The Cold War, Part 2 ... Putin Rising
Jason P
Posts: 19,138
Well, it's officially on. Even if no one else really wants to play.
Russians warned if they go abroad, US might snatch them
US secret services are actively 'hunting' and jailing Russians in revenge for the annexation of Crimea – or so a warning by the Russian Foreign Ministry says.
It's not your typical travel advisory.
Russia's Foreign Ministry is warning that Russians should refrain from traveling abroad because they could be entrapped by US secret services who are actively "hunting" for Russians to persecute in punishment for Moscow's recent annexation of Crimea, according to an official notice published on the Ministry's website.
The message seems directed at the approximately 15 million Russians, most of them middle-class, who leave the country each year for tourism.
.....
news.yahoo.com/russians-warned-abroad-us-might-snatch-them-162100712.html
Russians warned if they go abroad, US might snatch them
US secret services are actively 'hunting' and jailing Russians in revenge for the annexation of Crimea – or so a warning by the Russian Foreign Ministry says.
It's not your typical travel advisory.
Russia's Foreign Ministry is warning that Russians should refrain from traveling abroad because they could be entrapped by US secret services who are actively "hunting" for Russians to persecute in punishment for Moscow's recent annexation of Crimea, according to an official notice published on the Ministry's website.
The message seems directed at the approximately 15 million Russians, most of them middle-class, who leave the country each year for tourism.
.....
news.yahoo.com/russians-warned-abroad-us-might-snatch-them-162100712.html
0
Comments
Oh, and Putin as Mr. Burns. Outrageous!
He scares people that's living around the boarders.
It wasn't very nice of him to fly with bomb planes against our capital as happened last year..
I don't know..to practis?
The embarrassing part is that the military in my nation didn't even do anything, the only reaction was from a NATO plane observing this.
(We aren't even in NATO)
Oh, plus the Fins beat them in hockey ...
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
In either situation, Russia is going to take what they want. But fighting now may give them a fighter's chance.
Scary shit.
Being a history major and knowing bits of info on that area, I understand why he is doing this. In the past (and currently still), there were/are not many natural borders in Eastern Europe. People moved about freely and established themselves where they wanted. Generations have lived in the same land and created their identity. The people of Poland have lived in the land that is now Poland for centuries, despite it being under the control of various countries at certain points in time. When Russia controlled parts of Poland, they were never really Russian; instead, they were still ethnically Polish.
Many of the former Russian countries are still ethnically Russian. Many people in Ukraine are still technically "Russian." They have lived there forever, and have been under control under a few different people, mainly Russia. So, I get Putin's argument.
However, if he plans to re-establish the USSR as it was, including bringing back communism, then he is dumb.
I am not saying he should take back those former countries, so don't get that idea. My point is I get what the situation is, even though is intentions are not so great.
You can spend your time alone, redigesting past regrets, oh
or you can come to terms and realize
you're the only one who can't forgive yourself, oh
makes much more sense to live in the present tense - Present Tense
Like so many big issues, the whole thing is complicated and convoluted. It's too bad we don't still have (or maybe we do and I don't know about them) people like Ryszard Kapuściński (the great Polish reporter/journalist) and Vaclav Havel (even though the Czech Republic was never really a part of the USSR). They said a lot of things that made sense.
Now US fighter jets are intercepting spy planes in the Baltics, Russian jets are invading airspace and doing fly-overs within a few thousand yards of US destroyers ... and Putin's ego is at an all-time high with the way he handed the US their ass in Syria and post Olympic glory.
I don't think Putin respects Obama.
NATO has been pushing to Russia's borders since 94, and has considered Ukraine a candidate for membership since 2008 (unsurprisingly, the same time Shell, Chevron and Exxon tendered agreements to 'develop' the Black Sea). Polls have repeatedly shown overwhelming opposition to NATO amongst the Ukranian people.
The Ukraine is the main corridor thru which Russian natural gas reaches Europe (40% of the EU's gas comes from Russia). It is also the 'breadbasket' of Eastern Europe (more US corp interest - Monsanto...) Both countries are trying to protect their interests, with the people of the Ukraine caught in the middle. Pretty much every conflict in Eurasia, Central Asia, and North Africa, in the past 25 years (including both Iraq and Afghanistan), has been tied to the same problems. Pipelines, currency, and expansion of trade/military blocs. It's to the point that you have to assume any kind of popular revolution was co-opted from the start, then read between the lines asking who benefits...in the case of the Ukraine, it's long been established that the coup was US financed - openly admitted on CNN, and caught on tape (remember the 'fuck the EU' recording?)...it wasn't so long ago the Ukrainian Orange Revolution attempted the same things - the US, thru NGO's financed that as well...their boy Yushenko (sp?) was pushing for NATO membership, and severing ties with Russia....now the Ukraine was about to cozy up to Russia and the EU, and the US couldn't let that happen.
In the last few months, we have witnessed a variation of the nuclear M.A.D. Doctrine and for which I have been warning for as long as I can remember but my ringing of the alarm bells have fell on deaf ears.
The “Financial Nuclear Weapon” (the sale of oil in a currency other than the US dollar) which was previously deployed by Saddam Hussein resulted in the total destruction of Iraq, but it failed to deter other countries pissed off with the highhandedness of the Global Policeman.
Libya made another attempt and it resulted in the destruction of the country and the brutal murder of its leader Muammar Gaddafi. Next was Iran. The US and the global financial war party found it much more difficult to isolate and annihilate Iran, even when she was threatened with outright nuclear attack by US and the rabid Israel. And in spite of unprecedented sanctions against Iran (which constitute economic warfare and are war crimes in itself), Iran stood defiant.
The leading members of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) Russia and China restrained themselves so as to preserve global stability. However, the war party faction of the Obama regime (the leftovers of the Bush regime) took such restraint as weakness and went on a spree of regime change throughout the world to undermine the growing strength of BRICS.
The straw that broke the camels’ back was the unbridled and reckless coup against the elected President of Ukraine by US and NATO and orchestrated by the US State Department and led by the war-monger Victoria Nuland. She openly admitted on CNN that the US had disbursed through such organisations as the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) over US$ 5 Billion to facilitate the coup with the support of the oil giant Chevron.
This was an unprecedented treachery as a few weeks before the bloody coup, the relevant stakeholders entered an agreement to preserve the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine brokered by Russia and endorsed by the EU. Victoria Nuland could not and would not accept the check-mate and so she launched the bloody coup giving no choice to Russia to support the self-determination of Crimea where the majority of the citizens were Russians and where Russia’s Black Sea fleet was located.
The US blatantly threatened Russia in her own backyard. The rest as they say is history.
(..............................)
The existence of “petrodollars” is one of the pillars of America’s economic might because it creates a significant external demand for American currency, allowing the US to accumulate enormous debts without defaulting. If a Japanese buyer want to buy a barrel of Saudi oil, he has to pay in dollars even if no American oil company ever touches the said barrel. Dollar has held a dominant position in global trading for such a long time that even Gazprom’s natural gas contracts for Europe are priced and paid for in US dollars. Until recently, a significant part of EU-China trade had been priced in dollars.
Lately, China has led the BRICS efforts to dislodge the dollar from its position as the main global currency, but the “sanctions war” between Washington and Moscow gave an impetus to the long-awaited scheme to launch the petroruble and switch all Russian energy exports away from the US currency.
The main supporters of this plan are Sergey Glaziev, the economic aide of the Russian President and Igor Sechin, the CEO of Rosneft, the biggest Russian oil company and a close ally of Vladimir Putin. Both have been very vocal in their quest to replace the dollar with the Russian ruble. Now, several top Russian officials are pushing the plan forward.
First, it was the Minister of Economy, Alexei Ulyukaev who told Russia 24 news channel that the Russian energy companies must ditch the dollar. “They must be braver in signing contracts in rubles and the currencies of partnercountries,” he said.
Then, on March 2, Andrei Kostin, the CEO of state-owned VTB bank, told the press that Gazprom, Rosneft and Rosoboronexport, state company specialized in weapon exports, can start trading in rubles. “I’ve spoken to Gazprom, to Rosneft and Rosoboronexport management and they don’t mind switching their exports to rubles. They only need a mechanism to do that”, Kostin told the attendees of the annual Russian Bank Association meeting.
Judging by the statement made at the same meeting by Valentina Matviyenko, the speaker of Russia’s upper house of parliament, it is safe to assume that no resources will be spared to create such a mechanism. “ Some ‘hot headed’ decision-makers have already forgotten that the global economic crisis of 2008 – which is still taking its toll on the world – started with a collapse of certain credit institutions in the US, Great Britain and other countries. This is why we believe that any hostile financial actions are a double-edged sword and even the slightest error will send the boomerang back to the aborigines,” she said. It seems that Moscow has decided who will be in charge of the “boomerang”. Igor Sechin, the CEO of Rosneft, has been nominated to chair the board of directors of Saint-Petersburg Commodity Exchange, a specialized commodity exchange.
In October 2013, speaking at the World Energy Congress in Korea, Sechin called for a “global mechanism to trade natural gas” and went on suggesting that ” it was advisable to create an international exchange for the participating countries, where transactions could be registered with the use of regional currencies “. Now, one of the most influential leaders of the global energy trading community has the perfect instrument to make this plan a reality. A Russian commodity exchange where reference prices for Russian oil and natural gas will be set in rubles instead of dollars will be a strong blow to the petrodollar.
Rosneft has recently signed a series of big contracts for oil exports to China and is close to signing a “jumbo deal” with Indian companies. In both deals, there are no US dollars involved. Reuters reports, that Russia is close to entering a goods-for-oil swap transaction with Iran that will give Rosneft around 500,000 barrels of Iranian oil per day to sell in the global market. The White House and the russophobes in the Senate are livid and are trying to block the transaction because it opens up some very serious and nasty scenarios for the petrodollar. If Sechin decides to sell this Iranian oil for rubles, through a Russian exchange, such move will boost the chances of the “petroruble” and will hurt the petrodollar.
It can be said that the US sanctions have opened a Pandora’s box of troubles for the American currency. The Russian retaliation will surely be unpleasant for Washington, but what happens if other oil producers and consumers decide to follow the example set by Russia? During the last month, China opened two centers to process yuan-denominated trade flows, one in London and one in Frankfurt. Are the Chinese preparing a similar move against the greenback? We’ll soon find out.
businessinsider.com/ukrainian-president-admits-loss-to-russia-2014-5
No wonder Putin would get a bug in his butt in past years over the Europe missile sheild ...
No wonder - any state would want to keep it's 'enemies' away from it's borders.
or
No wonder - Putin has resisted the missile shield because he had expansionist aspirations?
thewire.com/global/2014/05/vladimir-putin-scores-six-goals-in-amateur-hockey-game/362045/
We haven't had a president that I feel could for about 14 years. As for congress, they seem to be a lost cause anyhow. So Putin smells blood.
Will be interesting to see who leads the way.
Either way, this much is clear:
The US and EU are meddling with one of Russia's most strategically and economically important neighbours...The US funded the coup, and are competing with the EU in trying to force unpopular and unwanted alliances on people who would prefer to stay allied with Russia. As I mentioned earlier; this has been openly admitted.
Three regions have held referendums, ranging from 80% - 92% support for joining the Russian Federation. If I've got my facts straight, the only one Russia has entertained is the one in which it's Black Sea fleet sits in port (Crimea). Putin has done nothing to suggest that he is going to move into the Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk despite the referendums. Now the IMF is threatening to reneg on their deal to bail out the Ukraine if they lose these regions. in an effort to control the fallout. We can't talk about Russia trying to expand it's influence without looking to the West as well. The difference is, the Ukraine has traditionally been Russian allied, and the West is actively working to change that, often against the will of the people of Ukraine. That would make the West the aggressors, no?
This post was pretty prophetic tho - the massacre in Odessa last week was exactly this - supporters of the coup burning protestors and unionists alive, and shooting them as they tried to escape the fire. Yet Putin is still not allowing this to force his hand, as you suggested it would. So again...who is the agreessor?
http://21stcenturywire.com/2014/05/14/crony-collusion-vp-joe-bidens-son-joins-board-of-ukrainian-gas-company/
Fair point.
Their exiled president was taking away their freedom of press and speech and he went too far. If Russian snipers hadn't brazenly opened fire like Ben "The Butcher" Richards in The Maiden, the agreement that Klitschko and other opposition leaders signed for new elections in the fall would most likely have been accepted by the public.
Yanukovych got the hell out of Dodge cause he knew he went too far, under his orders or Putin's orders is unknown. He was Putin's puppet and Putin don't play that, so he told his guys to take the flag patch off their arm and go take the eastern Ukraine, including airports and military bases. It's a full scale invasion, except Putin sits there with his shit eating grin and says it's not his guys.
To deny the West's involvement from the beginning is true ignorance. Are you not aware of the leaked phone call between Victoria Nuland and the US ambassador to Ukraine? She stated that the US had 'invested' 5 billion in what has led to the coup, and they would continue to support it. In 2012, Klitschko was assigned the task of forming a permanent far-right, pro-EU party in Ukraine, by a German political party. So not CIA; still working for the EU to subvert Russian influence. But in that phone call, Nuland insisted he not be given a seat in the new interim puppet regime. And he didn't get one. 'fuck the EU'
Without going too far into Ukraine's recent history; the current protests went on for months before the government crackdown... The new legislation was aimed at quelling them, yes...but the Ukrainian govt stated that the protests involved armed raids to steal more weapons, aimed at govt overthrow, and made claims of foreign involvement...this is where I ask you where you think the 5 billion USD went? Who were the people conducting these acts of 'terrorism' (as defined by Ukraine)....? Where are you getting that the snipers were Russian? That is a claim that has been echoed thru Western media with zero investigation or evidence....in fact, there was a second leaked phone call, this time between the Estonian foreign minister, and Catherine Ashton (EU foreign affairs chief), in which the Estonian claimed he had evidence that after speaking to the doctors and witnesses that the snipers were positioned atop (and were seen leaving) a building controlled by Andrei Parubiy - who became the defense minister in the new government. The sniper shootings were used as the reason to topple Yanukovych. These people gained more than anyone from avoiding an election - they were handed power with full Western support.
Putin has been involved in two conflicts since he came to power in 2000, and it can be argued that he was provoked both times. Both conflicts (Chechnya and Georgia) can also somewhat be argued as internal conflicts. How many countries has NATO and the US 'intervened' in since 2000? Again, Putin's Black Sea fleet is in Crimea (btw - this fleet routinely supplies Syria).
The Western media have gone to extreme lengths to paint the neo-nazi members of the 'opposition coalition' as minor players....but they've been given a number of important cabinet positions - national security, agriculture, the judicial system, the police, and education. Read up on Svoboda, and UNA-UNSO. Nuland didn't want the leader of Svoboda, Oleh Tyahnybok to have a major position of power, so he didn't get one. But the co-founder is head of National Security.
Once again, Western powers are in bed with extremists. Even if some of the analysis I've been reading is hyperbole or flat out wrong - there is undeniable evidence that the West has backed these people. Knowing that, I don't know how you can't question the narrative you've been given, and are defending in your post. Putting these people in power in Russian borderland is beyond provocative.
8-}
oh no hes not laughing behind our backs.. i routinely see a smirk on his face... usually just before he kicks a puppy.
take a good look
this could be the day
hold my hand
lie beside me
i just need to say
Looks like toilet paper may become a valuable commodity once again in the USSR.