? But then again, this woman (obviously with Slavic roots) looks a bit... strange I would say. 

Something about her is odd. But then again, she is from California and Hollywood (which is in California, as we all know) have different shamans. You know well groomed and well-connected, they, I am sure, exorcise evils (wink, wink) from such bimbos as Gwyneth Paltrow and Selma Bleir (Selma Bleir???). But this Alexandra Souverneva is obviously a renegade and why, oh, why can't we get shaman women like this Irish shaman:

Screw you, Ireland, you always raise our hopes only for the reality to dash them ruthlessly. At least Russian Baba-Yaga is honest and is about what you see is what you get. 

To the best of my knowledge she never drinks bear urine and, in fact, before killing you or turning you into a goat, or something like that, she actually feeds you a normal (and even delicious) food and she is mostly into small evils, like... turning you into a goat. I don't remember Baba-Yaga being sued by Ivanovo or Moscow regions (oblast) for setting a fire to half of them. But now, we obviously have one in California and should I have ever met her while wandering forests of Sierra-Nevada, even at the verge of starvation, I would have never accepted any food from her, even if that would look delicious.  Beware of shamans, folks.

Is Hungary An Example...

...of what pragmatic non-ideological approach to foreign policy should be?  In many respects it is. Victor Orban is a man who cares about his nation's prosperity and stability. Among major prerequisites for that is a foreign policy, which in case of a relatively small nation such as Hungary, serves interests of Hungarian people and business, not some ideological purposes. Apart from Hungary having a contract with Russia's giant Rosatom for new reactors for Hungary's only Paks nuclear power station, Hungary did this now:

Budapest signed a new long-term contract on Monday with Russia’s energy giant Gazprom for gas supplies bypassing Ukraine, Reuters reports. The agreement was sealed by Gazprom CEO Aleksey Miller and Hungarian energy group MVM executives at the Hungarian Foreign Ministry.The deal was signed after Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto announced last month that Budapest had agreed with Moscow on all the conditions for a new supply contract to take effect from October 1. The minister said that under the new deal, Hungary will buy gas “at a much better price than under the expiring contract,” which was signed in 2020.

You see how simple it is? Be nice to Russia and Russia will pay back in kind, a really win-win situation. Obviously Ukraine went bananas immediately and manifested 404's main trait which is envy, which automatically transforms in hatred for Russia. Ukraine immediately ran to...of course, European Commission and promised to halt all gas transit to Hungary through Ukraine. You see, these miserable people cannot reconcile themselves to the fact that not only they managed in 30 years of Project 404 turn their country into the utter shithole and poorest one at that in Europe. No, they still cannot face the reality of Russians agreeing with them that Russians and Ukrainians "are non-brothers". Russians say fine, let's be non-brothers. Since you are not relatives, plus your "leadership" is a collection of Nazi-sympathizers or sanctimonious ass holes who care only about themselves, get in line and face consequences. 

 

Maria Zakharova pointed out in her Telegram-channel that: 

Когда в следующий раз наши западные партнёры будут отмечать «дни жертв тоталитаризма», кивая в сторону постсоветского пространства, пусть вспомнят, что питательной средой для его становления являются доносы на соседей по случаю зависти.  

Translation: The next time our Western partners celebrate the "days of victims of totalitarianism", nodding towards the post-Soviet space, let them remember that denunciations of neighbors on the occasion of envy are a breeding ground for its (totalitarianism) formation.

 

You can almost feel desperation of 404 and her curators in Europe (and the US), but the issue is extremely simple: Gazprom fulfills all its contractual obligations to European customers. Anything above it or when politics is involved, which is always, either pay more or go and freeze to death. Russia is not a charity, and as Putin is on record Russo-phobia has a price. Yes, the price is steep. But when politics takes precedent over normal mutually beneficial relations, well, what can I say--let them live with the consequences. New possible German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (from German Social Democratic Party) already started the same tired tune: Russia needs to keep Ukrainian transit and that Germany really "cares" about "energy security" of Eastern Europe (in Russian). 

 

What most of German politcos fail to understand, of course, is the fact that Russia is not beholden to Germany or Europe. Considering economic and political dynamics of EU, Russia is already hard at work with rerouting her energy supplies to the East, where there are very many customers hungry for Russian energy and, most importantly, those customers do not give a shit about LGBTQRC4ISR rights, about the "freedom of speech" and other propaganda BS the combined West uses for its nefarious purposes, and will gladly pay for what will be (and is being) rerouted from Europe. The objective of Russia's energy policy is to remove EU from the position of primary energy customer and supply it on the bases "as needed" or as "what is available". US "ministry of truth" is already hard at work:

Russia is pumping a lot less natural gas to Europe all of a sudden — and it is not clear why

Then it goes into the same "Russia is bad" tropes until in the very cellar of the article it gets to a sensible conclusion that: 

Another theory, although analysts consider it somewhat less likely, is that because Gazprom believes Nord Stream 2 will soon be fully operational, it may not need to book further capacity elsewhere.

Generally speaking, one cannot communicate with EU and NATO in normal language anymore and the drifting apart will continue. But Hungary is an excellent example of how bilateral relations can work. As you can see the trend in EU-Russian economic relations is very pronounced:

And compared to volume of trade China alone (I underscore it--alone) and despite a dip in exports in 2019 due to pandemic--the trend here is also obvious, the trade grows. 

This trade also begins to increasingly substitute the trade with EU. Once one considers Russia's trade with Japan, Republic of Korea, Vietnam and other countries in Asia (such as steadily increasing trade with Indonesia as one example), one can get a clear idea of a steady diminishing in importance of Europe for Russia, not to mention the fact of a dramatic, tectonic shift in Russian attitudes toward the combined West which is viewed (correctly) as hostile, decadent, perverted and unattractive. As I said many times--I never experienced such level of contempt towards the West in Russia, even during the Cold War 1.0 it was different. Never. These attitudes do have a bearing on economy in the long run. But Hungary is definitely not covered by these attitudes because of both personality of Victor Orban and bilateral steady relations. In the end, even such an uncomfortable partner (due to Erdogan's expansionist aspirations) as Turkey sees her trade relations with Russia on the level ANY EU nation, including totally confused Germany, can only dream about. 

Turkey pledged its commitment to gradually enhancing commercial relations with one of its top trade partners, Russia, as the two nations look to reach their trade volume target, according to Trade Minister Mehmet Muş. “We want to develop trade with Russia in a balanced way on a win-win basis,” Muş said following his visit to Moscow last week, stressing Turkey's determination to bring the volume of commercial exchange to $100 billion (TL 845.4 billion), a goal set by the leaders of the two states. “We have serious cooperation in the field of energy. We want to expand and shift our cooperation there to different areas of energy,” Muş told Anadolu Agency (AA) Sunday.

$100 billion? Absolutely. As I said, Europe is becoming not that important for Russia and it is all for the better. So, Germany should keep in mind that one day she may wake up and find no good will left in Russia and for that she can blame only herself. Eventually, the transit through 404 will be stopped and this shithole of a nation will exist only on the handouts from those who helped to turn it into what it is today. Germany played and continues to play a huge role in creating this cesspool in the middle of European continent and Russians do keep the score.

Two Weeks Ago France Bid Adieu To Herself.

I know it is Friday but two weeks ago one of the greatest actors in world cinematography, Jean Paul Belmondo, passed into eternity and suddenly my generation saw remnants of France we once loved and cherished. It couldn't have been otherwise, Belmondo had to depart with Morricone's masterpiece from Professionnel. The scale of man is too big to depart without this greatest musical eulogy to masculinity and sacrifice. You will look at the comments to this report--most  of them in Russian. Russia wept with France. 

Six million views in Russian segment alone with all main Russian news channels breaking it and people still crying from him never reaching this damn helicopter. 

 

Yeah, France used to have great cinematography. Well, France used to be France. It is painful to see Alain Delon and Pier Richard at the end of their lives. We all remember this.

Yes, Paris falls.

Yeah, Good Luck With That.

France, as was anticipated, started to complain and take "actions". 

French shipbuilder Naval Group has said it will send a “detailed and calculated proposal” to Australia after Canberra canned a $40 billion submarine deal in favor of a new pact with the US and UK, much to France’s dismay. On Wednesday, Naval Group CEO Pierre Eric Pommellet told France’s Le Figaro newspaper that Australia would be receiving a bill for the submarine contract which was cancelled last week. Pommellet said a “detailed and calculated proposal” would be sent to Canberra in the next “few weeks” which sets out the money it expects Australia to cough up for cancelling the 2016 deal. The shipbuilder chief said that such an eventuality had been planned for by the French firm.The bill will supposedly cover costs already incurred as well as those to come, with some “linked to demobilization of infrastructure and IT as well as the redeployment of employees,” he said, adding that the company will assert its rights.

Any chance of me getting on the French legal team which will be dealing with this issue? I expect a financial bonanza for lawyers in this matter. But, on the other hand, one has to keep in mind that at this level, same as was with hapless Mistrals' deal (awarded to France by Russia for "mediation" after Russian-Georgian War of 080808), geopolitics and operational realities play as large, if not larger, role as financial considerations, however important $40 billion are. As I continue to stress for the last week: we still don't have all facts on our hands in terms of American-Australian intentions and I want to underscore--we are merely speculating for now. If lease comes through, things will become much clearer. Some are even suggesting the possibility of US converted Ohio-class SSGNs leased out to Australia. I doubt it, but I could be wrong. Obviously with a single Ohio-class SSGN packing 154 TLAMs this is a concern for China. But then again--I stress it--for now it is mostly a speculation. 

 

I personally lean towards SSNs on SLOCs, but we just have to wait and see. As for French grievances, well, what can I say--geopolitical weight of players is too different, not in France's favor, for France to have any reasonable chances on substantial compensation, not to speak of a wounded national pride. Thanks to Larch for pointing this out. 

HELSINKI, Finland (AP) — The top U.S. military officer met with his Russian counterpart Wednesday, against the backdrop of U.S. struggles to get military basing rights and other counterterrorism support in countries bordering Afghanistan — a move Moscow has flatly opposed. The meeting in the Finnish capital, Helsinki, between Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Chief of the Russian General Staff Gen. Valery Gerasimov comes at a crucial time in the wake of the military withdrawal from Afghanistan. Without troops on the ground, the U.S. needs to forge more basing, intelligence sharing and other agreements to help monitor al-Qaida and Islamic State militants in Afghanistan to ensure they are not regrouping and posing a threat to America and its allies. Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said in July, however, that Moscow warned the U.S. that any deployment of American troops in countries neighboring Afghanistan “is unacceptable.” He said Russia told the U.S. “in a direct and straightforward way that it would change a lot of things not only in our perceptions of what’s going on in that important region, but also in our relations with the United States.”

As I am on record for years--I feel better when Russian and American militaries speak to each-other. Russia, obviously, is not going to allow US troops to be stationed in all those Stans, but I want to stress another tremendously important point: there IS a very real threat of Jihad and terrorism which should not be discounted against the background of the US escape from Afghanistan. We can only speculate (yet again) on a complexity of this issue, but it is an established fact that exchange between Russia and US regarding these matters exists and it is steady. Well, the United States can only blame itself for this development, with special thanks to Zbig, who due to him being a rather fanatical Russophobe and a pseudo-scholar thought that the United States can manage Political Islam it helped to create and fund. We all know how American political "science" works in real life, ask Fukuyama, late Huntington or present day Mearsheimer who got lost completely in their ignorance of the outside world.  But then again, it is a defining feature of American "academe" and elites. The proof, as it is known, is in the pudding, or as Hegel stated--practice is the criterion of the truth. Those who are not brainwashed are well aware of this truth.    

In related news, Russia continues to build and launch those pesky missile corvettes capable of carrying anything from 3M14M and 3M54M to Zircon, like there is no tomorrow. The latest one, two days ago was launched in Kerch, at Zaliv wharf. 

This one is named Askold after the famous Russian cruiser of Russo-Japanese war and of Gallipoli fame. It (she) still has to have navalized Pantsir and other systems installed. Can you imagine a ceremony at Zaliv when first project 23900 LHD will be launched? I hope to live to see this. I am sure HIMSELF will be present for this occasion. I am also in a desperate anticipation of Admiral Nakhimov getting more publicity and getting ready for sea trials in 2023. I cannot recognize this world anymore. The changes in the last 5 years are stunning and historic in scale and scope.

Color Me Surprised, Not.

Oh, please! As if primarily Western economic "science" and banking establishment are not utterly corrupt. The whole thing is the institutionalized BS for the consumption of yuppies with BS (or BA, whatever) in "economics" from Ivy League madrasas. 

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Romer said the current head of the International Monetary Fund, in her previous senior role at the World Bank, engineered a "whitewash" of his concerns surrounding the bank's flagship report. In an interview with AFP on Thursday (Sept 16), Dr Romer said there was a "lack of integrity" among the World Bank leadership, including then chief executive Kristalina Georgieva. Earlier in the day, the World Bank announced it was immediately discontinuing its Doing Business report after an independent investigation commissioned by its board found irregularities in the 2018 and 2020 editions and concluded that Ms Georgieva pressed staff for alterations to avoid angering China.

There is absolutely nothing, zilch, nada unexpected about this whole thing. The report continues:

But "I had some suspicions that things like this might be going on". Dr Romer resigned from his post as chief economist in January 2018 after he went public with his concerns about how the bank made "arbitrary" alterations to the methodology that drastically changed rankings for some countries, notably Chile. He said the changes lowered the rankings under Chile's socialist leader Michelle Bachelet, but raised them under her more conservative successor President Sebastian Pinera.

Well, duh! Just to demonstrate what a contrived piece of shit Western economic "science" is, here is an example--the mental excrement from yuppies from Harvard, their "laboratory" where those ignoramuses analyze, strategize, conceptualize and drinkalize their lattes. Behold, rankings of "economic complexity" concocted by "economists" from the US "leading" university: 

You may ask what is in common between this and World Bank ratings? The answer is everything--this is West's school of economic (lack of)thought which has zero relation to any reality. If China's or Chile's "ratings" of ease of doing business could be altered (which most likely they have been), then why should anyone be surprised that a genuinely lovely nation of Slovenia, whose population is about the size of one of the smaller Moscow' boroughs, and whose primarily agricultural and tourist economy is the size of one of the smaller St.Petersburg's industrial districts some of which produce, as an example 10% of world's power turbines, can have economic complexity of the nation which produces literally everything ranked higher by 38 positions? Don't believe me? Here is good ol' CIA, not that one has to believe them anyway, judging by the "level" of their analysts it is no surprise that the US finds itself where it finds itself today. Still, for the lack of better options, here is CIA. 

complete range of mining and extractive industries producing coal, oil, gas, chemicals, and metals; all forms of machine building from rolling mills to high-performance aircraft and space vehicles; defense industries (including radar, missile production, advanced electronic components), shipbuilding; road and rail transportation equipment; communications equipment; agricultural machinery, tractors, and construction equipment; electric power generating and transmitting equipment; medical and scientific instruments; consumer durables, textiles, foodstuffs, handicrafts.

Yes, the country which produces spaceships, nuclear ice-breakers and pretty much everything else has "economic complexity" less complex than that of Slovenia (again, nothing personal against this fine and lovely country), or lovely (sincerely) Slovakia. Remarkably, these cretins from Harvard placed even the United States, in terms of complexity, below Slovenia. Yes, these agonizing and deindustrializng United States of America which still produce a lot of complex machinery, commercial aircraft (some of them outstanding), electronics and cars. Yes, these United States, and yet the US still fails to beat Slovenia in terms of economic complexity. Moreover, lest we forget--IMF, World Bank, Harvard, CIA, America's think-tankdom et all are ALL American organizations, founded and funded by the US and it is on America's dime that these "reputable" (among yuppies) organizations, decade after decade, produce statistics and "analysis" which has to be studied by psychiatrists as acute cases of clinical delusion. It is this delusion which is behind America's precipitous (in historic terms) decline.

But in the end, the rule is as old as humanity itself: the one who dines and wines the girl, this one also dances this girl. Simple as that. Pay me enough money and I can prove with numbers that the United States won in Vietnam. In fact, such school of thought does exist and prospers. There is school of thought which states that Wehrmacht actually defeated the Red Army in WW II. These are mental constructs which are very close, in fact adjacent to the Western economic "science" and "scientists" who wouldn't know the difference between steal and steel, and can barely know shit from shinola. I would suggest the introduction of a new category for such a useless BS Nobel Prize, such as in literature and economics--the most useless economic index of them all. And, indeed, why not write some Ph.D thesis on correlation between Walmart shoppers weirdness and credit rating of Spain. Introducing this very weirdness index. I am sure you can measure it. 

I am absolutely positive, there is a pattern and with some effort this whole thing can be tied into a tidy theory which, with a creative use of statistics, game theory and differential equations, can produce a valuable addition to a host of other discredited, useless and down right imbecilic economic theories which do not work and never did. Hey, Harvard, or World Bank, send the royalties from Nobel Prize in economics for my wonderful idea to my address: Solar System, Mars, 2.71 Bonneville Crater Pl., 314159, Martyanov Andrei. I need to go, I have a phone call with the US President Hillary Clinton, I have some ideas on sociology and statistics too, but about this later.

Boy, Haven't I Heard This Tune Before?

LOL. Of course, Russia is a "threat". She has been since the United States decided that it is the force for everything good against everything bad and that the war it is when the United States bombs weak defenseless nations into the stone age and then changes those hapless countries into shitholes, while profiting from it. But that is not a real war. 

Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command, said Russia remains the most urgent and immediate threat to the homeland even as China captures the attention of defense policymakers. “Russia is the primary military threat to the homeland today. It is not China—it is Russia,” VanHerck told Air Force Magazine on the sidelines of the Air Force Association’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md. VanHerck explained that while China is the “long-term existential threat” to America, Russia is the stronger warfighting threat today. “From a kinetic standpoint—submarines, bombers, cruise missiles, those kinds of capabilities—Russia is the primary military threat,” VanHerck said, calling Russia and China “equals in non-kinetic—cyber, space.” “They have to both be feared,” he added.

Russians are strange people, they just don't like to be democratized. Especially when stand-off weapons are involved and, with a typical Russian cunning and perfidy, arrived to a conclusion that if they are getting bombed and invaded, they might as well respond in kind and do bombing of their own. You know, as in rearrange stones in the lands of those who bomb Russia, and in doing so destroy forces which bomb Russia. Yes, I know, this is such a treachery on Russians' part. How could they refuse all those benefits of "democracy" and the general even concluded: 

“If your only option to prevent an attack on the homeland is to nuke them, you’re not in a good place,” he said. “We have to create other capabilities and options to create doubt in their mind about ever striking our homeland.”

Right. Because we all know that the only thing Russians sleep and dream about is how to strike Skid Row or Detroit... ah, wait, I believe it has been bombed already by someone.

Well, you get my drift, after all, who said that Robocop movies were fiction? Communities like these are popping up around America like mushrooms after the rain. 

On a more serious note, however, it is clear that the United States militarily is in a bind and is undergoing a severe tactical and operational cognitive dissonance spurred by the decades of "transformation" which resulted in deluding itself with some very special "American way of war", while in reality nothing in warfare changed in terms of its main objective since the times of Clausewitz' truism that the main object of war "is to compel the enemy to do our will". Russians are not that kind of people who are compelled to do anyone's will (as many greatest military leaders in human history learned the hard way), and if they refused to do so on the insistence of Napoleon and Hitler and their largest armies in history in their time, they certainly wouldn't do it on America's account. 

Russia is certainly not going to attack the United States but if the United States attacks Russia, yes, Russia has means to obliterate the United States in response, no matter what efforts the United States undertakes to prevent such a response. Basically, VanHerck's main grievance is this: he doesn't want to be bombed back while bombing others. I know. But it is what it is--American generals do not know what it means to lose their families as a result of war, that is why they have such a cavalier attitude towards war. Russia, however, makes them uncomfortable and they don't like it. 

Russian verb, which Putin uses, сдохнуть, sadly, does not directly translate into English and it is not "drop dead", this verb is used when one describes the death of an animal--human dies, animal сдыхает. The nearest term is to croak. These are subtleties of Russian language which many in the West cannot grasp. VanHerck also expressed his opinions on Arctic, but I heard this tune before too. Sure, looking at the Rosatom fleet today I really cannot see what investment in time and treasure will be required on the US side to catch up. No, really.  

Sometimes people just have to stick to doing what they do best. Russians certainly did--they make best weapons and ice-breakers. And a couple of other things which are beyond the narrow scope of this post.

While On Topic. ASW.

Thanks to the excellent Periscope Film Channel which provides wonderful and easily understood archive footage, explaining basics. 

ASW basics.
 

Some Explanations.

 Some explanations by me talking into camera. 

FYI, definition of Navalism.

Russia Is Game.

Nikolai Patrushev already expressed himself (that means Russia's leadership position) on this AUKUS thing.  RT reports:

A new geopolitical deal that will see the US and UK team up with Australia to station nuclear submarines deep down in the Pacific Ocean is a hostile step aimed not only at Beijing, but at Moscow too, a top Russian official claims. Nikolay Patrushev, the secretary of Russia's Security Council, told the Argumenty i Fakty newspaper on Tuesday that the pact between the three nations, known as AUKUS, will inevitably be yet another military bloc aimed at containing and confronting the two strongest non-Western powers.According to the interview, Patrushev compared the pact to QUAD, a strategic dialogue format between the US, India, Japan, and Australia, designed to strengthen Washington's position across Asia. According to him, the group is “a military-political bloc with a pronounced pro-American character.”“Just the other day, another military bloc was formed in the region – the American-British-Australian AUKUS, which pursues the same goals,” the top official went on. According to him, the new deal, which will see London and Washington hand over the technical know-how for Canberra to develop and deploy nuclear-powered submarines, is a threat to “the entire security architecture in Asia.”

Of course, it is a threat and Russia, being Asian power, I am sure, will aid China in this matter but for now we can only speculate what will Russia do specifically. As I stated before, the immediate focus is on pr. 971 Schuka (NATO Akula-class) SSNs, many of which are being upgraded to SSGNs. China has cash, a lot of it, Russia has technology and it is totally conceivable to see China seeking Russia's assistance in developing advanced SSNs. What forms will it take? We will see soon enough. I will address some tactical and operational issues re: Indian Ocean SLOCs later--here, China, indeed, faces odds stacked against her, since the US Navy can support, at least initially, guerre de course of submarines, including through deployment of CBGs, which will preclude effective actions of China's ASW/Patrol aviation. Base in Pakistan (Gwadar) thus could get a serious boost in turning it into a full blown Chinese naval base and that will help address a serious vulnerability of Indian Ocean SLOCs which for China have an existential importance. 

Meanwhile, refresh your memory with this piece from more than 3 year ago:

Harry J. Kazianis Really Needs A Muscle Relaxant-II, Or China The Omnipotent. 

The issue is NOT new. 

It Is Only Natural.

Let's throw away emotions and feelings and recall what I stated in my video and in discussion several days ago: 

Repeating Russian (Soviet)-India model of lease of nukes, about which I speak in my video. US Navy will have Block I Virginias reaching their 20-years service life equator by 2025 and do not forget that there are still plenty of Los Angeles-class which reached their 30 years service life. Plenty of goodies to go around.

Thanks to Bernhard of Moon of Alabama who does, as usual, an excellent job of monitoring media and analyzing facts, I personally became aware of this by the way of MoA from The Guardian:

The short-term leasing of nuclear-powered submarines from the UK or the US is being considered by the Morrison government but the Coalition insists nuclear weapons won’t be based in Australia.  

Let's take a look on what is at stake here.

1. This is an intensity of a marine traffic in the region around China.

 

As you can see, any kind of nukes (SSNs) based in Australia have an excellent and fast access to SLOCs both in Indian Ocean and into the deep areas of South China Sea. Operations on SLOCs are as old as navies themselves. China, obviously, depends on SLOCs and even 2-3 additional (Australian) SSNs with Harpoons and torpedoes on permanent patrol in the areas of interest can wreck a havoc on the flow of resources for China. They will also attract serious Chinese resources in terms of ASW. I am not going to discuss now purely tactical and operational issues, but in the minds of US planners this all makes sense.

2. Now, to the mechanics of all that. This is Chakra of Indian Navy. 

USSR/Russia and India have been at this "lease" thing since 1980s, with the first SSGN of project 670 officially joining the Indian Navy in 1988. So, nothing new, really, in leasing out state-of-the-art nukes to someone. If Russia and India can do that, US and Australia, who ARE brethren nations, certainly can. So, not really surprising in learning that the US will lease subs to Australia. In fact, emotions aside, it is the only natural way to increase the submarine force against China in such a way that it strains Chinese and PLAN's resources and, in case of war, helps to shut down SLOC's which are still crucial for China. Pure navalism, folks. 

3. Let's take a look at what is available in a short term. Granted, the Australian crews are getting ready or are already in training for running US nukes. I can tell you immediately--do not forget good ol' Los Angeles-class SSNs. Many of them are either in conservation, reserve or are about to be moved there. There are currently, if to believe WiKi 28 active Los Angeles class SSNs and 1 expecting decommissioning. SSNs 768 through 773 are reaching their 30 year old age but are still active and who knows what their fate will be with at least 8 Virginia-class SSNs being either under construction or announced. Those Los Angeles subs will need to go somewhere and this time it might not be to the scrap yard. Couple of early Los Angeles class subs SSN 719 and 723 are also planned for recycle in 2022. 

So, there are options. It doesn't make France's life easier, for sure, but purely on the military merit, from the shores of Potomac it makes perfect sense. I have to admit, all things considered, it does make at least some sense. Of course, such an approach does not guarantee a success for a number of reasons, but keep in mind that anything based in Perth, as an example, becomes impervious to Chinese medium-range ballistic missiles because neither DF-21 nor DF-17 fly at 5,800 kilometers even when launched from China's south-most point. So, this is another key to this decision. The main issue, however, is this--does the United States think that it can control possible conventional conflict with China that it does not accelerate to a nuclear threshold? That is a huge question to ponder. And yes, China's nuclear subs are not as good as American ones, it is a hard cold fact. What will China do? Ask this question: what will Russia do?  Believe me, it is no less important, if not more. Recall few years back my reaction:

And here is the news, PLAN, for now, doesn't have submarine force which is even remotely competitive both in numbers and quality with the US Navy's submarine force. All bravado on both sides apart, US submarines in the Pacific are overwhelmingly superior to PLAN's nuclear subs (SSKs are a separate issue). Currently the US Navy operates 32 Los Angeles-class + 3 Sea Wolf-class + 15 Virginia-class SSNs = 50 SSNs ALL of whom, including older L.A. class SSNs are superior to anything PLAN can deploy in terms of nukes, which is roughly 9 nuclear subs, only 6 of which could be considered relatively modern (Type 093). Period. Yes, PLAN does deploy a substantial number of conventional SSKs, but again, this fleet of subs is good only for a relatively short distance deployments in defense of own littoral. We are talking here about overwhelming advantage US Navy enjoys over any PLAN's surface or nuclear power submarine force beyond the First Island Chain. I am not even talking here about remote segments of SLOCs. Yes, Chinese are improving, yes, they are gaining both capability (such as destroying US aircraft carriers) and some operational experience, but it takes much more than that to command the seas. I will also avoid describing some info (very reliable one), I just mention it, that testifies against Chinese tactical and operational maturity, for now--I underscore that, for now. But namely for now PLAN, for all US Navy's huge institutional problems, is not a real competitor in one domain, which today defines command of the seas--underwater. US submarine force is simply better, much better and that's the reality, which Admiral Lou should have considered and James Holmes remembered when trying to respond to Chinese naval officer.

And don't tell me that I didn't warn you;)) I sure did, wink, wink. It was only natural for the United States to start leveraging its one of a few remaining and significant advantages in combat technology, submarines, and I am sure people in Beijing and Moscow expected it. I am sure Moscow did. 

Oh, No, No, No, No...

Ria publishes today the review of Le Figaro's article (in fact there are several of them, which is expected, given the circumstances) regarding this whole CLUSTERFAUKUS which discusses this whole issue. But Ria concentrates not on the article but on more than 1200 comments to it (in Russian). One of very many comments by French readers states this:  Une seule solution claquer la porte de l'OTAN ! Even without the translation it is obvious that he (or she) calls on slamming the door on NATO. Others call for distancing from Anglo-Saxondom and removing sanctions on Russia and joining her in whatever form. Well, I have some bad news for French audience of Le Figaro--Russia is not your rebound flick to ease the pain from being dumped by a long time lover who, in addition, promised to get married after many years of engagement. No, no, no, no, this is not how it works. As one Russian commenter summarized the overwhelmingly dominant sentiment on Ria's discussion board:

А оно нам надо? С такими друзьями никаких врагов не надо...  

Translation: Do we really need it? Who needs enemies with such friends...

Exactly. This is how overwhelming majority of Russians thinks today. 

1. Current France and current Russia have zero commonalities culturally and in terms of values cannot be further apart. France since long ago is a playground for alternative lifestyle, multiculturalism (a euphemism for Islamization) and suicidal cultural practices. French intellectual "elites" are much larger in scale likeness of what in Russia is a marginalized freak-show of Russian "liberals" and fifth column. Why would Russia, then, have any interest in "expanding" on these policies by associating herself in any way with a country which only nominally is France, while in reality is a ticking demographic and cultural time bomb? Russia, in French mind, is a backward country which builds Christian cathedrals, declares marriage between the man and the woman sacred in her Constitution, Russians are nationalists and do not allow LGBTQ ideology to roam freely. Russian also shoot to kill terrorists and feel no compunction about it.

2. Russians did not elect Macron, French people did. There are always consequences to actions. Russians hate globalists, French, evidently, make them their Presidents time after time. Each nation deserves the government it elects. If the French government is bad (well, it is--it is utterly globalist, neoliberal and anti-national) it is France's problems and in terms of possibility for any common political approach between Russia and France in case of France deciding to seek rapprochement with Russia (granted, Russia is interested, which I doubt)--well, probability of such an arrangement is approaching if not zero, at least a trivial value. 

3. Removing sanctions from Russia by France changes absolutely nothing because Russia is not suffering from those sanctions at all and if somebody in France still thinks that removing sanctions is a valuable political and economic gesture, they better study what modern Russia is. Here is how France is "important" for Russia economically. 

Come on people, let's be serious, yes--some Airbus planes, some Renault, some other French stuff, but in a larger scheme of things France barely registers for Russia as an economic partner but the main question is not even this.

4. I understand that French ego is badly hurt currently, but this too will pass and France will soon forget about Russia and will crawl back to her master, where she belongs because France cannot act otherwise--it is not in France's nature. Cultural, political and military DNA of France has been damaged since De Gaulle's departure so much that France my generation used to know is simply not there anymore. 

So, I don't think Russia is interested in any way in France's maneuvering and posturing at this time because Russia has a much much bigger fish to fry and she really doesn't care about being picked up on the rebound, especially by a date which, as Tolstoy noted: "A Frenchman is self-assured because he regards himself personally, both in mind and body, as irresistibly attractive to men and women."  Obviously, France's elites somehow missed this tectonic shift in global power-balance which was ongoing for the last 15 years at least, and did not recognize the fact that France is not that important for a titanic power struggle in the China-Russia-Anglo-Saxon triangle. France traded remnants of her sovereignty in in 2009 by reintegrating into NATO fully and she is not leaving NATO. For that, one has to have a set of balls--a doubtful proposition for current French political class. There are many politicians in France, zero statesmen. But that is the problem of the combined West, not just of France.

P.S. Among numerous comments in Le Figaro I stumbled upon one which proposed that, maybe, Putin will fork money for these French subs. LOL. This is an exhibit A of "irresistibly attractive" syndrome, which is similar to American exceptionalism. Evidently the reader who posted this has zero awareness of Russia's SSK and SSN/SSGN/SSBN programs which dwarf in scale and scope anything France ever did in this field. I hope he posted it in jest. I doubt though.