That Is What Real Revolution In Military Affairs Gives You...

When you are the one who drives it. What 10 years ago could have been viewed as an overstepping the red line of US Dollar's hegemony, today is a normal, business-like occurrence. Vladimir Putin effectively offers Russian Ruble as a reserve currency within BRICS in Brasilia at BRICS summit. Starts at roughly 4:00. Albeit the whole report is very interesting. 

Now, Putin may wax all he wants (for the consumption of business people and investors) about Russia's macroeconomic situation which looks, indeed, stable and is not dependent on hydrocarbons market. That is easy. What needs to be emphasized, yet again, is that US Dollar's reserve status in the last 50 or so years is based primarily on the myth of American military power, period. The times when the United States was a manufacturing powerhouse of the globe are long gone, with China taking this position, and, once this American capacity was gone, the only thing which remained, apart from the "soft power" driven primarily by Hollywood, the only thing on which US Dollar's status remained to be based became expeditionary warfare. As Moammar Qaddafi, and few others, learned the hard way--one doesn't question the dominance of US currency, nor US "economic" views. That is, of course, if you are Libya, Iraq or any other location where the pre-deployment of about 300,000 US marines and GIs could be done without interruption from subject or, rather object, to be taught a valuable lesson. Color revolutions are also in this teaching tool-box. 

But those instruments go only so far, until they run into the wall of near-peer, let alone peer, who, actually, can teach its own lessons and draw its own red lines. Once one considers that Russia sits on roughly 30% (by different estimates) of global mineral wealth, has modern economy, stable political system and, what really matters, state-of-the-art Armed Forces armed with some mind-boggling weapons--that is the moment when one, like Russia, can offer a variety of alternatives from increasing the share (already growing) of payments in national currencies, to using Ruble as a main payment tool within BRICS at least. Not only Russia can, but she questions US Dollar's hegemony and, in fact, calls for overthrowing it. She can afford to. In the end, it is Russia, not even China, who now stands guard on Eurasian economic integration and this guard function requires a real high-end military capability, which is a first derivative of economy of scale. As one long-time observer of China noted recently:

No Chinese citizen doesn’t understand what is going on. They are unified that the US is trying to destroy what they built in the last 40 years. And they perceive it as racist, also. It’s a recapitulation of centuries of racist imperialism. The reason the Chinese have stated their strategic relationship and acted in coordination with Russia, more and more every day, is their sense of need of Russia’s titanium spine against the Hegemon. China knows it is not strong enough to handle the storm.

Russia is. In fact that's Russian professional occupation for the last 1000 years--to handle storms. As I continue to state ad nauseam now for years--Russia has a product so valuable, so desirable by so many around the globe, that the question of price is not even that important, even if making Ruble a main currency of BRICS. Stability and peace are the names of this most treasured commodity and it is only the strength of arms which can provide it. How ironic, indeed. 

Paul Craig Roberts About My New Book.

PCR wrote a review on my latest book and I give here some excerpts from it: 

Martyanov’s book is, in a way, two books.  One is about the revolution in military affairs that has left the United States behind.  The other is about the self-medicating and propagandistic version of reality that Americans mistake for reality.  Martyanov convinced me that the Pentagon’s war planners need to upgrade their understanding of war and how to conduct one, but I found more interesting the fake reality supported by controlled explanations from which Americans seem unable to escape that is described in the other part of his book.  It turns out that it is not only the insouciant general population but also the ruling elites themselves who are locked in The Matrix.

But one phrase which PCR used (I really wish I could have come up with it;)) is really succinct and beautiful:

                     Slogans masquerade as ideas

Damn, this is good. It also captures the essence of the contemporary political discourse in the United States. Indeed, where are the real ideas instead of nauseating in their repeatability talking points delivered often by people who absolutely have no business in what should have been the "marketplace" of the real thoughts? Bar some large scale thinkers, such as PCR himself, who constitute a constantly shrinking field of people with actual expertise crucial for saving the United States, all we have today is infotainment. But then again: what constitutes this "saving". What are its basic parameters and metrics? Economy? Absolutely! You cannot to anything without economy, healthy, working economy that is. Military power? Sure! But what are the extents of this power, what it should be and how should it be used? Crucial issue? Absolutely! But, in the end--it all comes down to people who constitute this entity which should be saved. 

As classic of Marxism, Lenin that is, stated once (correctly) that idea becomes a real force when it take possession of the masses. Today, there are no ideas, only slogans and they cannot substitute ideas which are badly needed. World became too complex and it requires new mechanism, instead of utterly corrupt and often incompetent think tanks, for generating ideas which really matter. In the end, those are not just about the fate of the United States, but about humanity as a whole and it is this humanity, a global community, which increasingly doesn't see the future in what came to be known as liberalism, which increasingly comes across as totalitarianism in foreign and domestic policies. And this mutation is being countered as I type this. I finished one of the chapters in my new book with this:

Soviet poet Alexandr Trvardovsky left a Great Patriotic War literary masterpiece for the Soviet people—the epic Vasily Tyorkin, large and written in many self-contained parts, because many Red Army soldiers could never expect to read the entirety because of the possibility of being killed at the front. It was a poem about life and the combat of a simple Russian soldier, Vasily Tyorkin, which later transcended its literary origin and lived on in Russian folklore and culture. One of the most powerful episodes in Tvardovsky’s master­piece about River-Crossing under enemy’s fire, encapsulates the meaning of the titanic struggle against Nazi evil:

Бой идет святой и правый.

Смертный бой не ради славы,

Ради жизни на земле.

The battle goes on, holy and righteous

A deadly battle not for glory

                       For life on Earth

This is what at the stake for humanity today. No less than that. Maybe, more.    

Coupon For New Book.

Guys and gals, my publisher, Clarity Press, was kind enough to develop a coupon for my new book in order for people who visit this blog to buy it directly from them at good discount. Here are the instructions:

To get a 50% discount on buying The(Real) Revolution in Military Affairs, click on link, then click on Paperback option, then add to cart.  View cart.  There will be an option to enter the coupon.  The coupon code is:                                     

                                Martyanov2-469

No points or commas. Just that.