This Guy Is Ready For ...

 ... MI6. Fully))

As he stands beside Xi, Putin is merely posing as a superpower leader. True, he has a nuclear arsenal. But Russia’s only remaining international allies are rogue nations like North Korea and Iran. China, whom Putin claims as a strategic partner, has refused to send weapons and offers only the most guarded of diplomatic support to the war. Russia’s economy is smaller than Spain’s, and is in increasing trouble as world energy prices sink. And the army fighting Putin’s war – which in Russia is officially not a war but a “special military operation” – is composed of expendables recruited from the country’s prisons and poorest regions. Putin and the elderly KGB men who form his inner circle may believe that they have restored Russia to the prestige of the USSR at the height of its power. But all they are really demonstrating is how far Russia has fallen from those glory days, no longer a world power but rather a vassal to the true superpower of China. 

Here is the cretin who wrote this:  

Owen Matthews (born December 1971) is a British writer, historian and journalist. His first book, Stalin's Children, was shortlisted for the 2008 Guardian First Book Award, the Orwell Prize for political writing, and France's Prix Médicis Etranger. His books have been translated into 28 languages. He is a former Moscow and Istanbul Bureau Chief for Newsweek. Owen Matthews was born in London in 1971. His father was Mervyn Matthews, a British expert on Soviet society. His mother Lyudmila Bibikova was born in Kharkiv, Soviet Ukraine, and he speaks Russian as a native speaker. Matthews's maternal grandfather, Boris Bibikov, was a Communist Party supporter. Matthews studied Modern History at Oxford University. 

An Exhibit A of British "intellectual" class. Poor sod, to waste so much time at Oxford degree mill and gain no actual skills and knowledge in anything. Retard is a classic British sore loser who uses verbiage as a pain relief for the suffering of being born British. I wonder if this dude has basic arithmetic skills. I know, he is British--for the banking and service "economy" math and physics are not critical, but did he think ever that if Spain, whose economy allegedly larger than Russia's, decides to produce MC-21 and the line of jet engines ranging from PD-8 to PD-35 or put up there 32 GLONASS satellites and maintain them, how fast Spain's economic bottom will fall off? 

This Issue Is Not Going Away.

Well, then I might as well address it. I am talking about this whole AUKUS affair and France losing huge contact on submarines for Royal Australian Navy. At this stage I am not interested in technical minutiae of this whole scandal, because it is useless anyway to concentrate on technical details of something which may change many times before, and if, it comes to fruition. I am, however, as always, interested in fundamental factors defining the framework. Le Drian and anyone in France' political top can express their frustration and play geopolitical games whatever they want, such as running to India:

On Friday, France recalled its ambassadors from Washington and Canberra after Australia scrapped a major submarine program with France in favor of acquiring nuclear-powered submarines with the help of the US and UK. Paris furiously protested the new arrangement between Australia, the US and UK, known as AUKUS. Le Drian called the ditching of French-Australian submarine program “a stab in the back.”

It still doesn't change the fact that in the times of a severe, terminal crisis of Pax Americana and Western liberalism, France is not a global superpower and is only important as an attachment to the Anglo-Saxon world which is in a desperate fight for its survival as one of the global power poles. Simple as that. France is simply not that important for this existential struggle. In the end, D.C. and London care about themselves first, however distorted and delusional this care is, and Paris is viewed merely as a "food" and will be consumed if necessity and opportunity arise. You all may counter that France has her own nuclear deterrent, she has Renault and is the home for Airbus, she has her own space program etc. Right. It all is present, but let's not forget the definition, not West's political pseudo science BS, of global power. Right, the definition is Jeffrey Barnett's (not to be mistaken with Corelli Barnett) 14 points and allow me to remind you what they are. Barnett listed them in the US Army War College quarterly Parameteres in 1994.  No matter how France's achievements are considered, some of them with well deserved respect, France simply does not dominate any of those 14 points. 

France does not dominate access to space, US, Russia, China and India do, France doesn't control Sea Lanes of Communications (SLOC), the United States, China and Russia do, France certainly does not provide the majority of the finished goods, China does and France certainly does not dominate the high-tech weapons industry, US and Russia do. Even if to imagine that tomorrow Marine Nationale will add two other nuclear powered aircraft carriers to its order of battle, this still will not make France a global power. Militarily and economically France is a second tier power, which surrendered part of her sovereignty to supranational organizations such as NATO and EU and thus fails in the most important criterion defining global or superpower--fully independent and protected global policies. France also is not capable to create and maintain any kind of meaningful alliance on her own. The United States and Russia can, while China, due to her economic and demographic enormity, is an alliance in and of herself. Plus China and Russia DO have alliance between each-other. 

So, in this case, being a second tier regional power, France cannot expect her interests to be seriously considered when one talks about such immense, financially, projects as AUKUS. Alliances are created not only against someone but also for an exclusive access to capitals and markets, especially weapons markets, within those alliances. In this particular case France is an outsider and no matter what hyperbole frustrated French politicians use describing "betrayal" of France by Anglo-Saxons, it is what it is. Scott Ritter may well be right when describing this AUKUS thingy as: this is a story of geopolitically driven military procurement gone mad. But when one considers US' economic state which can only be described as FUBAR or clusterfuck, all means are good for maintaining a cash flow and France was simply removed on the road to this cash flow. Simple as that. Desperate times, desperate measures. Truism, really. 

So, no matter how much we discuss technical details of this whole circus, some lessons from it are already obvious and here I subscribe to every word in Ritter's conclusion:

But the fact remains that the US has no meaningful military counter to China, the UK is not capable of sustaining any credible military presence in the Pacific, and Australia cannot afford to acquire and operate a force of eight nuclear-powered attack submarines. The Australian nuclear submarine project is a dangerous joke that only further exacerbates the existing geopolitical crisis with China by injecting a military dimension which will never see the light of day. 

This whole AUKUS thing, as I already stated previously, is a great indicator of a waning power of the United States, which in desperate attempts to preserve the remnants of her once self-proclaimed global hegemony, will go to any length, hopefully, short of nuclear war, and if it takes to humiliate and "sacrifice" France, so be it. Western Europe should get ready to be, as I wrote for many years (I quote one from 2 years ago):

Macron makes one mistake here. Well, several mistakes, actually. For starters "Pushing Russia from Europe" was not a "strategic mistake"--that was the plan and main objective of Washington, headed then by Obama and being continuously implemented now by Trump Administration. Moreover, "pushing Russia" out is not just about Russia, but by implication about Europe itself. Europe as it exists today is of no interest to Russia in any metaphysical sense, except for purely economic interest as a market, but majority of Russians are counting their blessings now because of this "pushing out" largely succeeding. Europe, meanwhile, is a sacrificial lamb for the United States, which, in a desperate attempt to save herself, will demolish Europe economically because European elites are a pathetic parody on a required political leadership, some of them are outright imbeciles, not to mention that vast swathes of them are effectively products of the American selection. So, no--let Europe deal with the US, or vice-versa, and keep Russia out of it. 

So, don't tell me that I didn't warn you. Oh, come on, the United States needs to eat too. The moment France reintegrated into NATO fully in 2009, a process championed by then President Sarkozy, it was all over for France. Too bad they didn't see it coming. Well, they see it now. As they say: better late than never. Tolstoy saw it long time ago:

A Frenchman is self-assured because he regards himself personally, both in mind and body, as irresistibly attractive to men and women. An Englishman is self-assured, as being a citizen of the best-organized state in the world, and therefore as an Englishman always knows what he should do and knows that all he does as an Englishman is undoubtedly correct. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and easily forgets himself and other people. A Russian is self-assured just because he knows nothing and does not want to know anything, since he does not believe that anything can be known. The German’s self-assurance is worst of all, stronger and more repulsive than any other, because he imagines that he knows the truth—science—which he himself has invented but which is for him the absolute truth. 

Well, what can I say. It is the 21st Century and France learned absolutely nothing since her last Titan and Hero departed in 1969. Or, rather, was forced out by what many still consider a color revolution organized by the US. Time to face consequences.  

Meanwhile Russia continues to build those missile corvettes as if there is no tomorrow, the latest one, Grad (Hail), was floated out at Zelenodolsk yesterday (video in Russian). 

With new 4,500 kilometer range 3M14M coming up, these ships can pretty much strike anything in Europe from some river or lake deep within Russia's territory. Just in case. In other rfelated news:

TEHRAN (Iran News) – Moscow Signs Deal With Tehran to Boost Aircraft Sales.The Russian Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsia) and the Civil Aviation Organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran signed a Memorandum of Understanding on September 6, 2021, intended to “create favorable conditions for the approval of the standard design of Russian civil aviation equipment when exported to Iran.” The agreement is the result of negotiations that took place between the two aviation authorities in June 2021, Rosaviatsia explained in a statement.

Iran will get a large number of fully Russified SSJ-100Rs. MS-21 is in line, once Russia satisfies her internal commercial aviation needs.

This Is Pure... Gold.

Not that we didn't know that Mitt Romney is an unprincipled power-hungry prostitute, but I like how this was phrased. 

Basically, Judy Shelton views gold as it was always viewed prior to Nixon's 1971 "Gold Embargo" and other currency machinations which lead to the state of US economy which we all observe today. Mechanism of US financing its economy through US budget deficit was launched. US started to "tax" other nations and went from the economy of the "need" to the economy of the "want". Oh, it worked fine through 1990s until, as we all know, US decided to move her industries abroad and the rest is history. At this stage, anything which questions America's pure money "printing" is an anathema to America's "shareholders", many of who, frankly, do not give a damn if the US collapses tomorrow or exists as a viable state for a few years longer. As long, as they think, they have their fat accounts and real estate away from ANTIFA and BLM cultural enrichment they think they are fine. Hey, I just throw a shit here against the wall trying to see what sticks. Truth is, America which is tied to gold standard will find out really fast that most of her GDP is an inflated BS and will see her economy shrink catastrophically. This is why even mentioning of gold as a standard is a thought-crime in modern day America. Shelton learned it today a hard-way. 

In related news, Obama released his memoirs recently (I didn't read them, nor am I intent to) and apart from complaining about Israelis basically running the US (nothing new here, really) foreign and domestic policies--Phil Giraldi gives a good overview at Unz (the site is down currently)--our friend Laurent Parodi directed my attention to another Obama's revelations and those are... pure gold. 

If it wants to be taken seriously on the world stage, Russia should take a leaf out of Washington’s book and deploy more of its soldiers in other countries. That’s according to former US President Barack Obama.In his new book, ‘A Promised Land’, the two-term president claimed that while Russia has “a nuclear arsenal second only to our own,” the country “wasn’t a superpower anymore,” as it “lacked the vast network of alliances and bases that allowed the United States to project its military power across the globe.”Despite this view, Obama vented frustration at how effectively Moscow had been able to oppose many of Washington’s diplomatic goals. In particular, he bemoaned that “when US-backed initiatives came before the UN Security Council … Russia blocked them or watered them down.”

Yes, we know. This is what one gets when the country chooses a lawyer by education and a community organizer by occupation as its President. I thought (at least I wanted to) that Obama's 2008 election was a watershed moment in the US history. It was a watershed moment, alright. Not the one I, as well as very many others, expected. By 2012 it was clear that Obama was a mediocrity and a feeble-minded figure-head, who not only wrecked Russian-American relations and laid down the foundation of the insanity which followed his caving in to neocons and interest groups in Syria and Ukraine, but he managed to damage the United States dramatically. By 2012 it was becoming increasingly clear that the guy was simply incompetent. Of course, you all remember his sacramental "Russia's economy is left in tatters". Now he parades his ignorance and frustration yet again, not understanding the nature of military power and its application. You say POTUS must have the understanding? No, the whole American political power class and even some fairly large segments of military do not have a grasp of what modern warfare against peer or near-peer is. This is not a theorem, it is an axiom, because the "power projection" is a euphemism for blowing shit somewhere. When and if the United States will decide to "project power" against Russia or China, then Obama should try again his definition of "superpower". Obviously, eight years in the White House taught him nothing. But then again, there are many US legislators whose ass developed a hardened uniform callus from abusing seats in both houses for decades--they also learned nothing. I am not being facetious, Senator Kennedy speaks for me. 

Let's face it, US was and is being run by a bunch of morons, who do not know shit from shinola, and the whole world, with the exception of even stupider and cowardly Euro "elites", can see that. But then again, Obama is a Nobel Prize winner, what do I really know...